*District Judge of the Eastern District of Louisiana, sitting

by designation.

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT

_______________________

No. 98-60243

_______________________

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

Plaintiff-Appellee,

v.

BILLY LEON CAMPBELL,

Defendant-Appellant.

_________________________________________________________________

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Northern District of Mississippi

_________________________________________________________________

June 10, 1999

Before JONES and STEWART, Circuit Judges, and DUPLANTIER,* District

Judge.

EDITH H. JONES, Circuit Judge:

Campbell pled guilty to armed bank robbery, use of a

firearm during and in relation to a crime of violence, and two

counts of obstruction of commerce by robbery, on the condition that

he could challenge the district court’s denial of his motion to

suppress evidence. On appeal, he argues that there were

insufficient grounds for an investigatory detention and its

successive steps: being told to lie prone, being handcuffed, being

frisked, and having several objects removed from his pocket.

Alternatively, he argues that his detention constituted an arrest
2

unsupported by probable cause. We conclude that, under the

circumstances, the officers’ conduct was reasonable.

I.

On the morning of July 31, 1997, a lone black male robbed

a bank in Olive Branch, Mississippi. In the course of the robbery,

he pointed a handgun at the teller whom he asked for money. The

robber was described as being in his twenties or early thirties,

about 6'1" tall, 155 pounds, with long hair and a dark complexion.

He escaped with $3,365 in what witnesses described as a late 1980s,

black Chevrolet Cavalier with Tennessee license plate 600TTP.

The next day, FBI agent Lent Rice learned from Memphis

police that the license plate had expired, and that the person to

whom it had last been registered said it was now in the possession

of Michael Campbell (the defendant’s brother), who lived at 4544

Fontaine Place, in Olive Branch. At about 5:00 P.M., Agent Rice

went to that address with Detective Cleates Oliver of the Olive

Branch Police Department. When they arrived, they saw the Cavalier

with the same Tennessee license plate parked in the carport next to

the house. They set up surveillance a block away and called for

backup. Sergeant Scott Gentry arrived to assist in the

surveillance. He was told that they were surveilling a possible

armed robbery suspect who was armed, given the description of the

robber, told that the car in the carport was the getaway vehicle,

and told that Michael Campbell was the suspect.

Within minutes, three black males emerged from the house

and appeared to be getting into the car. The surveilling officers

moved in to stop their departure. Sergeant Gentry got to the
3

driveway first. By then, Michael Campbell and another man were

already in the car. Billy Campbell was still walking towards the

driver’s side of the car. With his gun drawn, Gentry ordered all

three men to put their hands up. Moving towards Billy Campbell,

Gentry told him to get on the ground. As Campbell did this, Gentry

looked to the two men in the car and told them to keep their hands

visible. When Agent Rice and Detective Oliver approached the men

in the car, Gentry turned his attention back to Billy Campbell, who

had complied with his order to lie down on the concrete surface of

the carport.

Billy Campbell matched the description of the bank

robber: he was 24 years old, 6'1" tall, 160 pounds, with a dark

complexion and shoulder-length hair. Gentry considered this a

high-crime neighborhood and noted that there were people in nearby

yards, as well as two women and a small child under the carport.

Gentry holstered his weapon, handcuffed Campbell behind his back,

and frisked him. Gentry ran his hands along Campbell’s body, and

around the waistband, rolling Campbell to the left and right side

to frisk his pockets. In Campbell’s right front pants pocket,

Gentry felt a large bulge. Fearing that it might be “some type of

weapon,” Gentry called Detective Oliver over. Gentry then reached

into the pocket, pulled its contents out, and laid them on the

ground. The contents comprised a large wad of money (more than

$1,400), a gold cardboard jewelry box containing a gold chain, and

some change.

Meanwhile, Agent Rice had been dealing with Michael

Campbell. Rice asked Michael Campbell to get out of the car and
 

1It is unclear from the record and the briefs whether Campbell

was lying down or standing up while the bills were checked.

