United States Court of Appeals

For the Eighth Circuit

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No. 17-1455

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United States of America,

lllllllllllllllllllllPlaintiff - Appellee,

v.

Nalenzer Lee Edwards,

lllllllllllllllllllllDefendant - Appellant.

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Appeal from United States District Court 

for the Western District of Missouri - Jefferson City

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Submitted: November 16, 2017

Filed: May 31, 2018

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Before COLLOTON and GRUENDER, CircuitJudges, and READE, DistrictJudge. 1

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The Honorable Linda R. Reade, United States District Judge for the Northern 1

District of Iowa, sitting by designation.
COLLOTON, Circuit Judge.

Nalenzer Edwards was convicted of conspiracy to distribute heroin and

possession with intent to distribute heroin. The district court denied Edwards’s pre- 2

trial motion to suppress evidence seized during a traffic stop and statements made to

officers after his arrest. We conclude that law enforcement officers did not violate

the Fourth Amendment, so there was no basis to exclude the disputed evidence, and

we therefore affirm the judgment.

I.

The investigation and prosecution of Edwards arose from communications to

police by a confidential informant on June 10, 2015. The informant, who previously

had provided reliable information, contacted Detective Timothy Giger from the

Columbia Police Department to report that Edwards wasinvolved in drug trafficking. 

The informant told Giger that Edwards would be driving that day from Columbia to

Jefferson City to provide money to a woman named “Tasha” and to obtain heroin for

transport back to Columbia.

Giger and other officers followed Edwards’s silver Pontiac Bonneville from a

hotel in Columbia to a house in Jefferson City owned by Natasha Terrell. Edwards

entered the home and remained for thirty to forty-five minutes before driving back to

Columbia. That evening, Jefferson City police searched the trash outside Natasha

Terrell’s residence and discovered drug paraphernalia consistent with drug

trafficking. Based on the totality of the evidence, Detective Greg Bestgen of

The Honorable Brian C. Wimes, United States District Judge for the Western 2

District of Missouri, adopting the report and recommendation of the Honorable Matt

J. Whitworth, United States Magistrate Judge for the Western District of Missouri.

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Jefferson City obtained a search warrant for the home, but did not execute it

immediately.

A week later, the same informant notified Detective Giger that Edwards again

planned to travel to “Tasha’s” house that day to obtain heroin. As before, Giger and

other officersfollowed EdwardsfromColumbia to Natasha Terrell’s house. Edwards

went inside the house and then drove away. Once he left, Detective Bestgen and

other officers executed the search warrant; they found heroin, crack cocaine, pills of

an unknown nature, and approximately $7,000 in cash. A second confidential

informant, who was present in the home during the search, informed Bestgen that

Edwards had left with approximately twenty grams of heroin.

While officers searched Natasha Terrell’s home, Officer Paul Gash ofJefferson

City conducted a traffic stop of Edwards’s vehicle after learning fromDetective Giger

that Edwards was believed to have completed a drug transaction. Giger instructed

Gash to arrest Edwards, so Gash placed Edwards in custody in the back of a police

car. After Edwards declined to consent to a search of his vehicle, Gash ran his canine

around the Bonneville’s exterior, but the dog did not alert to the presence of drugs.

Gash next contacted Detective Bestgen, who stated that there was probable

cause to search the vehicle. Gash then searched the Bonneville and discovered four

bags of heroin behind the instrument panel of the car. In an interview, after receiving

the warnings prescribed by Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436 (1966), Edwards

admitted his involvement in drug trafficking. Thereafter, a grand jury charged

Edwards with conspiracy to distribute heroin and possession with intent to distribute

heroin, in violation of 21 U.S.C. §§ 846 and 841(a)(1), respectively.

Before trial, Edwards moved to suppress his incriminating statements and the

heroin seized from his vehicle, but the district court denied the motion, and the case

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proceeded to trial. A jury found Edwards guilty on both charges, and the district

court sentenced him to 156 months’ imprisonment.

II.

