Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caDC-05-03132/USCOURTS-caDC-05-03132-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Douglas Myron Proctor
Appellant
United States of America
Appellee

Document Text:

United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued March 27, 2007 Decided June 19, 2007

No. 05-3132

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

APPELLEE

v.

DOUGLAS MYRON PROCTOR,

APPELLANT

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the District of Columbia

(No. 04cr00427-01)

Neil H. Jaffee, Assistant Federal Public Defender, argued the

cause for the appellant. A. J. Kramer, Federal Public Defender,

was on brief.

Ryan W. Scott, Attorney, United States Department of

Justice, argued the cause for the appellee. Jeffrey A. Taylor,

United States Attorney, and Roy W. McLeese III, Assistant

United States Attorney, were on brief.

Before: SENTELLE, HENDERSON and TATEL, Circuit Judges.

Opinion for the court filed by Circuit Judge HENDERSON.

KAREN LECRAFT HENDERSON, Circuit Judge: A jury found

appellant Douglas Myron Proctor guilty of unlawful possession

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of a firearm and ammunition by a felon in violation of 18 U.S.C.

§ 922(g)(1). He was sentenced to 120 months’ imprisonment

and five years’ supervised release. Proctor now appeals the

district court’s denial of his motion to suppress evidence

obtained during an inventory search of his vehicle following his

arrest for moving violations on the ground that the arresting

officers failed to follow standard police procedures when they

impounded his car and subsequently retrieved a weapon from a

trash bag found in the trunk. For the reasons set forth below, we

conclude that the district court erred in denying the motion to

suppress and reverse the district court’s judgment.

I.

At approximately 1:35 a.m. on September 8, 2004,

Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) Officer Jody Shegan,

and his partner, Officer Martin Nassar, while parked near

Spingarn High School at the corner of 26th Street and Benning

Road, Northeast, in Washington, D.C., received a radio call

informing them that a maroon 1989 Mercury Grand Marquis

traveling westbound on Benning Road had failed to stop at a red

light. After the vehicle turned onto 26th Street and passed by

Officers Shegan and Nassar, they followed it for a short distance

before noticing that it had tinted windows. The officers initiated

a traffic stop “[a]lmost immediately.” Tr. 11/23/04 at 7-8.

Proctor, the driver and sole occupant, produced his license

and registration to Officer Nassar. At that time, Nassar noticed

the odor of alcohol on Proctor’s breath. As he returned to the

squad car to check the license and registration information,

Nassar signaled to Shegan that Proctor had been drinking.

Shegan then approached Proctor and initiated a conversation

with him, during which Shegan too smelled alcohol and noticed

that Proctor’s speech was slurred. When Shegan directed

Proctor to step out of the vehicle, Proctor “swayed back and

forth and used his vehicle as a leaning post so . . . he wouldn’t

fall down.” Id. at 9. Because Proctor exhibited signs of

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Proctor ultimately received traffic citations for running a red light

and having tinted windows in addition to the OWI and DUI charges.

Tr. 11/23/04 at 27.

intoxication, Shegan placed him under arrest for operating a

vehicle while intoxicated (OWI) and driving under the influence

(DUI).1

After Proctor’s arrest and while he remained at the scene, the

officers conducted an inventory search of the vehicle. In the

trunk, the officers recovered a .380 semi-automatic pistol from

a “white trash bag,” Tr. 4/18/05 at 56, that also contained clothes

and Proctor’s cell phone bill. From the front passenger seat, the

officers recovered another plastic bag containing personal

documents with Proctor’s name. After waiving his Miranda

rights, Proctor informed the police that the bag belonged to him

but the gun did not. In an indictment filed September 23, 2004,

Proctor was charged with unlawful possession of a firearm and

ammunition by a felon. On October 20, 2004, he filed a motion

to suppress, challenging, inter alia, the physical evidence

recovered during the inventory search.

