Title: State v. Martin

State: oregon

Issuer: Oregon Supreme Court

Document:

Filed:  April 9, 1998

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF OREGON

STATE OF OREGON,

	Petitioner on Review,

	v.

STEVEN LAMONT MARTIN,

	Respondent on Review.

(CC C95-03-31796; CA A88759; SC S44459)

	On review from the Court of Appeals.*

	Argued and submitted March 2, 1998.

	Douglas F. Zier, Assistant Attorney General, Salem, argued
the cause and filed the petition for petitioner on review.  With
him on the petition were Hardy Myers, Attorney General, and
Virginia L. Linder, Solicitor General.

	David C. Degner, Deputy Public Defender, Salem, argued the
cause and filed the brief for respondent on review.  With him on
the brief was Sally L. Avera, Public Defender.

	Before Carson, Chief Justice, and Gillette, Van Hoomissen,
Durham, and Leeson, Justices.**

	GILLETTE, J.

	The decision of the Court of Appeals and the order of the
circuit court are reversed.  The case is remanded to the circuit
court for further proceedings.

	*Appeal from Multnomah County Circuit Court,

	 Janice R. Wilson, Judge.

	 146 Or 459, 934 P2d 467 (1997).

    **Kulongoski, J., did not participate in the consideration or
decision of this case; Graber, J., resigned March 31, 1998, and
did not participate in this decision.

		GILLETTE, J.	

		This is a criminal case in which defendant was charged
with one count each of unlawful delivery and unlawful possession
of cocaine, a controlled substance.  ORS 475.992.  Defendant
filed a motion to suppress evidence, claiming that the charges
against him were based on evidence seized in a warrantless search
of his person and that the warrantless search was without
probable cause.  The trial court agreed and suppressed the
evidence.  The state appealed that pretrial order to the Court of
Appeals.  ORS 138.060(3).  A divided panel of the Court of
Appeals affirmed.  State v. Martin, 146 Or 459, 934 P2d 467
(1997).  We allowed the state's petition for review and now
reverse the decision of the Court of Appeals and the order of the
trial court.

		We take the facts from the majority opinion of the
Court of Appeals, as supplemented by the dissent and the
testimony of the arresting officer.(1)

		"Around 11:20 p.m., Portland Police Officer Mahuna
was driving to work in his personal car when he stopped
at a red light at the intersection of Northeast
Killingsworth and Albina Streets [in the City of
Portland].  Immediately in front of his car was a van
that also had stopped for the light.  Mahuna could see
both the driver and a passenger through a window in the
back of the van.  He also could see defendant standing
near a bus shelter on the adjacent sidewalk, about ten
feet away.  The officer saw the passenger in the van
gesture to defendant and say something to defendant,
although he could not hear what the passenger said. 
Defendant looked to the left and to the right, stepped
into the street and approached the van.  Defendant put
his head and one hand into the open passenger window
for about three seconds.  He then turned and walked
away.  Mahuna saw no money or any other objects
exchanged.  As defendant walked back toward the
sidewalk, he put his right hand into his right rear
pants pocket.  Mahuna did not, however, see whether
defendant put any object into his pocket.  The light
then turned green, and both the van and Mahuna drove
away.  At that point, Mahuna believed that he had just
witnessed a hand-to-hand drug transaction.  In his
experience, the area is a known location for such
transactions; he had made numerous arrests for
possession and delivery of a controlled substance at
that very corner.  Mahuna refrained from arresting
defendant because he was not yet on duty.

		"Two hours later, while on duty, Mahuna returned
to the intersection of Northeast Killingsworth and
Albina Streets.  He saw defendant standing on the same
corner.  Mahuna stopped, got out of his car, approached
defendant and told defendant to put his hands on his
head.  Defendant did so, while Mahuna patted down his
right rear pocket.  Mahuna felt an object in the pocket
that he suspected was rock cocaine.  He reached into
the pocket and removed a plastic bag containing what
appeared to be cocaine.  Mahuna then arrested defendant
* * *."

146 Or App at 461-62.

		In addition, the following facts are important:  The
bus stop was a place at which, according to Mahuna, drug dealing
was going on "twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week."  Such
intense commercial activity was made possible by the fact that
the bus stop was only one half-block from an apartment complex
that served, again according to Mahuna, as a kind of "safe haven"
for drug dealers, who either live in or have keys to the complex. 
Mahuna explained that a dealer typically would keep a significant
store of drugs in the complex, but would venture onto the street
with only a small amount, because in an emergency it would be
easier to quickly dispose of such an amount.  Once they made a
sale, Mahuna testified, dealers would return to the complex to
obtain more drugs and go through the same process again.

		Mahuna also testified that many "hand-to-hand" drug
sales occurred at the location of the bus stop.  The
transactions, which took only a few seconds, would occur either
at the corner or around the corner and part way down a side
street.  Mahuna explained that "a lot" of people did not like to
conduct their drug transactions on Killingsworth, which is a
major arterial street in the area.

		Finally, Mahuna testified that, although he did not
actually see anything pass to or from defendant's hand when
defendant reached inside the van, what he saw was consistent with
other "hand-to-hand" drug transactions that he had observed at
that very corner.

		As noted, defendant moved to suppress the evidence
seized from him.  The trial court granted the motion, ruling
that, although Mahuna believed that he earlier had observed a
drug transaction, that belief was not objectively reasonable,
without some observation that defendant actually had exchanged
something tangible with someone in the van.