4

immediately handcuffed him, placed him on the ground, and frisked

him. (Detective Oliver asked the third man, who was too short to

meet the bank robber’s description, to get out of the car and sit

down on the carport’s concrete surface.) Michael Campbell told

Rice that he had been in jail the previous day. Someone contacted

the DeSoto County Sheriff’s Department, which confirmed within 10

to 25 minutes that Michael Campbell had been in their custody at

the time of the bank robbery. Michael Campbell’s handcuffs were

removed.

During the time that Michael Campbell’s alibi was being

checked, Detective Oliver took the items from Billy Campbell’s

pocket to his car. Within a few minutes, Assistant Police Chief

Hal Pino arrived. Pino checked the $20 bills and found that three

of them matched the serial numbers on the list of “bait bills” that

the bank teller had given the robber. During the time it took to

check the bills, Billy Campbell was left handcuffed.1 After the

bait bills had been identified and Michael Campbell’s alibi was

confirmed, Billy Campbell was told he was being held on suspicion

of bank robbery, taken to a squad car, and advised of his rights.

Billy Campbell later confessed to the bank robbery as

well as several other armed robberies in the area in the weeks

before the bank robbery. A consent search of the house on Fontaine

Place (which was owned by the Campbells’ mother) revealed a

hardhat, goggles, and plastic hair net matching those worn by the
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bank robber. Mrs. Campbell later located the handgun that had been

used in the string of robberies and turned it over to the police.

Before trial, Campbell moved to suppress the physical

evidence obtained from the stop. After a hearing where three of

the officers testified, the district court denied the motion to

suppress, finding that the officers had reasonable suspicion to

detain the men getting into the car, that their conduct was

reasonable under the circumstances, and that it did not exceed the

bounds of an investigative detention.

II.

The “reasonableness of an investigatory stop and frisk”

is reviewed de novo. United States v. Michelletti, 13 F.3d 838,

841 (5th Cir. 1994) (en banc). Yet the evidence is reviewed “in

the light most favorable to the government as the prevailing

party,” and the denial of the motion to suppress will be upheld “if

there is any reasonable view of the evidence to support it.” Id.

(internal quotation omitted).

III.

There is no doubt that the officers had reasonable

suspicion to make an investigatory stop of Campbell. “[I]f police

have a reasonable suspicion, grounded in specific and articulable

facts, that a person they encounter was involved in or is wanted in

connection with a completed felony, then a Terry stop may be made

to investigate that suspicion.” United States v. Hensley, 469 U.S.

221, 229, 105 S. Ct. 675, 680 (1985). Campbell matched the

physical description of the bank robber from the day before and was

approaching a car that matched a detailed description of the
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getaway vehicle and bore the same license plate. These facts were

sufficient to warrant further investigation.

In the course of that investigation, the officers had two

goals: to investigate and to protect themselves during their

investigation. See Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 23, 88 S. Ct. 1868,

1881 (1968) (“[I]n addition [to the governmental interest in

investigating crime], there is the more immediate interest of the

police officer in taking steps to assure himself that the person

with whom he is dealing is not armed with a weapon that could

unexpectedly and fatally be used against him.”). The officers were

authorized to “take such steps as were reasonably necessary to

protect their personal safety and to maintain the status quo during

the course of the stop.” Hensley, 469 U.S. at 235, 105 S. Ct. at

684. This court asks case-by-case “whether the police were

unreasonable in failing to use less intrusive procedures to conduct

their investigation safely.” United States v. Sanders, 994 F.2d

200, 206-07 (5th Cir. 1993).

In Sanders, this court observed that “using some force on

a suspect, pointing a weapon at a suspect, ordering a suspect to

lie on the ground, and handcuffing a suspect -- whether singly or

in combination -- do not automatically convert an investigatory

detention into an arrest requiring probable cause.” Id. at 206.

Although there are some differences between this case and the facts

of Sanders -- here there was no sign of non-cooperation and the

stop happened about 30 hours after the bank robbery -- that does

not mean that the use of drawn guns and handcuffs was unreasonable.