At the November 23, 2004 suppression hearing, Officer

Shegan, the hearing’s only witness, testified that the MPD

standard procedure required the officers to impound Proctor’s

vehicle after his arrest. Shegan, who had been a police officer

for twenty years and a member of the MPD for three years,

declared that he did not “believe [he] had a choice” in

impounding the vehicle, Tr. 11/23/04 at 38, because Proctor was

not the owner and no one else was present to take custody of it,

id. at 38, 24. Shegan further explained that the officers did not

attempt to contact the owner to retrieve the vehicle because they

“weren’t going to wait that long” and that they did not consider

parking the car nearby because the police were “still responsible

for the vehicle if it [was] parked.” Id. at 38. Pursuant to the

MPD’s “new procedure” (Shegan’s term) for any vehicle not

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Shegan testified that the “new procedure” was developed in

response to the lack of MPD impoundment space. Tr. 11/23/04 at 25.

held as evidence or for civil forfeiture, id. at 25, Shegan testified

that he requested the dispatch of a “ROC crane”—a crane

operated by a private towing company which, by contract with

the MPD, conducts towing operations for each Regional

Operations Command—to remove the vehicle to a private

impoundment lot instead of to the regional MPD station or the

MPD impoundment lot, id. at 24-25.2

Shegan also testified that the MPD procedure required the

officers to search “[t]he entire vehicle,” id. at 26, before removal

“[t]o reduce liability on the police department and to preserve

any property that the owner of the vehicle or the occupants of

the vehicle may have,” id. at 25. He explained that

[t]he old policy was if a vehicle is taken to Metropolitan

Police Department under the[] same circumstances [as

here], the passenger compartment of the vehicle would

be inventoried on the scene; and then within a certain

amount of time after that, 24, 48 hours after that, then

the entire vehicle, if the owner didn’t come and pick it

up, the entire vehicle would be inventoried. . . . That

policy is no longer in existence.

 Id. at 26-27. According to Shegan, the current search policy

went into effect when “Metropolitan Police Department didn’t

have the room to store these vehicles.” Id. at 27.

In response to Shegan’s testimony, Proctor introduced into

evidence a copy of MPD General Order 602.1 which sets forth

MPD impoundment and inventory search procedure. General

Order 602.1, Automobile Searches and Inventories (May 26,

1972) (GO 602.1), reprinted in Appendix for Appellant (AA) at

32. Part I.B.3, entitled “Prisoner’s Property,” provides, “When

a person is arrested in an automobile which he owns or has been

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authorized to use and the vehicle cannot be classified [as

evidence or for civil forfeiture], that vehicle shall be classified

as prisoner’s property.” Id. at 42. Subpart (a) of Part I.B.3

provides that a vehicle “classified as prisoner’s property shall be

disposed of in any lawful manner in which the person arrested

directs. In any case where a prisoner requests that his vehicle be

lawfully parked on a public street, he shall be required to

indicate his request in writing.” Id. Subpart (b) provides:

If a vehicle classified as prisoner’s property is disposed

of so that it is not taken to a police facility, it shall not be

inventoried in any way. If it is necessary to take such a

vehicle into police custody, the vehicle shall be taken to

a police facility or to a location in front of or near a

police facility. Immediately upon arrival at the police

facility the arresting officer shall remove from the

passenger compartment of the vehicle any personal

property which can easily be seen from outside the

vehicle and which reasonably has a value in excess of

$25. . . . No other inventory or search of the vehicle

shall be made at this time.

Id. at 43 (emphases added). And subpart (c) states:

If a person authorized by the prisoner or the prisoner

himself, upon his release, does not claim the vehicle

within 24 hours of the time that the prisoner was

arrested, a complete inventory of the contents of the

automobile shall be made by the arresting officer or an

officer designated by an official.

Id. Finally, Part I.B.6, entitled “Scope of Inventory,” provides:

Whenever an officer has a right to inventory a vehicle

pursuant to this order, the officer shall examine the

passenger compartment, the glove compartment,

whether or not locked, and the trunk, whether or not

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locked. . . . Any container such as boxes or suitcases

found within the vehicle shall be opened . . . .

Id. at 46-47.

While noting “a conflict or something of a disparity”

between Shegan’s testimony and GO 602.1 regarding the MPD’s

impoundment and inventory search procedure, Tr. 11/23/04 at

62, the district court denied Proctor’s suppression motion. The

court explained that “it is clear . . . through the testimony of

[Officer Shegan] that th[e written] procedures have been

changed and perhaps because of financial realities or whatever

it appears that the city in the last several years has adopted

different procedures.” Id. at 63. The court found the “new

procedure”—that is, an inventory search of a vehicle classified

as “prisoner’s property” whether or not the vehicle is removed

to a police facility—“reasonable” and concluded, 

I have listened to the testimony of the particular officer

and decided, based on the way he has testified and to the

content, he seems to be knowledgeable and he strikes me

as being an honest police officer with no agenda with

respect to this particular vehicle during the time span of

the events, that I find nothing that would even remotely

suggest a pretextual search in this case as a way of

getting inside the trunk of that car.

Id. at 64.