		On the state's appeal, the Court of Appeals
characterized Mahuna's actions in his encounter with defendant as
an arrest.  146 Or App at 462-63.  We agree.  The Court of
Appeals then concluded, however, that Mahuna did not have
probable cause to arrest defendant.  Id. at 463.  For the reasons
that follow, we disagree with that conclusion.

		Under ORS 133.310(1)(a), an officer may arrest a person
without a warrant "if the officer has probable cause to believe
that the person has committed * * * [a] felony."  The amount of
objective knowledge required to provide "probable cause" to make
such an arrest is defined in ORS 131.005(11):  An arresting
officer has probable cause to arrest if "there is a substantial
objective basis for believing that more likely than not an
offense has been committed and a person to be arrested has
committed it."  Those statutory standards are met in this case.

		Relying on his previous experience, Mahuna testified
that:  (1) due to the availability of a "safe haven" for dealers
in a nearby apartment complex, drug transactions were occurring
at the location of the bus stop on a more-or-less continuous
basis; (2) defendant was at that location late at night, with no
other apparent purpose for being there; (3) when hailed by the
occupant of the van, defendant looked both up and down the street
before going to the van, as if to assure that he would not be
observed closely when he reached it; (4) defendant's interaction
with the occupants of the van was consistent with a "hand-to-hand" 
drug transaction, considering its duration, intensity,
furtiveness, and defendant's apparent pocketing of something
immediately afterward; (5) defendant was back at his post later
that same evening, reinforcing the belief that he was dealing
drugs on the corner.

		From Mahuna's testimony, we have no difficulty
concluding that he subjectively believed that defendant had
committed a crime.  Under the totality of the circumstances, we
further conclude that Mahuna's belief was objectively reasonable. 
Especially significant, in our view, is the fact that defendant
was back at the corner two hours after his encounter with the
van.  Given all that Mahuna already had witnessed and the
specific nature of that location as a drive-up drug dispensing
location near "crack central," it was more likely than not that
defendant was dealing drugs at that corner and was, when Mahuna
saw him the second time, actually in possession of drugs.  It
follows that Mahuna had probable cause to arrest defendant and
that the ensuing seizure of drugs from defendant was lawful as a
seizure incident to the arrest.

		The Court of Appeals' contrary conclusion in this case
appears to have turned, at least in part, on the failure of
Mahuna actually to see anything in defendant's hand during the
encounter with the van.  146 Or App at 465.  But seeing something
in a suspected dealer's hand cannot be the sine qua non of
probable cause, any more than any other single fact.  The fact
that a drug transaction was occurring could be inferred from the
totality of the circumstances surrounding the event.  Ultimately,
the question in every case is whether the totality of the
circumstances, i.e., the direct evidence and the inferences that
fairly may be drawn from that evidence, establish probable cause. 
As we have explained, the evidence and inferences in this case
readily fulfill that role.

		The Court of Appeals' majority relied on this court's
opinion in State v. Bates, 304 Or 519, 747 P2d 991 (1987), as
supporting the opposite conclusion.  In Bates, the defendant was
stopped for a traffic infraction late at night in an area
characterized (without elaboration) by one of the arresting
officers as a "high crime residential" area.  A television and a
videocassette recorder were in plain view in the defendant's car. 
Although the defendant produced a valid Washington driver's
license, the officers were suspicious.  Seeing the end of "some
kind of a bag" on the floor beneath the defendant's feet, the
officers asked the defendant to pull the bag from between his
feet so that the officers could see what it was.  When the
defendant did not comply, one of the officers drew his service
revolver, ordered the defendant to get out of his car, and seized
the bag.  The bag contained drugs and ammunition; a further
search of the car disclosed a loaded handgun.  The defendant was
convicted of possessing the drugs and the gun.  The Court of
Appeals affirmed without opinion.  State v. Bates, 85 Or App 428,
736 P2d 629 (1987).  

		On review, this court reversed.  The Bates court
addressed each of the objective facts that was relied on by the
arresting officers but concluded that, whether considered alone
or together, those facts did not justify the officer's search of
the defendant's car.  As most pertinent here, the Court of
Appeals' majority relied on the following passage from Bates:

	"'[The officer's] suspicions in this regard may have
been an excellent guess -- the kind resulting from a
sixth sense that many officers develop over the years. 
But, again, there is no objective quality to them that
entitles them to any weight, either individually or
collectively, in the constitutional calculus.  Neither
the hour nor the "high crime" nature of the area tells
us whether this defendant is likely to be a criminal,
unless there is some reason to think that everyone
driving in that particular area at that time of night
is up to no good * * *.'"

Martin, 146 Or App at 463 (citing Bates, 304 Or at 526) (emphasis
in original).

		This court continues to adhere to the analysis and
principles set forth in Bates.  This case, however, is different. 
The key contrast between the facts in Bates and the facts in this
case is that, as we have explained, there is abundant evidence,
all of which we have summarized, that creates probable cause to
believe that "this" defendant was engaged in criminal activity. 
The arresting officer in Bates acted -- so far as that record
disclosed -- on the basis of a suspicion, i.e., a hunch.  Here,
both Mahuna's observations and his conclusions, filtered through
the lens of his experience, are shown in his testimony to be
objectively reasonable.  That difference dictates the difference
in outcome between the two cases.

		The decision of the Court of Appeals and the order of
the circuit court are reversed.  The case is remanded to the
circuit court for further proceedings.

1. 	Although it ruled against the state on legal grounds,
the trial court stated on the record that, factually, it fully
accepted the testimony of the state's police officer witness,
Mahuna.  We therefore examine the facts as testified to by
Mahuna, including the inferences that reasonably may be drawn
from those facts.