United States Court of Appeals 

For the Seventh Circuit

Chicago, Illinois 60604

Argued August 7, 2019

Decided August 27, 2019

Before

DANIEL A. MANION, Circuit Judge

DIANE S. SYKES, Circuit Judge

AMY C. BARRETT, Circuit Judge

No. 18‐2195

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

Plaintiff‐Appellee,

v.

DEVON L. BEAN,

Defendant‐Appellant.

Appeal from the United States District

Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin.

No. 15‐CR‐146

Lynn Adelman,

Judge.

O R D E R

Devon Bean challenges the denial of his motion to suppress a gun and marijuana.

The district court denied Bean’s motion on the ground that police officers, in blocking

his car and then smelling marijuana in it, had probable cause to search him and the car.

Bean conditionally pleaded guilty to possessing a firearm as a felon, 18 U.S.C.

§ 922(g)(1), and possessing with intent to distribute marijuana, 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1). We

affirm the judgment. Before the search, the police saw that Bean had stopped his car in a

loading zone—a potential parking violation. They thus had probable cause to block him

and ticket him, see United States v. Johnson, 874 F.3d 571, 573 (7th Cir. 2017) (en banc).

Also, after smelling marijuana in his car, they had probable cause to search him and the

car.   

NONPRECEDENTIAL DISPOSITION

To be cited only in accordance with Fed. R. App. P. 32.1
No. 18‐2195    Page 2

The facts are largely undisputed. At 7:30 p.m. in January 2015, police officers

were driving through a “high‐crime area” of Milwaukee. Officer Jose Ramirez, the

driver, slowed to about 15 miles per hour as he approached a liquor store, a familiar

trouble spot. He noticed a car about 30 to 40 feet down the street from the store. It was

stopped in a loading zone marked by two street signs. Ramirez saw Bean in the driver’s

seat and an “older” man leaning into the car through the passenger‐side window.

Ramirez watched Bean and the man make hand‐to‐hand contact. After Bean and the

man saw the police cruiser, the man began walking away. Ramirez then activated the

cruiser’s flashing lights and stopped five feet in front of Bean’s car, blocking it. All of

this occurred in a matter of “several seconds,” from the time the police slowed down in

front of the liquor store to when they blocked Bean’s car.   

Ramirez got out of his cruiser to investigate. He told the older man to stop, but

the man slipped through a gap in a fence and ran. As Ramirez approached Bean’s car,

he saw Bean reach down toward his feet. When Ramirez got to the passenger‐side

window, he smelled marijuana coming from the car. The other officers ordered Bean

out of the car, and he complied. The officers found marijuana in Bean’s pocket and a

gun underneath the driver’s seat and arrested him. Bean also received a ticket for

parking in a loading zone.   

The government charged Bean with firearm and drug offenses, and he moved to

suppress the gun, the marijuana, and any other evidence obtained from the stop. A

magistrate judge held a hearing and received briefing. The government argued that the

officers’ observations gave them reason to believe Bean was parked illegally. In

Wisconsin, parking in a loading zone is illegal unless a driver is attending the car and

someone is entering or leaving it. WIS. STAT. § 346.53(1). The magistrate judge found

that the government relied “exclusively” on the alleged parking violation for the stop

and recommended that Bean’s motion be denied. In his objection to that

recommendation, Bean emphasized that the government had abandoned any

arguments that the officers had some other legitimate basis for the stop. This court

decided Johnson before the district court ruled, so it ordered the parties to address that

case.   

Johnson involved comparable facts. Milwaukee police officers saw a car stopped

within 15 feet of a crosswalk, also a parking offense unless a driver is attending the car

and someone is entering or leaving it. 874 F.3d at 572 (citing WIS. STAT. § 346.53). Seeing

no one in the driver’s seat, the officers approached the car to issue a parking ticket and

noticed a gun in plain view inside the car. Id. As a result, Randy Johnson, a passenger,
No. 18‐2195    Page 3

conditionally pleaded guilty to possessing a gun as a felon, reserving the right to appeal

the denial of his motion to suppress the gun. Id. Sitting en banc, this court held that the

police had probable cause to believe that the car was parked illegally, and thus the

officers “were entitled to approach the car before resolving statutory exceptions” to the

offense (such as the loading or unloading of passengers). Id. at 573.   

