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NON-PRECEDENTIAL DECISION - SEE SUPERIOR COURT I.O.P. 65.37 

COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA, : IN THE SUPERIOR COURT OF 

 : PENNSYLVANIA 

Appellee : 

: 

 v. : 

 : 

JEROME RAYMOND BANKS, : 

 : 

 Appellant : No. 895 WDA 2013 

Appeal from the Judgment of Sentence April 24, 2013

In the Court of Common Pleas of Allegheny County 

Criminal Division No(s).: CP-02-CR-0002813-2013 

 CP-02-CR-0011408-2012 

BEFORE: GANTMAN, P.J., SHOGAN, and FITZGERALD,* JJ. 

MEMORANDUM BY FITZGERALD, J.: FILED JUNE 02, 2015 

Appellant, Jerome Raymond Banks, appeals from the judgment of 

sentence entered in the Allegheny County Court of Common Pleas following 

a bench trial and convictions for possessing a firearm with an altered 

manufacturer’s number,1 receiving stolen property,2 firearms not to be 

carried without a license,3 and possession of firearm prohibited.4 Appellant 

challenges whether the arresting officer possessed the requisite reasonable 

 

*

 Former Justice specially assigned to the Superior Court. 

1

 18 Pa.C.S. § 6110.2(a). 

2

 18 Pa.C.S. § 3925(a). 

3

 18 Pa.C.S. § 6106(a)(1). 

4

 18 Pa.C.S. § 6105(a)(1). 
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suspicion to conduct a pat-down. We reluctantly conclude Appellant is due 

no relief. 

We adopt the facts set forth by the trial court.5 See Trial Ct. Op., 

5/6/14, at 1-4. Appellant timely appealed and timely filed a court-ordered 

Pa.R.A.P. 1925(b) statement. Appellant raises the following issues: 

Were Appellant’s Pa. Const. art. I § 8 and U.S. Const. 

amend. IV & XIV constitutional rights violated when the 

police, acting without a warrant, detained him for 

investigation as he walked along a public street without 

the reasonable suspicion required for such a detention 

(i.e., objectively reasonable suspicion that he was engaged 

in, had been engaged in, or was about to engage in 

criminal activity)? 

Were Appellant’s Pa. Const. art. I § 8 and U.S. Const. 

amend. IV & XIV constitutional rights violated when the 

police frisked his person for [a] weapon without reasonable 

suspicion required for a protective frisk (i.e., objectively 

reasonable suspicion that he was both armed and 

presently dangerous at the time of the search or frisk of 

his person)? 

In view of the proper answers to Question Nos. 1 and 2, 

should not the trial court have granted Appellant’s pretrial 

motion seeking to suppress the firearm seized from his 

person by the police, and should not this Court vacate 

Appellant’s convictions and sentences, and remand 

Appellant’s case for a retrial on Allegheny County Criminal 

Complaint Numbers 2012-11408 and 2013-02813 (with 

 

5

 We acknowledge the holding of In re L.J., 79 A.3d 1073 (Pa. 2013), that 

after October 30, 2013, the scope of review for a suppression issue is limited 

to the record available to the suppression court. Id. at 1085, 1089 (stating 

holding applies to “all litigation commenced Commonwealth-wide after the 

filing of this decision”). Because the instant criminal complaint was filed 

prior to October 30, 2013, In re L.J. does not apply. 
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the firearm seized from his person barred from admission 

into evidence)? 

Appellant’s Brief at 4.6

We summarize Appellant’s arguments for all of his issues together. 

Appellant argues that the police lacked a reasonable suspicion that he was 

engaged in criminal activity or was armed. He reasons that walking in a 

high crime area while wearing a hooded, zipped sweatshirt in August while 

carrying a heavy, unknown object in his waistband did not justify the search 

and seizure. Appellant acknowledges that he reported to the police that he 

was robbed in the area five days earlier. He further concedes that he was 

uncooperative when he was questioned earlier by a police officer about that 

robbery, who, coincidentally, was also the instant arresting officer. We are 

constrained to hold Appellant is not due relief. 

Our standard of review in addressing a challenge to a 

trial court’s denial of a suppression motion is limited to 

determining whether the factual findings are supported by 

the record and whether the legal conclusions drawn from 

those facts are correct. Where the prosecution prevailed in 

the suppression court, we may consider only the 

Commonwealth’s evidence and so much of the evidence for 

the defense as remains uncontradicted when read in the 

context of the record as a whole. Where the record

supports the factual findings of the trial court, we are 

 

6

 Appellant admits his brief exceeds the 14,000 word limit set forth in 

Pa.R.A.P. 2135. See Appellant’s Counsel’s Cert. of Compliance with Word

Count Restrictions. We decline to quash or dismiss the appeal, however. 

