Opinion ID: 1685078
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Detention Before and During Execution of the Warrant

Text: ¶ 46. We next address the detention of Amerie Becker pending the arrival and during the execution of the warrant. In Rawlings v. Kentucky, 448 U.S. 98, 110 (1980), the Supreme Court stated that the legality of temporarily detaining a person at the scene of suspected drug activity to secure a search warrant may be an open question. The defendant in Rawlings was a visitor at a house where police smelled and observed marijuana. The Court more or less assumed that when the police detained Rawlings while they obtained a search warrant, they were violating the Fourth Amendment. Id. at 106. Nonetheless, the Court upheld Rawlings' conviction. Id. at 111. ¶ 47. In the years since 1980, there has been a clear evolution in the law. In Summers, the Court reviewed the case of a man who was detained as he was leaving his home and then held while the police executed a search warrant of his house. Summers, 452 U.S. at 693. Thereafter the man was arrested and searched. The Court said: [F]or Fourth Amendment purposes, we hold that a warrant to search for contraband founded on probable cause implicitly carries with it the limited authority to detain the occupants of the premises while a proper search is conducted. Id. at 705. The Court explained that: The connection of an occupant to that home gives the police officer an easily identifiable and certain basis for determining that suspicion of criminal activity justifies a detention of that occupant. Id. at 703-04. ¶ 48. Applying Summers to this case, it seems clear that law enforcement officers could have validly detained Cramer, the person to whom the room was registered, while the search warrant for contraband was executed. However, Vorburger attempts to distinguish the Summers case as applied to Becker. He contends that Becker was neither a resident nor occupant of the room. The answer to this argument is found in two federal cases, United States v. Pace, 898 F.2d 1218 (7th Cir. 1990), and United States v. Fountain, 2 F.3d 656 (6th Cir. 1993). ¶ 49. In Pace, the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals applied Summers to a situation in which officers went to a condominium to execute a search warrant for gambling records and money and found the owner and three non-residents. Pace, 898 F.2d at 1223. The officers patted down all four men and detained them while they searched the condominium. Id. Two of the nonresidents later claimed that they had been unlawfully detained during the search and, therefore, were arrested. Id. at 1238. They argued that Summers did not apply because they were not occupants or residents of the condominium. Id. at 1239. The court determined that Summers did apply because: While it turned out that [the two men] were not residents of [the] condominium, it is still significant that they were present in a condominium that a neutral magistrate had found probable cause to believe contained evidence of illegal gambling activities. The police officers could not be sure whether or not [the two men] were involved in the gambling, nor could they even be sure whether or not [the two men] were occupants of the condominium. Thus as in Summers, the connection of [the two men] to the condominium gave the officers an easily identifiable and certain basis for detaining [the two men] during the search. Id. ¶ 50. Similarly, in Fountain, the Sixth Circuit applied Summers to a situation in which law enforcement officers looking for drugs executed a search warrant at a house where the owner and three other people were present. Fountain, 2 F.3d at 659. The officers gathered the four people they found in the house, handcuffed them, and had them lie face down on the floor. Id. In executing the warrant, the officers found illegal drugs. Id. at 660. They then questioned each of the four detainees separately. Id. One of the nonresident defendants moved to suppress the evidence against him, claiming that the officers could not have detained him under Summers because he was not a resident of the house and was therefore not an occupant. Id. at 663. The Fountain court determined that the officers acted reasonably in detaining the defendant because his apparently voluntary connection with the home provided the agents with `an easily identifiable and certain basis for determining that suspicion of criminal activity justifie[d] detention.' Id. The court rejected the argument that the Supreme Court intended Summers to apply only to residents. Id. [8] ¶ 51. We agree with the Pace and Fountain interpretations of Summers. The Task Force officers acted reasonably in detaining Becker and Vorburger even though they were not the persons to whom room 230 was registered. Becker and Vorburger voluntarily connected themselves to the motel room and its occupant. Without investigation, they could not be dismissed as innocent bystanders. There was reasonable suspicion that they were present at the motel room for criminal activity. ¶ 52. Vorburger points out that Becker was not in the room at the time the officers stopped her. Under the circumstances, we find this distinction meaningless. Becker was standing outside the room with the person to whom the room was registered. The