The district court denied Bean’s motion to suppress. It found that the police

validly seized Bean when Ramirez pulled the cruiser in front of Bean’s car, and upon

smelling marijuana, permissibly searched it. The court ruled that Johnson controlled this

case—Officer Ramirez was justified in stopping Bean for a parking violation and did

not need to wait to see if Bean was engaged in loading or unloading.   

Bean conditionally pleaded guilty, reserving the right to appeal the denial of his

motion to suppress. See FED. R. CRIM. P. 11(a)(2). The district court sentenced Bean to

time served, in part because he had served a 30‐month state sentence for the same

conduct.   

Bean challenges the district court’s legal conclusion that Ramirez had sufficient

grounds to stop him for parking illegally, so our review is de novo. See United States

v. Bell, 925 F.3d 362, 369 (7th Cir. 2019). The rule articulated in Johnson comes from

Atwater v. City of Lago Vista, 532 U.S. 318, 354 (2001): “If an officer has probable cause to

believe that an individual has committed even a very minor criminal offense in his

presence, he may, without violating the Fourth Amendment, arrest the offender.”

Atwater involved the traffic offense of failure to use a seat belt, punishable only by a

fine. In Johnson, this court held that, based on Atwater, an officer who has probable cause

to believe that a car is parked illegally may conduct a stop to issue a ticket. 874 F.3d

at 573–74.   

Bean seeks to distinguish Johnson on the ground that Ramirez did not have

adequate reason to believe that he was parked illegally. He points out that, unlike in

Johnson, a driver (Bean) was behind the steering wheel, and someone was outside the

car interacting with him, suggesting the loading or unloading of a passenger or cargo.

Thus, Bean concludes, the mere fact that his car was in a loading zone did not provide a

sufficient basis for the stop.   
No. 18‐2195    Page 4

The relevant statute for parking violations provides:   

No person shall stop or leave any vehicle standing in any of the following

places except temporarily for the purpose of and while actually engaged in

loading or unloading or in receiving or discharging passengers and while

the vehicle is attended by a licensed operator so that it may promptly be

moved in case of an emergency or to avoid obstruction of traffic.

WIS. STAT. § 346.53. The statute lists six places of possible violations. The one at issue in

Johnson was “Closer than 15 feet to the near limits of a cross‐walk.” Id. § 346.53(5). The

one in this case is “In a loading zone.” Id. § 346.53(1).

In Johnson, we recognized that the parking restriction contained a statutory

exception that applies when a driver is attending the car and the car is loading or

unloading passengers or cargo. 874 F.3d at 573. But the police did not have to watch the

car to find out whether this exception applied. Id. “Police possessed of probable cause

can hand out tickets (or make arrests) and leave to the judicial process the question

whether a defense, exception, proviso, or other limitation applies.” Id.

The distinctions that Bean raises (he was in the driver’s seat and a man was

outside the car) do not require a different outcome. Like in Johnson, the police observed

Bean’s car parked in a restricted area without any loading or unloading occurring. By

itself this was a probable violation of the law sufficient to support the arrest. Although a

statutory exception was partly satisfied—Bean was in the driver’s seat—the officers did

not have to resolve the remainder of the exception by figuring out if he was picking up

or dropping off something, or if the man leaning on the car had just gotten out of it or

was going to get in it. See id. And because the police smelled marijuana in the car after

they validly blocked it, they had probable cause to search Bean and the car. United States

v. Paige, 870 F.3d 693, 700, 703 (7th Cir. 2017).

AFFIRMED