See generally Pa.R.A.P. 2101; Commonwealth v. Spuck, 86 A.3d 870 

(Pa. Super. 2014). 
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bound by those facts and may reverse only if the legal 

conclusions drawn therefrom are in error. 

In re J.E., 937 A.2d 421, 425 (Pa. 2007) (citations omitted). In evaluating 

the legal conclusion drawn by the suppression court, this Court may also 

consider uncontradicted testimony from the suppression hearing not 

included in the suppression court’s findings of fact. Commonwealth v. 

Mendenhall, 715 A.2d 1117, 1119 n.1 (Pa. 1998). 

Initially we note that Fourth Amendment jurisprudence 

has led to the development of three categories of 

interactions between citizens and the police. The first of 

these is a “mere encounter” (or request for information) 

which need not be supported by any level of suspicion, but 

carries no official compulsion to stop or to respond. The 

second, an “investigative detention[,]” must be supported 

by a reasonable suspicion; it subjects a suspect to a stop 

and a period of detention, but does not involve such 

coercive conditions as to constitute the functional

equivalent of an arrest. Finally, an arrest or “custodial 

detention” must be supported by probable cause. 

Commonwealth v. Ellis, 662 A.2d 1043, 1047 (Pa. 1995) (citations and 

footnote omitted). An investigative detention is also known as a “Terry

stop.” Commonwealth v. Chase, 960 A.2d 108, 117 (Pa. 2008). 

The Pennsylvania Supreme Court adopted the objective 

Jones/Mendenhall7 standard “in determining whether the conduct of the 

police amounts to a seizure or whether there is simply a mere encounter 

 

7 United States v. Mendenhall, 446 U.S. 544 (1980); Commonwealth v. 

Jones, 378 A.2d 835, 839 (Pa. 1977). 
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between citizen and police officer.” Commonwealth v. Matos, 672 A.2d 

769, 774 (Pa. 1996). 

In [Commonwealth v. Hicks, 253 A.2d 276 (Pa. 1969)], 

this Court adopted the United States Supreme Court’s 

decision in Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 88 S. Ct. 1868, 20 

L. Ed. 2d 889 (1968), which permits a police officer to 

effect a precautionary seizure where the police have a 

reasonable suspicion that criminal activity is afoot. Terry, 

and by analogy Hicks, recognized that there are some 

instances in which an individual may not be arrested, but 

will still be considered to be “seized.” In Jones, this Court 

adopted an objective standard for determining what 

amount of force constitutes the initiation of a Terry stop: 

whether a reasonable person innocent of any crime, would 

have thought he was being restrained had he been in the 

defendant’s shoes. This case, which preceded the United 

States Supreme Court’s decision in . . . Mendenhall, . . . 

was a precursor to the so-called “Mendenhall” test 

posited by the United States Supreme Court: “a person 

has been ‘seized’ within the meaning of the Fourth 

Amendment only if, in view of all the circumstances

surrounding the incident, a reasonable person would have 

believed he was not free to leave.”

The Jones/Mendenhall standard has since been 

consistently followed in Pennsylvania in determining 

whether the conduct of the police amounts to a seizure or 

whether there is simply a mere encounter between citizen 

and police officer. 

Id. at 773-74 (punctuation and some citations omitted). 

The Pennsylvania Supreme Court provided further guidance in applying 

this “totality of the circumstances” test: 

In evaluating the circumstances, the focus is directed 

toward whether, by means of physical force or show of 

authority, the citizen-subject’s movement has in some way 

been restrained. In making this determination, courts 

must apply the totality-of-the-circumstances approach, 
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with no single factor dictating the ultimate conclusion as to 

whether a seizure has occurred. 

Commonwealth v. Strickler, 757 A.2d 884, 890 (Pa. 2000) (footnotes and 

some citations omitted). Factors examined in this totality-of-thecircumstances approach include “all circumstances evidencing a show of 

authority or exercise of force, including the demeanor of the police officer, 

the manner of expression used by the officer in addressing the citizen, and 

the content of the interrogatories or statements.” Mendenhall, 715 A.2d at 

1119. This Court also set forth a non-exclusive list of factors: 

[T]he number of officers present during the interaction; 

whether the officer informs the citizen they are suspected 

of criminal activity; the officer’s demeanor and tone of 

voice; the location and timing of the interaction; the visible 

presence of weapons on the officer; and the questions 

asked. Otherwise inoffensive contact between a member 

of the public and the police cannot, as a matter of law, 

amount to a seizure of that person. 