registrant was putting his key in the lock. Becker was seconds away from entering the room and later admitted that she intended to enter the room. The fact that Becker and Vorburger were standing immediately outside the room when they were stopped does not destroy their required voluntary connection to the room. ¶ 53. A third distinction between this case and Summers is that the officers in Summers already had their warrant when they detained the defendant. Here, Becker was detained before the warrant had arrived and before it was signed. ¶ 54. This concern was substantially allayed in United States v. Ritchie, 35 F.3d 1477 (10th Cir. 1994). An FBI agent was traveling to the defendant's home with a search warrant when the defendant began to leave the premises in an automobile. Agents on the scene detained him for about ten minutes until the arrival of the warrant. The Tenth Circuit determined that the agents on the scene were justified in stopping and detaining the defendant because they knew that a neutral party had issued a search warrant for [the] premises, thus giving them reasonable suspicion to detain him. Id. at 1483. ¶ 55. The Supreme Court affirmed this principle on different facts in Illinois v. McArthur, 531 U.S. 326 (2001). In McArthur, a police officer with probable cause to believe that the defendant had marijuana in his trailer home, prevented him from entering the home unless the officers accompanied him inside. Id. at 329. In the meantime, another officer left to obtain a search warrant. Id. The Court reversed an Illinois court's suppression of the drug evidence found in the trailer. Writing for the Court, Justice Breyer explained: When faced with special law enforcement needs, diminished expectations of privacy, minimal intrusions, or the like, the Court has found that certain general, or individual, circumstances may render a warrantless search or seizure reasonable. . . . . . . . . . . [T]he police made reasonable efforts to reconcile their law enforcement needs with the demands of personal privacy. They neither searched the trailer nor arrested McArthur before obtaining a warrant. Rather, they imposed a significantly less restrictive restraint, preventing McArthur only from entering the trailer unaccompanied. . . . . . . [T]he police imposed the restraint for a limited period of time, namely, two hours. . . . As far as the record reveals, this time period was no longer than reasonably necessary for the police, acting with diligence, to obtain the warrant. Id. at 330-32. ¶ 56. The rationale for detentions involving search warrants is fully explained in the Summers opinion. The Court noted the difference between the detention of Summers and the detention of a suspect on the street, à la Terry: A neutral and detached magistrate had found probable cause to believe that the law was being violated in that house and had authorized a substantial invasion of the privacy of the persons who resided there. The detention of one of the residents while the premises were searched, although admittedly a significant restraint on his liberty, was surely less intrusive than the search itself. Summers, 452 U.S. at 701. ¶ 57. The involvement of a neutral and detached magistrate also impressed Justice Souter in the McArthur case. Justice Souter wrote that the legitimacy of the decision to impound [McArthur's] dwelling follows from the law's strong preference for warrants . . . . The law can hardly raise incentives to obtain a warrant without giving the police a fair chance to take their probable cause to a magistrate and get one. McArthur, 531 U.S. at 338 (Souter, J., concurring). ¶ 58. The Summers court evaluated the law enforcement interests in the detention of Summers and found significant: (1) the law enforcement interest in preventing flight in the event that incriminating evidence is found; (2) the law enforcement interest in minimizing the risk of harm to the officers; and (3) the law enforcement interest in the orderly completion of the search. Id. at 702-03. ¶ 59. The Court expanded on the second point, stating: Less obvious, but sometimes of greater importance, is the interest in minimizing the risk of harm to the officers. . . . [T]he execution of a warrant to search for narcotics is the kind of transaction that may give rise to sudden violence or frantic efforts to conceal or destroy evidence. Id. at 702. ¶ 60. The Summers decision provides the framework for evaluating Becker's detention pending the arrival and during the execution of the warrant for contraband. ¶ 61. Becker was detained at approximately 9:20. She and her companions were told that the officers were conducting an investigation, that the three were being detained and were not free to leave, but that they were not under arrest. The three were patted down, handcuffed, and held in the second floor corridor of a motel. All three were offered chairs. Becker declined to sit down. At one point she asked to go to the bathroom. There is a dispute about what she said and what Officer Kosovac said, but Becker did not go to the bathroom until the search warrant was executed. Her purse was not searched until later, with her consent. ¶ 62. Vorburger complains that several elements of the detention during this period were unreasonable and transformed the