On appeal, Edwards challenges the district court’s denial of his motion to

suppress. He contends that police lacked probable cause to arrest him, and that his

statements should have been suppressed as the fruit of an unlawful arrest. He also

argues that police searched his vehicle without probable cause, and that evidence

found in the car should have been excluded from the trial.

Probable cause to arrest exists “when, considering all the circumstances, police

have trustworthy information that would lead a prudent person to believe that the

suspect has committed or is committing a crime.” United States v. Velazquez-Rivera,

366 F.3d 661, 664 (8th Cir. 2004). The standard is “not a high bar,” and it “requires

only a probability orsubstantial chance of criminal activity, not an actual showing of

such activity.” District of Columbia v. Wesby, 138 S. Ct. 577, 586 (2018) (internal

quotation marks omitted).

The information provided by DetectiveGiger’s confidentialinformant,together

with corroborating evidence gathered during investigation, established probable cause

to believe that Edwards committed a drug trafficking offense. The informant had

proven reliable in previous investigations, and law enforcement independently

corroborated details that the informant had supplied about Edwards. Officers

followed Edwards as he traveled from Columbia to a residence in Jefferson City that

was owned by a woman matching the name given by the informant. A

contemporaneous trash pull corroborated the informant’s suggestion that the

residence was associated with drug activity. Where an informant has provided

reliable information in the past, and where officers are able to corroborate important

details from a current tip that a subject is engaged in drug trafficking, there is

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probable cause to believe that an offense has been or is being committed. Draper v.

United States, 358 U.S. 307, 312-14 (1959). 

Although Officer Gash had not personally observed Edwards before the traffic

stop on June 17, “probable cause may be based on the collective knowledge of all law

enforcement officers involved in an investigation and need not be based solely upon

the information within the knowledge of the officer on the scene if there is some

degree of communication.” United States v. Horne, 4 F.3d 579, 585 (8th Cir. 1993). 

Detective Giger communicated with Officer Gash before the traffic stop, informing

him that Edwards was under investigation for drug trafficking and that there was

probable cause to believe that Edwards had just obtained drugs. Because the officers

collectively had probable cause, and Officer Gash was included in the

communications, Edwards’s arrest was lawful. The district court properly denied

Edwards’s motion to suppress his custodial statements to police.

Gash also had probable cause to believe that Edwards’s car contained heroin

before he searched the vehicle. Under the automobile exception to the warrant

requirement, officers may conduct a warrantless search of a vehicle if they have

probable cause to believe that the car contains contraband or other evidence. 

California v. Acevedo, 500 U.S. 565, 580 (1991). The same information that

provided probable cause for the arrest justified the search of the Bonneville. See

United States v. Marchena-Borjas, 209 F.3d 698, 700 (8th Cir. 2000) (per curiam). 

Edwards complains that the second informant at Terrell’s house had no history of

providing reliable information. But a track record is not required before officers may

deem an informant credible, see United States v. Winarske, 715 F.3d 1063, 1067 (8th

Cir. 2013), and the second informant’s assertion that Edwards had purchased heroin

at the house was consistent with other evidence and worthy of some weight. In any

event, officers did not need the second informant’s statement to establish probable

cause, because statements of the first informant and subsequent investigation were

sufficient.

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Seizing on testimony from Officer Gash that his drug dog alerts accurately “[a]

hundred percent of the time,” Edwards contends that any probable cause that might

have existed promptly dissipated when the canine failed to alert to the presence of

drugs at Edwards’s car. A drug dog’s failure to alert is relevant, see United States v.

Jacobs, 986 F.2d 1231, 1234-35 (8th Cir. 1993), but not dispositive. See United

States v. Lakoskey, 462 F.3d 965, 976-77 (8th Cir. 2006). Whatever Officer Gash’s

subjective opinion about the accuracy of his dog, officers may consider pre-existing

information in making the objective determination whether there is a fair probability

that evidence of a crime would be found in the conveyance. The evidence of criminal

activity here was strong enough to establish a substantial chance that the dog might

have been mistaken or unable to perceive drugs that were within the vehicle. Based

on the totality of the circumstances, there was probable cause to search the car. The

district court properly denied the motion to suppress the heroin found inside the

Bonneville.

The judgment of the district court is affirmed.

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