Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca7-14-03209/USCOURTS-ca7-14-03209-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Hector Roman
Appellant
United States of America
Appellee

Document Text:

United States Court of Appeals

For the Seventh Circuit

Chicago, Illinois 60604

Argued October 7, 2015

Decided October 15, 2015

Before

WILLIAM J. BAUER, Circuit Judge

MICHAEL S. KANNE, Circuit Judge

DIANE S. SYKES, Circuit Judge

No. 14-3209

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

Plaintiff-Appellee,

v.

HECTOR ROMAN,

Defendant-Appellant.

Appeal from the United States District 

Court for the Northern District of 

Illinois, Eastern Division.

No. 12 CR 828

Robert W. Gettleman,

Judge.

O R D E R

Hector Roman challenges the denial of a motion to suppress heroin seized from 

his car after police pulled him over during a narcotics-trafficking investigation. Roman 

contends that the police did not reasonably suspect that he had committed a crime when 

they stopped his car and that he did not voluntarily consent to its search; therefore, he 

argues, the search violated the Fourth Amendment. Because the district court 

permissibly concluded that the police had valid reasons to stop Roman and that Roman 

voluntarily consented to the search, we affirm the judgment. 

NONPRECEDENTIAL DISPOSITION

To be cited only in accordance with Fed. R. App. P. 32.1

Case: 14-3209 Document: 46 Filed: 10/15/2015 Pages: 5
No. 14-3209 Page 2

During a traffic stop, police found a kilogram of heroin in Roman’s car. The 

government charged Roman with possessing the heroin, see 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1), and 

Roman moved to suppress the drugs as unlawfully seized. A suppression hearing 

revealed the following.

The Drug Enforcement Administration was investigating a heroin-distribution 

ring in Chicago. A confidential informant told the DEA that Miguel Lara, an eventual 

co-defendant of Roman’s, supplied large quantities of heroin for distribution. The 

informant also said that another, unknown person supplied Lara with heroin.

The DEA devised a plan to catch Lara and his supplier. Monitoring the 

informant’s phone calls, they had him call Lara to order a kilogram of heroin. When the 

informant called Lara for the heroin, Lara replied that he would meet his supplier at his 

sister’s house. Agents then surveilled that house and saw when Lara entered it. About 15 

minutes later, a gray Honda Pilot parked behind Lara’s car. Two people carrying a large 

purse left the car, entered the house, and after another 15 minutes, returned to the Pilot 

and drove away.

Efforts to track Lara’s supplier continued. Two hours after the meeting at the 

sister’s house, Lara called the informant. Lara confirmed that he had just met with his 

supplier and told the informant to meet him at Lara’s home because he noticed police 

around his sister’s house. He added that the heroin was now near his home. The DEA 

then began surveilling Lara’s house. Detective Christine Maguire—a police officer 

working on the DEA task force—soon saw the same gray Honda Pilot drive through the 

alley behind Lara’s house, along with a black Durango. Another agent also observed the 

two cars park near the house. Then, presumably to abort the drug deal, a DEA agent 

used the informant’s cell phone to call Lara and tell him that the informant had been 

arrested and needed to be bailed out. About ten minutes later, the Pilot and Durango 

and drove away. 

The DEA had both cars followed and stopped. It directed two Chicago police 

officers who were assisting with the investigation, Eliz Perez and Robert Ramirez, to 

stop the Pilot. (Officers also pursued the Durango, but found no heroin in it.) 

The parties dispute what happened at the stop. According to Officer Perez, he 

pointed his unholstered gun at the ground as he approached Roman’s car. Officer 

Ramirez thought that neither officer had unholstered his gun. Both officers testified that, 

after posing a few questions to Roman, they asked him if they could search the car and 

Case: 14-3209 Document: 46 Filed: 10/15/2015 Pages: 5
No. 14-3209 Page 3

he said yes. Agent Maguire testified that, as she arrived at the car, she heard Roman give 

the officers permission to search his car. According to Officers Perez and Ramirez, they 

then walked Roman out of his car where he stood unrestrained. Agent Maguire searched 

the car, found the heroin, and then Officer Perez arrested Roman. 

Roman disputed the officers’ description of the stop. Roman said that he did not 

consent to the search. He testified that once he stopped the car both officers pointed their 

guns at him, yanked him out of his car, and cuffed him. Neither of the officers, Roman 

continued, asked for his consent to search the car, though he conceded that he knew he 

could refuse consent. 

In opposing the suppression motion, the government argued that the stop and 

search were lawful. To justify the stop, the government argued that under the 

collective-knowledge doctrine Perez and Ramirez had at minimum reasonable suspicion

to believe that Roman was committing a crime. The collective-knowledge doctrine 

allows one officer, when directed by other officers to stop a suspect, to rely on the 

aggregate knowledge of directing officers. But the directing officers must themselves 

have reasonable suspicion or probable cause and the stop must be no more intrusive 

than would have been permissible for the directing officers. United States v. Williams, 627 

F.3d 247, 252–53 (7th Cir. 2010). Reasonable suspicion that Roman was committing a 

crime would allow a brief investigatory stop. See Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 30 (1968). In 

defending the search, the government argued that Roman consented to it.