A three-day jury trial was held in April 2005. On April 20,

2005, the jury found Proctor guilty and he was sentenced on

August 8, 2005 to 120 months’ imprisonment and five years’

supervised release. This appeal followed.

II.

The Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution

protects “[t]he right of the people to be secure in their persons,

houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and

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seizures.” U.S. Const. amend. IV. “The touchstone of the

Amendment is reasonableness.” United States v. Askew, 482

F.3d 532, 538 (D.C. Cir. 2007); see also Cady v. Dombrowski,

413 U.S. 433, 439 (1973). “‘[W]hether a search and seizure is

unreasonable within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment

depends upon the facts and circumstances of each case . . . .’”

South Dakota v. Opperman, 428 U.S. 364, 375 (1976) (quoting

Cooper v. California, 386 U.S. 58, 59 (1967)) (alterations in

original). Automobiles “are ‘effects’ and thus within the reach

of the Fourth Amendment.” Opperman, 428 U.S. at 367. “Both

the decision to take [a] car into custody and [a] concomitant

inventory search must meet the [Amendment’s] strictures.”

United States v. Duguay, 93 F.3d 346, 351 (7th Cir. 1996); see

also Colorado v. Bertine, 479 U.S. 367, 374-76 (1987);

Opperman, 428 U.S. at 368-70. Thus, “the decision to impound

(the ‘seizure’) is properly analyzed as distinct from the decision

to inventory (the ‘search’).” Duguay, 93 F.3d at 351. 

Proctor argues that both the impoundment and subsequent

search of his vehicle violated the Fourth Amendment because

the officers failed to follow the MPD’s standard impoundment

and inventory search procedure detailed in GO 602.1. Although

he does not dispute that adherence to unwritten standard police

procedure can satisfy the Fourth Amendment, he contends that

Shegan’s testimony failed to establish that the “new”—and

unwritten—MPD procedure had in fact modified GO 602.1. In

analyzing Proctor’s Fourth Amendment challenge, we review

the district court’s factual findings for clear error, giving “‘due

weight to inferences drawn from those facts,’” United States v.

Goree, 365 F.3d 1086, 1090 (D.C. Cir. 2004) (quoting Ornelas

v. United States, 517 U.S. 690, 699 (1996)), and we review de

novo whether the officers’ actions were reasonable, cf. United

States v. Brown, 334 F.3d 1161, 1164 (D.C. Cir. 2003) (“We

decide de novo whether the police had reasonable suspicion,

reasonable fear, and probable cause.”). 

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A seizure—including by impoundment—conducted without

a search warrant is “per se unreasonable under the Fourth

Amendment—subject only to a few specifically established and

well delineated exceptions.” Minnesota v. Dickerson, 508 U.S.

366, 372 (1993). One exception is the “community caretaking”

exception. See United States v. Coccia, 446 F.3d 233, 238 (1st

Cir. 2006); Miranda v. City of Cornelius, 429 F.3d 858, 862 (9th

Cir. 2005). As the Supreme Court observed in Opperman, “In

the interests of public safety and as part of what the Court has

called ‘community caretaking functions,’ automobiles are

frequently taken into police custody.” 428 U.S. at 368 (citing

Cady, 413 U.S. at 441). Indeed, “[t]he authority of police to

seize and remove from the streets vehicles impeding traffic or

threatening public safety and convenience is beyond challenge.”

Id. at 369. The Supreme Court has suggested that a reasonable,

standard police procedure must govern the decision to impound.

Bertine, 479 U.S. at 375-76. In Bertine, the defendant

challenged the inventory search of his vehicle because the police

officers had discretion to choose between impounding the

vehicle or parking it in a public place. The Court declared,

“Nothing in Opperman or [Illinois v. Lafayette, 462 U.S. 640

(1983)] prohibits the exercise of police discretion so long as that

discretion is exercised according to standard criteria and on the

basis of something other than suspicion of evidence of criminal

activity.” Id. at 375 (emphasis added). 

At least two of our sister circuits have held that the decision

to impound must be made pursuant to a standard procedure. See

United States v. Petty, 367 F.3d 1009, 1012 (8th Cir. 2004)

(“Some degree of ‘standardized criteria’ or ‘established routine’

must regulate [impoundments]” but “an impoundment policy

may allow some ‘latitude’ and ‘exercise of judgment’ by a

police officer when those decisions are based on concerns

related to the purposes of an impoundment.”); Duguay, 93 F.3d

at 351 (“‘[S]tandardized criteria or established routine must

regulate’ inventory searches. Among those criteria which must

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be standardized are the circumstances in which a car may be

impounded.” (internal citation omitted) (alteration in original)).