detention into an arrest. He argues that Becker's detention lasted for a period exceeding two hours, that she was handcuffed with her hands behind her back and directed to sit in the hallway with one or more police officers continually present, and that she was not allowed to use the bathroom privately. [9] ¶ 63. The circuit court found that Becker was detained for approximately one hour before the search warrant was executed. According to the record, her detention began at 9:20; the warrant arrived at 10:05; the warrant was read to Cramer at 10:15; and the warrant was executed at 10:17. Shortly after 10:30, Becker was taken into room 229. Thus, the period of detention related to the procurement and execution of the search warrant was roughly one hour and ten minutes. This period of detention was not unreasonable given the time of day and the distance separating police headquarters, the judge's residence, and the motel, which is located in the Town of Blooming Grove, east of Monona. In Justice Breyer's words, this time period was no longer than reasonably necessary for the police, acting with diligence, to obtain [and execute] the warrant. McArthur, 531 U.S. at 332. ¶ 64. The officers handcuffed the three detainees. In analyzing this fact, the circuit court quoted State v. Swanson, 164 Wis.2d 437, 448, 475 N.W.2d 148 (1991): Many jurisdictions have recognized that the use of handcuffs does not necessarily transform an investigative stop into an arrest. Many federal courts have made similar pronouncements. See e.g., United States v. $109,179 in U.S. Currency, 228 F.3d 1080, 1085 (9th Cir. 2000) (citing Halvorsen v. Baird, 146 F.3d 680, 685 (9th Cir. 1998); Alexander v. County of Los Angeles, 64 F.3d 1315, 1320 (9th Cir. 1995)); Fountain, 2 F.3d 656; United States v. Glenna, 878 F.2d 967, 972 (7th Cir. 1989); United States v. Taylor, 716 F.2d 701, 709 (9th Cir. 1983). ¶ 65. The Supreme Court stated in Summers that a warrant to search a premises for drugs may give rise to sudden violence . . . . The risk of harm to both the police and the occupants is minimized if the officers routinely exercise unquestioned command of the situation. Summers, 452 U.S. at 702-03 (citing 2 Wayne R. LaFave, Search and Seizure § 4.9 (1978)). ¶ 66. In this case, the officers' concern for their safety and the safety of others is well grounded in the record. There were three detainees at the motel. They were stopped in a second floor corridor. Cory Cramer, then 22, was 5 feet 10 inches tall and weighed 195 pounds. Police did not know then but later discovered in Cramer's car an electric weapon, which Cramer's girlfriend described as Cory's stun gun. Vorburger, also 22, was 6 feet 10 inches tall, 265 pounds. One of the officers at the motel recognized him as having worked as a bouncer at a local nightclub. We conclude that the officers did not act unreasonably in their efforts to protect themselves, secure the site, and preserve the status quo. See Segura v. United States, 468 U.S. 796, 815 (1984). ¶ 67. We also conclude that there is no merit to Vorburger's complaint about Becker's use of the bathroom. The testimony on this issue was disputed, and the circuit court did not find that the police had acted unreasonably. We agree. [12] ¶ 68. We recognize that in Swanson, this court stated that we use an objective test, assessing the totality of the circumstances, to determine whether a seizure has escalated into an arrest: The standard generally used to determine the moment of arrest in a constitutional sense is whether a reasonable person in the defendant's position would have considered himself or herself to be in custody, given the degree of restraint under the circumstances. The circumstances of the situation including what has been communicated by the police officers, either by their words or actions, shall be controlling under the objective test. Swanson, 164 Wis.2d at 446-47 (citations omitted). [18] The court of appeals utilized the Swanson language as the basis for its decision. Vorburger, 2001 WI App. 43, ¶¶ 14, 18. ¶ 69. We find it difficult to reconcile this Swanson language with the clear precedent in Summers, McArthur, Pace, Fountain, and Ritchie. The critical factor in this casethe factor that distinguishes it from Swanson is the presence of a valid search warrant for contraband. The search warrant is central to this case and to our analysis because it injects an objective justification, based upon the determination of a detached magistrate, into the totality of the circumstances. In Summers, the Supreme Court, in effect, recognized the concept of detention incident to the execution of a valid search warrant. This limited detention is based upon the same factorsconcern for the safety of officers and the possible destruction of evidencethat underlie searches incident to arrest. See Summers, 452 U.S. at 702; Chimel v. California, 395 U.S. 752, 763 (1969). We think such a concept applies to this case from the moment of initial detention to the completion of the search, because a search warrant was in the works and its execution was imminent, and because the police had articulable, reasonable suspicion for each of the people they detained. Becker and Vorburger cannot claim that their propinquity to room 230 was the result of pure coincidence.