The district judge denied the motion to suppress. He ruled that under the 

collective-knowledge doctrine the officers had reason to suspect Roman of a drug crime 

and perform a Terry stop of the car. He also believed Detective Maguire, finding that 

Roman consented to the search.

Roman pleaded guilty to possession with intent to distribute 100 grams or more 

of heroin, 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1), on the condition that he could appeal the denial of his 

motion to suppress. The district court imposed a below-guidelines sentence of 36 

months’ imprisonment. 

On appeal, Roman challenges the district judge’s denial of his suppression 

motion. He first contends that the judge misapplied the collective-knowledge doctrine 

because, he says, the aggregate knowledge of the law enforcement agents was 

insufficient to establish reasonable suspicion to stop Roman’s car. He relies on this 

court’s decision in United States v. Williams, 627 F.3d 247 (7th Cir. 2010), to contend that 

Case: 14-3209 Document: 46 Filed: 10/15/2015 Pages: 5
No. 14-3209 Page 4

reasonable suspicion was lacking because—unlike the defendant in Williams—Roman 

was not a named target of the drug investigation and no evidence implicated him in a 

crime. 

The district court correctly applied the collective-knowledge doctrine to validate 

the stop. Having listened to the monitored phone calls of the pre-arranged heroin deal 

and surveilled the deal’s locations, the DEA investigators had reason to believe that 

Roman’s car contained heroin. Specifically, they knew that Lara’s heroin supplier drove 

to Lara’s sister’s house and Lara’s house to sell the heroin; that the driver of a Honda 

Pilot drove to both houses at the pre-arranged times; and that when the driver of that 

Pilot—later determined to be Roman—left Lara’s home after the drug deal was called 

off, the Pilot might be carrying the unsold heroin. This gave the DEA at least reasonable 

suspicion to stop the Pilot, even though Roman was not a named target. See United States 

v. Schaafsma, 318 F.3d 718, 722 (7th Cir. 2003) (probable cause established when 

informant told police that his unnamed supplier had drugs in his car and, as deal was 

interrupted, supplier’s car sped away); see also United States v. Baskin, 401 F.3d 788, 793 

(7th Cir. 2005) (police had reasonable suspicion to stop unidentified driver who sped 

away from a known, isolated drug site). And by acting at the DEA’s direction, the 

officers who were following Roman’s car could rely on the DEA’s knowledge and stop it. 

See Williams, 627 F.3d at 253; United States v. Rodriguez, 831 F.2d 162, 166 (7th Cir. 1987); 

see also United States v. Lyons, 733 F.3d 777, 782 n.1 (7th Cir. 2013) (“When law 

enforcement officers are in communication regarding a suspect, ... the knowledge of one 

officer can be imputed to the other officers under the collective knowledge doctrine.” 

(internal quotation marks omitted)). 

Roman responds that even if the stop was lawful, the search was not because the 

police coerced his consent to it. He cites to his testimony that the officers who stopped 

his car pointed their guns at him, pulled him from the car, and immediately cuffed him 

without asking for consent to a search, thereby intimidating him into allowing the search 

of his car. 

But the district court permissibly ruled that consent to the search was not coerced. 

It credited the testimony of the three law enforcement officers at the stop who said that 

Roman freely agreed to their request to search the car just a few minutes after the stop. 

Roman identifies no clear error in the district judge’s decision to reject Roman’s contrary 

story. See United States v. Bullock, 632 F.3d 1004, 1010–11 (7th. Cir. 2011) (“On a motion to 

suppress, we review ... questions of fact for clear error.”). Moreover, in view of all the 

circumstances of the search, see United States v. Alexander, 573 F.3d 465, 477 (7th Cir. 

Case: 14-3209 Document: 46 Filed: 10/15/2015 Pages: 5
No. 14-3209 Page 5

2009), consent was not coerced: Roman was not in custody, threatened, or targeted with 

a gun (at most, one gun was pointed to the ground) when asked for consent; nothing in 

the record suggests that he, an adult, had below-average intelligence or education; and 

although the police did not advise him of any rights before they asked for consent, he 

knew he could refuse consent. In similar circumstances, we have upheld consent as 

voluntary. United States v. Ruiz, 785 F.3d 1134, 1146 (7th Cir. 2015) (consent was valid, 

despite police failure to inform defendant of right to refuse search, when defendant was 

adult, consented immediately when asked, and officers used no physical coercion, 

displayed no weapons, and spoke calmly); United States v. Bernitt, 392 F.3d 873, 877 (7th 

Cir. 2004) (consent was voluntary, even though defendant was in custody and not 

advised of his right to refuse, because he had been in custody for only a few minutes, 

was an intelligent adult, and police did not pressure or abuse him); United States v. 

Quinones-Sandoval, 943 F.2d 771, 774–75 (7th Cir. 1991) (consent was voluntary despite 

police failure to advise him of right to refuse when police never brandished a weapon, 

physically restrained defendant, or threatened him with arrest). 

Accordingly, we AFFIRM the judgment.

Case: 14-3209 Document: 46 Filed: 10/15/2015 Pages: 5