COURT OF APPEALS OF VIRGINIA 

Present: Judges Baker, Coleman and Elder 

COMMONWEALTH OF VIRGINIA 

 MEMORANDUM OPINION* BY 

v. Record No. 0282-96-3 JUDGE LARRY G. ELDER 

 JULY 15, 1996 

DAVID WAYNE HALL 

FROM THE CIRCUIT COURT OF ROCKBRIDGE COUNTY 

George E. Honts, III, Judge 

 Kathleen B. Martin, Assistant Attorney 

General (James S. Gilmore, III, Attorney 

General, on brief), for appellant. 

 Ross S. Haine, Assistant Public Defender, for 

appellee. 

 The Commonwealth appeals the trial court's decision granting 

David Wayne Hall's (the defendant's) pretrial motion to suppress. 

 The Commonwealth contends that the trial court erred in finding 

that the police obtained statements from the defendant in 

violation of his Sixth Amendment right to counsel. Because the 

trial court did not err, we affirm its decision. 

 The record reveals that after receiving an informant's tip 

and finding stolen property in the defendant's residence, Officer 

Gary B. Coleman of the Lexington Police Department arrested the 

defendant on August 27, 1995, on a charge of receiving stolen 

property. Two days later, an attorney from the Public Defender's 

Office was appointed to represent the defendant, and the 

 

 *Pursuant to Code § 17-116.010 this opinion is not 

designated for publication. 
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defendant was released from jail on bond. 

 After his release from jail, the defendant moved to his 

girlfriend's apartment in nearby Buena Vista. On September 15, 

1995, Lexington Police Officer Torben A. Pederson, Rockbridge 

County Deputy Sheriff C. J. Blalock, and two Buena Vista police 

officers executed a search warrant at the apartment. During the 

search of the house, police found a number of items known to be 

stolen. 

 After Deputy Blalock advised the defendant of his Miranda

rights, the defendant claimed that he received the items from 

third parties and that he would assist the police in locating 

those parties. Officer Pederson and Deputy Blalock did not have 

actual knowledge on September 15, 1995 that counsel had been 

appointed for the defendant on the receiving stolen property 

charge. After further questioning at the sheriff's office, the 

defendant gave an inculpatory statement. 

 On September 20, 1995, Officer Coleman and Deputy Blalock 

encountered the defendant near his residence. Deputy Blalock 

advised the defendant of his Miranda rights, and Officer Coleman 

asked the defendant "directly, if he was represented by an 

attorney." The defendant stated that he did not have an attorney 

but was thinking of hiring one. Neither Officer Coleman nor 

Deputy Blalock attempted to determine if the defendant was in 

fact represented by an attorney. The defendant accompanied the 

officers in a police vehicle and indicated various locations in 
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Lexington and Rockbridge County where he committed burglary and 

larceny. The police then arrested the defendant for the numerous 

burglaries and larcenies committed around Lexington. 

 After the defendant filed a motion to suppress his 

inculpatory statements, the trial court found that the police 

violated the defendant's Sixth Amendment rights. The 

Commonwealth appeals the trial court's ruling. 

 In reviewing a ruling on a suppression motion, we consider 

the evidence in the light most favorable to the prevailing party 

below, in this case the defendant, and we will disturb the trial 

court's decision only if it was plainly wrong. Commonwealth v. 

Grimstead, 12 Va. App. 1066, 1067, 407 S.E.2d 47, 48 (1991). To 

prevail on appeal, the Commonwealth carries the burden to show 

that the granting of the defendant's motion constituted 

reversible error. Motley v. Commonwealth, 17 Va. App. 439, 

440-41, 437 S.E.2d 232, 233 (1993). 

 First, "[t]he invocation of the sixth amendment right to 

counsel is charge specific and does not bar police initiated 

interrogations with respect to charges unrelated to those for 

which counsel has been employed." Jackson v. Commonwealth, 14 

Va. App. 414, 416, 417 S.E.2d 5, 7 (1992)(citing McNeil v. 