As the Seventh Circuit has noted: “When a suspect is considered
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dangerous, requiring him to lie face down on the ground is the

safest way for police officers to approach him, handcuff him and

finally determine whether he carries any weapons.” United States

v. Tilmon, 19 F.3d 1221, 1228 (7th Cir. 1994).

This is precisely what Sergeant Gentry did. Given that

Billy Campbell matched the description of the armed bank robber and

was walking towards the driver’s side of what almost certainly had

been the getaway vehicle, there were good reasons to assume that

Campbell was armed. See Terry, 392 U.S. at 24, 88 S. Ct. at 1883

(“An officer need not be certain that an individual is armed....”);

Tilmon, 19 F.3d at 1227 (citing six cases finding it reasonable to

assume armed bank robbery suspects are dangerous). Although

Campbell had complied with Gentry’s order to lie down, this would

not have precluded his reaching for a weapon. There were other

people in the area and only three officers to control all three

suspects. Under the circumstances, it was not unreasonable for

Gentry to take the precaution of handcuffing Campbell and frisking

him. Nor was it unreasonable, as Campbell alleges, to handcuff him

before frisking him. See Sanders, 994 F.2d at 208-09.

Campbell argues that the removal of his pocket’s contents

was unreasonable because the frisk revealed nothing that could “be

taken for a weapon by an experienced officer under any stretch of

the imagination.” This ipse dixit is inadequate to reverse the

district court. Gentry testified that he thought the large bulge

in Campbell’s pocket “was some type of weapon.” The combination of

change, over $1,400 of currency, and a cardboard box containing a

gold chain was no mere “bump.” Cf. United States v. Ponce, 8 F.3d
 

2Michael Campbell’s handcuffs were removed as soon as his

alibi was confirmed. The third man present was never handcuffed

because he was too short to match the description of the bank

robber.

8

989, 999 (5th Cir. 1994) (“a police officer’s protective search

might properly include seizure of an object that feels like a wad

of folded bills concealing a weapon”). In the light most favorable

to the government, Gentry had not ruled out the possibility that

the large bulge was a weapon, and his removal of the pocket’s

contents was not beyond the scope of a permissible Terry frisk.

Finally, Campbell argues that the totality of the

officers’ conduct constituted an arrest, rather than an

investigatory stop, and was unsupported by probable cause. As

discussed above, drawn guns and handcuffs do not necessarily

convert a detention into an arrest. Nor did it convert the

detention into an arrest to leave Billy Campbell handcuffed during

the time it took to investigate Michael Campbell’s alibi and the

serial numbers on the $20 bills. As the Supreme Court has

explained:

In assessing whether a detention is too long in

duration to be justified as an investigative stop,

we consider it appropriate to examine whether the

police diligently pursued a means of investigation

that was likely to confirm or dispel their

suspicions quickly, during which time it was

necessary to detain the defendant.

United States v. Sharpe, 470 U.S. 675, 686, 105 S. Ct. 1568, 1575

(1985). There were substantial reasons to suspect Billy Campbell

had been the bank robber, and he was detained for no longer than

necessary to conduct a cursory check that could provide more

conclusory evidence.2 The entire detention took between 10 and 25
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minutes -- not an unreasonable amount of time under the

circumstances. See id. at 688, 105 S. Ct. at 1576 (20-minute stop

not an arrest); Allen v. City of Los Angeles, 66 F.3d 1052 (9th

Cir. 1995) (detention of suspect in police car for 24 minutes,

while police contacted car owner to determine if it had been

stolen, did not amount to an arrest); Courson v. McMillian, 939

F.2d 1479, 1492 (11th Cir. 1991) (30-minute detention not

unreasonable for an investigative stop).

The facts of this case demonstrate neither an arrest nor

unreasonably excessive steps for an investigatory detention.

IV.

Because the district court did not err in denying

Campbell’s motion to suppress, Campbell’s convictions on all counts

are AFFIRMED.

AFFIRMED.