FILED

January 26, 1998

Cecil Crowson, Jr.

Appellate C ourt Clerk

IN THE COURT OF CRIMINAL APPEALS OF TENNESSEE

AT JACKSON

OCTOBER 1997 SESSION

STATE OF TENNESSEE, )

) C.C.A. NO. 02C01-9705-CC-00167

Appellant, )

) MADISON COUNTY

VS. )

) HON. WHIT LAFON,

DEWAYNE MOORE, ) JUDGE

)

Appellee. ) (Interlocutory appeal: 

 motion to suppress)

FOR THE APPELLANT: FOR THE APPELLEE:

JOHN KNOX WALKUP JAMES D. GASS

Attorney General & Reporter P.O. Box 7624

Jackson, TN 38308

KENNETH W. RUCKER

Asst. Attorney General

Cordell Hull Bldg., 2nd Fl.

425 5th Ave. N.

Nashville, TN 37243-0493

JERRY WOODALL

District Attorney General

AL EARLS

SHAUN A. BROWN

Asst. District Attorneys General

Lowell Thomas State Office Bldg.

Jackson, TN 38301

OPINION FILED:____________________

AFFIRMED

JOHN H. PEAY,

Judge
1

Officer Coleman's description of the defendant's intention in making these turns is unsupported by any

independent proof. In other words, her description of the defendant's driving as “evasive” and done “in an attempt

to shake me” was based, as far as we can tell from the record, solely on the fact that the defendant had made

several turns. She did not testify that he had sped up or made the turns with any particular alacrity. The mere

making of m ultiple turns in a ne ighborho od is not ind icative of crimin al activity, even wh ile being follow ed by a

police car. Cf. State v. Scarlett, 880 S.W.2d 707 , 708 (Tenn. Crim. App. 1993) (where this Court, in reversing the

trial court's grant of the defendant's motion to suppress, relied in part on proof that, when the police officer

followed the defendant's car, he made “several quick, hard-angled turns.”) 

2

O P I N I O N

The defendant was indicted for two weapons violations, possession of drug

paraphernalia, and driving without a license. He filed a motion to suppress as evidence “all

drugs and drug paraphernalia, and firearms, which were taken from the vehicle [he] was

driving at the time of his arrest.” After a hearing, the court below granted the def endant's

motion. The State filed this interlocutory appeal, contesting the trial court's ruling. We

affirm.

Belinda Coleman, a patrol officer with the Jackson Police Department,

testified that, at approximately 11:00 p.m. on May 31, 1996, she had been in a residential

neighborhood taking a missing person report. While she was taking the report, she saw the

vehicle which the defendant was driving “traveling very, very slowly, five to ten miles an

hour through the neighborhood. . . . Approximately five to ten minutes later the vehicle

circle[d] again.” At this time, she testified, one of the people who lived in the

neighborhood had “advised [her] that the vehicle had been circling the neighborhood for

quite some time.” When she finished taking her report, she followed the vehicle in her

police car. She testified that it had had four people in it, and that as she had followed it, “It

made evasive actions and kept turning down different roads, taking side streets, back roads,

in an attempt to shake me.”1 She further testified that she had been given a description the
2

Officer Coleman's testimony refers to both automobile burglaries and stolen vehicles; it appears that she

may have b een using the terms interchan geably.

3

night before “of a small red vehicle which was occupied by four black males that had been

involved in several auto burglaries2 the night before.” 

After following it for some unspecified distance, Officer Coleman stopped

the vehicle. She initially testified that the defendant had not been the driver. However,

after reviewing her report, she acknowledged on cross-examination that the defendant had

been the driver. She also testified on cross-examination that, “The burglaries had occurred

over in the Daughtery Street area.” Shortly after this testimony, the trial court interrupted

the defendant's cross-examination and asked the State if it had any further proof. The State

responded that its only remaining testimony would come from the police officer who had

found the weapons after the stop. At that point, the court below held “the search was bad.”

No findings of fact were set forth on the record.

We first note that “stopping an automobile and detaining its occupants

constitute a <seizure' within the meaning of [the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments to the

United States Constitution], even though the purpose of the stop is limited and the resulting

detention quite brief.” Delaware v. Prouse, 440 U.S.648, 653 (1979). In some

circumstances, a police officer may briefly detain a suspect without probable cause in order

to investigate possible criminal activity. Brown v. Texas, 443 U.S. 47, 51 (1979). In these

situations, an investiga tory stop is permissible only when a police officer has a reasonable

suspicion, supported by specific and articulable facts, that a criminal offense has been or

is about to be committed. Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1 (1968). In order to determine specific
4

and articulable facts, this Court must consider the “totality of the circumstances.” United

States v. Cortez, 449 U.S. 411, 417 (1981). Among the relevant elements to be considered

are objective observations, information obtained from other police officers, and the pattern

of ope ration of certain offenders. Id. at 418. This Court must also consider “the rational

inferences and deductions that a trained police officer may draw from the facts and

circumstances known to him.” State v. Watkins, 827 S.W.2d 293, 294 (Tenn. 1992) citing

Terry v. Ohio.

In this case, the only specific and articulable facts that Officer Coleman had

in her possession at the time she pulled the defendant over were that (1) she had seen the

car drive by twice at a slow rate of speed; (2) the vehicle matched a description she had

been given of a car seen in an area where several vehicles had been burglarized (or stolen)

the night before; and (3) while she had followed it, the car made several turns.

Additionally, she testified that she had been told by someone that the car had been “circling

the neighborhood for quite some time.” There was no proof as to the speed limit of the

neighborhood or the proximity of the neighborhood to the area where the vehicles had been

burglarized (or stolen).

Prior to pulling the defendant over, Officer Coleman was constitutionally

required to have a reasonable suspicion, supported by specific and articulable facts, that a

criminal offense had been or was about to be committed. The facts adduced by the Sta te

at the suppression hearing simply do not form the basis for such a suspic ion. Prior to

stopping him, Officer Coleman had not observed the defendant violate any traffic law, cf.

Whren v. U.S., __ U.S. __, __ , 116 S.Ct. 17 69, 1772 (1996) (“As a general matter, the
5

decision to stop an automobile is re asonable where the police have probable cause to

believe that a traffic violation has occurred.”); she had not received reliable information

that the defendant had just committed a crime, or that he was about to commit one, cf. State

v. Banner, 685 S.W.2d 298 (Tenn. Crim. App. 1984); nor was she aware of an outstanding

capias for the defendant's arrest, cf. State v. Watkins, 827 S.W.2d 293 (Tenn. 1992). In

short, Officer Coleman stopped the defendant's car without a sufficient basis to do so and

thereby violated his constitutional rights. Accordingly, the evidence obtained as a result

of the unconstitutional stop was properly suppressed.

The judgment below is affirmed.

________________________________

JOHN H. PEAY, Judge

CONCUR:

_______________________________

PAUL G. SUMMERS, Judge

_______________________________

DAVID G. HAYES, Judge