Opinion ID: 166692
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Arrest of Mr. Kilgore

Text: As discussed above, after Officer Miller shot out the front tire of Mr. Lewis’s truck, Mr. Lewis attempted to escape on foot. Mr. Kilgore, on the other hand, did not attempt to exit the truck. Officer Miller “asked . . . [Mr.] Kilgore . . . to get out of [Mr. Lewis’s truck] and get in [Officer Miller’s] vehicle, so that [Officer Miller] could assist [Chief] Crittenden in locating [Mr.] Lewis.” Aplt. App., Vol. 1, Doc. 7, Attach. A at 4. It is unclear whether Mr. Kilgore was actually placed in Officer Miller’s vehicle, because Chief Crittenden “[a]lmost immediately” informed Officer Miller that he had caught Mr. Lewis and was returning to the convenience store. Id. Mr. Lewis and Mr. Kilgore were eventually handcuffed and placed in the police car of another officer who had arrived at the scene. Mr. Kilgore maintains that he was handcuffed and placed in the police car prior to the officers’ search of the truck and discovery of the eleven boxes of decongestant tablets and the used and unused needles and syringes. Because Officer Miller received the phone call from the store manager telling him that Mr. Lewis had purchase pseudoephedrine at “approximately sometime after 10:00 a.m,” id. at 3, and because Officer Miller requested a wrecker service to impound Mr. Lewis’s truck and began the inventory search at “approximately 10:39 a.m,” id. at 4, it is reasonable to assume that the most time -13- Mr. Kilgore spent handcuffed in the back of the police car prior to the search was approximately twenty to thirty minutes. “If a police-citizen encounter exceeds the limits of a Terry stop, the detention becomes an arrest that must be supported by probable cause.” Neff , 300 F.3d at 1220. “The allowable scope of an investigative detention cannot be determined by reference to a bright-line rule; common sense and ordinary human experience must govern over rigid criteria. Moreover, we should not engage in unrealistic second-guessing of a police officer’s decision.” Id. (quotation omitted). Here the detention prior to the search of Mr. Lewis’s truck was not onerous enough to exceed the limits of an investigatory detention and become an arrest. Our decision in Neff is instructive. There, the police received a report that the defendant was intoxicated and was walking down the street carrying a concealed weapon. The police located the defendant and asked him to stop. The defendant ignored their request and, when he reached for his chest or waist, the police officers drew their weapons and ordered him to drop to the ground. The police frisked and handcuffed the defendant and found shotgun shells in his jacket but no shotgun. After a period of questioning, the defendant directed the officers to a sawed-off shotgun in the cab of a truck that he had walked past a few minutes -14- earlier. Id. at 1219. Defendant claimed that the police had arrested him without probable cause prior to finding the shotgun. This court held: a Terry stop does not become unreasonable just because police officers use handcuffs on a subject or place him on the ground. Further, the use of guns in connection with a stop is permissible where the police reasonably believe the weapons are necessary for their protection. Since police officers should not be required to take unnecessary risks in performing their duties, they are authorized to take such steps as [are] reasonably necessary to protect their personal safety and to maintain the status quo during the course of [a Terry ] stop. Id. at 1220 (citations and internal quotation marks omitted; alterations in original). Our decision in United States v. Shareef , 100 F.3d 1491 (10th Cir. 1996), is similarly instructive. Three vehicles traveling together were stopped for speeding. When the officer radioed the drivers’ identifying information to the dispatcher, he was informed that one of the drivers, Smith, was wanted on a weapons charge in another state and was considered armed and dangerous. Upon receiving this information, the officer, with the help of backup, had each of the six occupants of the three cars exit the vehicles one at a time, and the occupants were frisked, handcuffed, and made to kneel on the pavement, while the officers pointed their guns at them. About an hour after receiving the initial information, the officers learned that Smith was not in fact a wanted felon. All but one of the occupants remained handcuffed the entire time despite the fact that they had been frisked -15- and the officers knew they were not armed. Id. at 1496-99. This court found that, although it was a close question, the use of handcuffs was reasonable and did not transform the detention into an unlawful arrest so long as the officers had a reasonable suspicion that Smith was a wanted felon. Id. at 1507. This case is not as close as Shareef . Mr. Kilgore was with Mr. Lewis when Mr. Lewis purchased a large quantity of pseudoephedrine and then tried to run over a police officer who was trying to stop Mr. Lewis’s truck. For the officers’ safety, Officer Miller fired his weapon to disable the vehicle. Mr. Kilgore could have been an innocent passenger or he could have been an accomplice as desperate to escape as Mr. Lewis. In this situation, it was entirely reasonable for the officers handcuff to both Mr. Kilgore and Mr. Lewis and place them in the back of a police car while conducting their investigation. It is clear, however, that Mr. Kilgore was arrested after the inventory search of the vehicle. Mr. Kilgore alleges that the evidence found during the search does not constitute probable cause for such an arrest. “To determine whether an officer had probable cause to arrest an individual, we examine the events leading up to the arrest, and then decide whether these historical facts, viewed from the standpoint of an objectively reasonable police officer, amount to probable cause.” Pringle , 540 U.S. at 371 (internal quotation marks omitted). The Supreme Court further stated in Pringle that “[t]he probable-cause standard is -16- incapable of precise definition or quantification into percentages because it deals with probabilities and depends on the totality of the circumstances.” Id. In Pringle , the defendant was one of three men arrested riding in a car at 3:16 a.m. The officers found $763 in cash in the glove compartment and five baggies of cocaine behind the back-seat armrest. The defendant was riding in the front passenger seat. The men offered no information as to the ownership of the drugs or money and all three were arrested. Id. at 365-69. The Supreme Court found that probable cause existed for the arrest. The Court noted that [the defendant] and his two companions were in a relatively small automobile . . . [and] that a car passenger . . . will often be engaged in a common enterprise with the driver, and have the same interest in concealing the fruits or the evidence of their wrongdoing. Here we think it was reasonable for the officer to infer a common enterprise among the three men. The quantity of drugs and cash in the car indicated the likelihood of drug dealing, an enterprise to which a dealer would be unlikely to admit an innocent person with the potential to furnish evidence against him. Id. at 373 (quotation omitted). The Court held: We think it an entirely reasonable inference from these facts that any or all three of the occupants had knowledge of, and exercised dominion and control over, the cocaine. Thus a reasonable officer could conclude that there was probable cause to believe [the defendant] committed the crime of possession of cocaine, either solely or jointly. Id. at 372. Here, Mr. Kilgore was in the passenger seat of Mr. Lewis’s truck. The officers had information that Mr. Lewis was involved in the manufacture of -17- methamphetamine, they had watched Mr. Lewis exit the convenience store with a plastic bag that the manager had informed them by phone contained a large quantity of pseudoephedrine, Mr. Lewis had attempted to escape when he saw the officers pull up, the officers had found a case containing a large quantity of syringes and needles, including one used needle and syringe, on the floor board of the front passenger seat where Mr. Kilgore was seated, and the bag with the eleven boxes of decongestant tablets was found in the middle of the back seat “within [Mr.] Kilgore’s reach.” Aplt. App., Vol. 1, Doc. 7, Attach. A at 1-5. “The term “probable cause,” according to it usual acceptation, means less than evidence which would justify condemnation. It imports a seizure made under circumstances which warrant suspicion.” Pringle , 540 U.S. at 371 (internal quotation marks and alterations omitted). From the above, a reasonable officer could conclude that there was probable cause to believe that Mr. Kilgore had committed any of the offenses previously mentioned. 1