On the other hand, the First Circuit has concluded that the

Supreme Court’s Bertine holding does not require that an

impoundment be governed by standard police procedure. See,

e.g., Coccia, 446 F.3d at 238 (“[W]e do not understand Bertine

to mean that an impoundment decision made without the

existence of standard procedures is per se unconstitutional.

Rather, we read Bertine to indicate that an impoundment

decision made pursuant to standardized procedures will most

likely, although not necessarily always, satisfy the Fourth

Amendment.”). The Coccia court explained:

“Virtually by definition, the need for police to function

as community caretakers arises fortuitously, when

unexpected circumstances present some transient hazard

which must be dealt with on the spot. The police cannot

sensibly be expected to have developed, in advance,

standard protocols running the entire gamut of possible

eventualities. Rather, they must be free to follow ‘sound

police procedure,’ that is to choose freely among the

available options, so long as the option chosen is within

the universe of reasonable choices.”

Coccia, 446 F.3d at 239 (quoting United States v. RodriguezMorales, 929 F.2d 780, 787 (1st Cir. 1991)). The Government

invites us to adopt the First Circuit’s conclusion that an

impoundment is reasonable so long as it “serves the

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In United States v. Reese, 561 F.2d 894 (D.C. Cir. 1977), we

suggested—prior to Bertine—that the decision to impound be

reasonable. Id. at 903 n.17 (“The officers acted in a completely

reasonable manner in moving the car to the police station, impounding

it and conducting an inventory search.”). It appears that we have not

addressed the issue again until now. 

4

Because Proctor was charged with OWI and DUI, we believe the

officers were also required to follow the impoundment procedures set

forth in the Comprehensive Anti-Drunk Driving Amendments Act of

1991, D.C. Code § 50-2201.05(c-1) (Anti-Drunk Driving Act or Act).

Indeed, both parties agreed that the Act rendered GO 602.1’s

impoundment procedures obsolete as applied to DUI and OWI arrests.

See Appellee’s Br. at 39 (“The Act rendered Part I.B.3(a) of General

Order 602.1 obsolete as applied to DUI and OWI arrests.”); Reply Br.

at 9 (“To the extent the Act is more restrictive than the General Order

in limiting the options to impoundment of vehicles relating to DUI or

OWI arrests, the statute trumps the General Order.”). The Act requires

that, before impounding the vehicle, the officer allow the OWI or DUI

arrestee to authorize the officer to release the vehicle to a

licensed—and capable—driver who can take possession of it within

a reasonable amount of time. See D.C. Code § 50-2201.05(c-1)(2)(C)

(“The officer shall not cause the vehicle to be impounded if . . . (C)

[t]he arrested person authorizes the officer to release the vehicle” to

government’s ‘community caretaking’ interests.’”3 Appellee’s

Br. at 48. We decline the invitation. 

We believe that if a standard impoundment procedure exists,

a police officer’s failure to adhere thereto is unreasonable and

violates the Fourth Amendment. Cf. United States v. Maple, 348

F.3d 260, 263-64 (D.C. Cir. 2003) (search of vehicle relocated

by police after traffic arrest unreasonable because contrary to

GO 602.1). GO 602.1 provides that a vehicle “classified as

prisoner’s property shall be disposed of in any lawful manner in

which the person arrested directs.” GO 602.1, AA at 42

(emphasis added).4 Thus, before impounding the vehicle, an

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a licensed individual not at the scene of the arrest who is physically

capable of removing the vehicle in “a reasonable period of time.”)

(emphasis added). At oral argument, the Government maintained that

the burden is on the arrestee in the first instance to request that the

vehicle be released to another. But to require an allegedly intoxicated

driver to understand that he can avoid impoundment by authorizing

the officer to allow another driver to remove the vehicle—without

being so advised by the officer—is unrealistic if not unreasonable. If

no licensed—and capable—driver can take possession of the vehicle

within a reasonable amount of time, or if the arrestee is incapable of

making the request, the Anti-Drunk Driving Act requires the officer

to impound the vehicle. Id.