Commonwealth v. Collins, 950 A.2d 1041, 1047 n.6 (Pa. Super. 2008) 

(en banc) (citation omitted). 

In sum, the question of “whether the police needed some level of 

requisite cause at the time they initially approached” the defendant is 

“governed by the type of encounter that the police initiated when they 

approached” the defendant. In re D.M., 781 A.2d 1161, 1164 (Pa. 2001) 

(emphases added). The critical inquiry is what type of encounter the police 

initiated at the time they initially approached the defendant. See id. After 

identifying the type of encounter—e.g., mere encounter, investigative 
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detention, or custodial detention—this Court must then determine whether 

the police had the requisite cause for that encounter, respectively, e.g., no 

suspicion required, reasonable suspicion that criminal activity was afoot, or 

probable cause for an arrest. See Ellis, 662 A.2d at 1047; Jones, 378 A.2d 

at 839 n.4. 

In Commonwealth v. Carter, 105 A.3d 765 (Pa. Super. 2014) (en 

banc), our Superior Court held the police had reasonable suspicion to stop 

and frisk the defendant based on the following: 

On November 9, 2011, at approximately 9:00 p.m., Officer 

Matthew Blaszczyk of the Philadelphia Police Department 

was patrolling near 700 East Madison Avenue in 

Philadelphia, at the corner of Madison Avenue and G

Street. Officer Blaszczyk testified that this is a known drug 

corner and he personally has made multiple gun and drug 

arrests at this corner. At said time, Officer Blaszczyk and 

his partner, Officer White, were driving northbound on G 

Street when they observed [the defendant] standing on 

the northeast corner of the intersection. Officer Blaszczyk 

“immediately observed a bulge in [the defendant’s] left 

coat pocket.” Officer Blaszczyk believed that it was a 

heavy object because of “the way it weighed the jacket 

down and the way it protruded.” As Officers Blaszczyk and 

White drove northbound by [the defendant], Officer 

Blaszczyk noted that, “[the defendant] looked in [their] 

direction and began to walk south.” The officers circled 

around the block and approached the intersection from a 

different direction. Upon returning to the intersection, 

Officer Blaszczyk observed that [the defendant] was back 

on the same corner, with the same bulge in his coat. 

Officer Blaszczyk noted that he and Officer White did this 

multiple times. 

Each time we came down the street, it was a few times, 

maybe three or four, [the defendant] would look in our 

direction and walk the opposite way whichever way we 

were coming from. 
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And the way he turned his body was so that that bulge, 

you know, we could see it initially. And then he’d turn. So 

he wasn’t in our view. 

The officers got out of their vehicle and approached [the 

defendant], and again [the defendant] turned his body 

away from the officers so they could not see the bulge in 

his coat. Officer Blaszczyk further testified that based on 

the size and shape of the bulge, the way it weighed [the 

defendant’s] coat down, and the way it swung, he believed 

the bulge to be a firearm. Officers Blaszczyk and White 

stopped [the defendant] and patted him down. During the 

pat-down, Officer Blaszczyk noticed upon feeling the bulge, 

that he could “immediately feel the shape of a firearm.” 

Officer Blaszczyk recovered from [the defendant’s] person 

“a 22–caliber Walther handgun, a Walther P–22 model.” 

Id. at 766-67 (footnote and citations omitted). 

The en banc Court held that the search and seizure was justified: 

[T]he Commonwealth, through Officer Blaszczyk, 

established that [the defendant] was in a high-crime area, 

at night, with a weighted and angled bulge in his coat 

pocket. Furthermore, [the defendant] was alerted to the 

officers’ presence and intentionally turned his body away 

from them, at least three times, to conceal the bulge. The 

officers also observed [the defendant] walking away from 

the known drug corner whenever the officer[s] passed by 

it. In our view, the Commonwealth sufficiently showed 

that Officer Blaszczyk had the reasonable suspicion to first 

seize [the defendant] as well as conduct the limited Terry

pat-down, as the entire basis for Officer Blaszczyk’s 

seizure before the pat-down was that [the defendant] was 

armed and dangerous. 

Id. at 774-75 (footnote and citations omitted). The Carter Court 

emphasized the totality of the circumstances justified the seizure. Id. at 

775. The en banc majority also noted that “the Commonwealth would not 

be penalized if the officer had been wrong because Terry, by its very 
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nature, ‘accepts the risk that officers may stop innocent people.’ Illinois v. 