Wisconsin, 501 U.S. 171 (1991)); Maine v. Moulton, 474 U.S. 159 

(1985). However, police initiated interrogations are barred with 

respect to crimes that are so "inextricably intertwined" as to 

foreclose isolating the right to counsel on one charge to other 
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related charges. See United States v. Kidd, 12 F.3d 30, 33 (4th 

Cir. 1993)(stating that in order to fall within the related 

offense exception, "the offense being investigated must derive 

from the same factual predicate as the charged offense"), cert. 

denied, __ U.S. __, 114 S. Ct. 1629 (1994); United States v. 

Hines, 963 F.2d 255, 257 (9th Cir. 1992)(discussing the 

application of the "inextricably intertwined" charges exception). 

 In this case, we hold that the trial court did not err in 

ruling that the two sets of charges were inextricably 

intertwined. The evidence supports the conclusion that all of 

the charges arose from an "on-going criminal enterprise" 

involving burglary, larceny, and the disposition of property 

stolen in those cases. The trial court cited five factors which 

were critical to finding the inter-relationship between the two 

sets of charges: 

 1. Officer Coleman knew from an informant 

before his first contact with the defendant 

that the defendant was selling numerous VCR's 

and other electronic equipment and that such 

items had been taken from private homes in 

Lexington. 

 2. The time lapse among these events was 

less than one month. 

 3. All the property involved in each charge 

was movable personal property and all of it 

came from private homes in the RockbridgeLexington area. 

 4. The defendant's explanation in each case 

was that he had acquired the property in 

question from a third party. The numerous 

"leads" he offered all resulted in nothing 

being development [sic] against the third 
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party named or described. 

 5. Not only was all of the property part of 

an on-going criminal enterprise, all the 

police investigations and actions focused on 

that particular criminal enterprise, and, 

significantly, officers from Lexington and 

Rockbridge County worked together in the 

investigations. 

We cannot say that the trial court erred in making these 

findings. 

 Even if the officers reasonably believed that the offenses 

were unrelated when they interrogated the defendant on September 

16 and 20, 1995, this does not mean that the defendant's rights 

were not violated. When adversarial proceedings were initiated 

against the defendant for receiving stolen property and counsel 

was appointed to represent him, his Sixth Amendment right to 

counsel attached and precluded further police questioning about 

any of the related offenses. See Tipton v. Commonwealth, 18 Va. 

App. 832, 835, 447 S.E.2d 539, 541 (1994). 

 Second, it matters not that the officers lacked actual 

knowledge that the defendant was represented by an attorney or 

that the officers did not purposely deny the defendant his Sixth 

Amendment right to counsel. Arizona v. Roberson, 486 U.S. 675, 

687 (1981)("we attach no significance to the fact that the 

officer who conducted the second interrogation did not know that 

the respondent had made a request for counsel"). "[S]ixth 

amendment principles require that we impute the [Commonwealth's] 

knowledge from one state actor to another." Michigan v. Jackson, 
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475 U.S. 625, 634 (1966). Once the defendant requested and was 

appointed an attorney by the trial court, all state actors were 

deemed to possess knowledge of this fact. See Roberson, 486 U.S. 

at 687-88 (stating that police departments must establish 

procedures enabling officers without actual knowledge to 

determine if an accused has requested counsel). It is of little 

import that the defendant told the officers on September 20, 

1995, that he did not have an attorney. The defendant 

misapprehended his Sixth Amendment rights and testified that he 

assumed that the question related only to the forthcoming 

burglary and larceny charges. See Jackson, 475 U.S. at 636 

(holding that once Sixth Amendment rights attach, and the accused 

properly invokes these rights by retaining or requesting counsel, 

subsequent waivers are deemed ineffective). 

 Based on the foregoing, we affirm the trial court's 

decision. 

Affirmed.
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Baker, J., concurring. 

 Because the trial court found as a fact that the stolen 

items discovered in defendant's possession on August 27, 1995 

were items stolen in the burglaries, I would simply hold that the 

evidence is sufficient to support the trial court's decision.