officer should provide the arrestee with the opportunity to

arrange for its removal. See Hill v. United States, 512 A.2d 269,

274 n.10 (D.C. 1986) (“As ‘prisoner’s property’ [under GO

602.1] . . . a vehicle cannot be impounded without first giving

the prisoner an opportunity to make other lawful arrangements

for its disposition.”); Arrington v. United States, 382 A.2d 14,

18 (D.C. 1978) (“[P]olice are authorized to impound a motor

vehicle as prisoner property [under GO 602.1] only where the

prisoner consents thereto or is incapable of making other

arrangements for its disposition.”). Proctor, however, was

afforded no such opportunity. On the contrary, Shegan testified

that the officers were required to impound Proctor’s vehicle

because no one was present to remove it, see Tr. 11/23/04 at 24,

Proctor was not the owner and they “weren’t going to wait” for

the owner to remove it, id. at 38; see also id. (“I don’t believe I

had a choice.”). Accordingly, the officers’ impoundment

(seizure) decision violated GO 602.1.

The officers’ impoundment decision led to an inventory

search that also violated GO 602.1. As noted earlier, Shegan

testified that due to a lack of impoundment space at MPD

facilities, MPD’s “new procedure” necessitated that a ROC

crane tow Proctor’s vehicle to a private impoundment lot rather

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Had the vehicle been towed to an MPD facility, the arresting

officer would have been required “[i]mmediately upon arrival” to

remove from the passenger compartment of the vehicle any personal

property “easily . . . seen from outside the vehicle” and “reasonably

ha[ving] a value in excess of $25.” GO 602.1, AA at 43. No further

search of the vehicle is permitted unless “a person authorized by the

prisoner or the prisoner himself . . . [fails to] claim the vehicle within

24 hours of the time that the prisoner was arrested.” Id. In that case,

an officer is required to make “a complete inventory of the contents of

the automobile.” Id.

than to an MPD facility. Id. at 24-25, 52-53. According to

Shegan, the officers were thus required to search “[t]he entire

vehicle” before it was towed, id. at 26, “[t]o reduce liability on

the police department and to preserve any property that the

owner of the vehicle or the occupants of the vehicle may have,”

id. at 25. GO 602.1, however, expressly prohibits an inventory

search of a vehicle not taken to an MPD impoundment lot. GO

602.1, AA at 43 (“If a vehicle classified as prisoner’s property

is disposed of so that it is not taken to a police facility, it shall

not be inventoried in any way.”).5 

The Fourth Amendment requires, again, that an inventory

search be reasonable and, if a standard procedure for conducting

an inventory search is in effect, it must be followed. See Maple,

348 F.3d at 264-65 (“[T]he reasonableness of the officer’s

conduct is to be determined by reference to whether he followed

the MPD’s procedures.”); see also Bertine, 479 U.S. at 374 n.6

(“Our decisions have always adhered to the requirement that

inventories be conducted according to standardized criteria.”).

Adherence to a standard procedure ensures that an inventory

search is “not . . . a ruse for a general rummaging in order to

discover incriminating evidence.” Florida v. Wells, 495 U.S. 1,

4 (1990). The district court concluded, erroneously, that the

inventory search of Proctor’s vehicle satisfied the Fourth

Amendment based on Shegan’s testimony that necessity had

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In fact, MPD Special Order (SO) 03-14, entitled “Implementation

of Centralized Towing Program,” a copy of which Proctor submitted

pursuant to Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 28(j), indicates that

GO 602.1 remains in effect. SO 03-14 provides, “Except as may be

modified by the provisions of this Special Order, the applicable

provisions of the following directives shall continue to be followed:

. . . 4. General Order SPT—602.1 (Automobile Searches and

Inventories).” SO 03-14, Implementation of Centralized Towing

Program, at 4 (June 15, 2003). SO 03-14 did not modify GO 602.1.

forced an unwritten MPD modification to GO 602.1 to allow an

inventory search before a vehicle is towed to a private

impoundment lot. Tr. 11/23/04 at 63-64. There is plainly

insufficient support on this record, however, to conclude that the

MPD is no longer bound by GO 602.1.6

 More than a single

officer’s ad hoc description of a new practice is required to

decide that a thirty-year-old inventory search procedure—in

writing—has been altered by “necessity.” 

Because the officers failed to follow the MPD standard

procedure, the impoundment of Proctor’s vehicle was

unreasonable and thus violated the Fourth Amendment.

Likewise, “if the seizure of the car was unconstitutional, the

materials later recovered during the inventory search [are]

excluded.” Coccia, 446 F.3d at 237 n.5 (citing Duguay, 93 F.3d

at 351). Accordingly, Proctor’s motion to suppress should have

been granted.

For the foregoing reasons, the judgment of the district court

is reversed.

So ordered.

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