Wardlow, 528 U.S. 119, 126, 120 S. Ct. 673, 145 L. Ed. 2d 570 (2000).” 

Id. at 769 n.4. 

Instantly, in a high-crime area around 1:30 p.m. on August 20, 2012, 

when the temperature was in the mid-70s, two officers were in a vehicle.8 

N.T. Suppression Hr’g, 2/21/13, at 6. The police saw Appellant wearing a 

zipped, hooded sweatshirt with his right hand in the front pocket of the 

sweatshirt or in front of his waistband holding something heavy. Id. at 6, 8-

10. The police believed Appellant was armed. Id. at 6. The police pulled 

up next to Appellant; the plainclothes officer opened the vehicle’s door, 

announced “Pittsburgh Police,” displayed his badge, exited the vehicle, and 

approached Appellant. Id. at 9-10. The following transpired: 

[District Attorney]. Now, as you passed [Appellant], what 

did you do, if anything? 

[Officer]. We turned our vehicle around and pulled up 

beside him. I opened my door and announced “Pittsburgh 

Police” and displayed my badge and approached him. He 

was still continuing to walk outbound. I got out of my 

vehicle and approached him. 

Q. Then what did you do? 

A. I said, “Pittsburgh Police. I need to talk to you.” 

[Appellant] didn’t acknowledge I was there, although we 

were in close proximity. He could hear me and did 

acknowledge my presence. I closed the gap between the 

 

8

 One officer was in plain clothes; the record does not establish the clothing 

of the other officer and whether the vehicle was marked or unmarked. 
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two of us. At that point he moved his hand out of his 

pockets. 

I said, “Do you have a weapon?” 

Again, he refused to answer me. At that point I 

believed he was armed. Did a pat down of his front

waistband where I observed his hands. Immediately felt 

the handle of a pistol. 

Id. at 9-10. We note the officer previously testified about his belief that 

Appellant was armed when they first saw him earlier. Id. at 6. 

Instantly, when the police initially approached Appellant, asked to 

speak with him, and inquired whether he was armed, the interaction was a 

mere encounter or request for information. See Ellis, 662 A.2d at 1047; 

see also In re D.M., 781 A.2d at 1164. There was no official compulsion to 

stop or to respond. See Ellis, 662 A.2d at 1047.9 The mere encounter, 

however, transformed into an investigative detention when the police 

conducted a Terry pat down. See Matos, 672 A.2d at 773-74; Chase, 960 

A.2d at 117. Having identified the type of encounter, we next ascertain 

whether the police had reasonable suspicion of criminal activity. See Ellis, 

662 A.2d at 1047; Jones, 378 A.2d at 839 n.4. 

 

9

 We acknowledge, “When a police officer initiates an encounter, an 

individual as a practical matter never feels free to leave. The police officer 

has a weapon. The police officer’s testimony is almost always believed in 

court. No responsible person would walk away from an encounter with a 

police officer.” Commonwealth v. Lyles, 54 A.3d 76, 84 (Pa. Super. 2012) 

(Strassburger, J., concurring), aff’d, 97 A.3d 298 (Pa. 2014). 
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Similar to the defendant in Carter who was standing on a street 

corner in a high crime area with a bulge in the left front pocket, Appellant 

was in a high crime area with his right hand in his sweatshirt or waistband 

holding something heavy. Cf. Carter, 105 A.3d at 766. The instant police, 

like the police in Carter, also believed Appellant had a firearm. Cf. id. at 

767. Appellant, analogous to the Carter defendant, walked away from the 

police. Cf. id. at 767. The police—identical to the police in Carter—patted 

Appellant down and recovered a firearm. Cf. id. Given the instant facts are 

comparable to the facts in Carter, we are constrained to hold that the 

Commonwealth, given the totality of the circumstances, established 

reasonable suspicion to conduct the Terry pat down. See Strickler, 757 

A.2d at 890; Mendenhall, 715 A.2d at 119; cf. Carter, 105 A.3d at 774-

75. Because the record supports the factual findings of the trial court and 

the legal conclusions drawn therefrom are correct, we discern no basis for 

relief and affirm the judgment of sentence. See In re J.E., 937 A.2d at 

425. 

Judgment of sentence affirmed. 

Judgment Entered. 

Joseph D. Seletyn, Esq. 

Prothonotary 
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Date: 6/2/2015