Opinion ID: 3068338
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Captain Farris did.

Text: No one asked Sudduth to state the time when the municipal judge was telephoned. The municipal judge responded that he had “prior commitments that he had to take care of and advised that he would run by the office the first thing the next morning when the office opened.” When the police office opened at 8:00 a.m. on Tuesday, Sudduth presented an affidavit to the court clerk. The judge arrived 30 minutes later, examined the affidavit, and conferred with Sudduth about the crime. Probable cause may be determined “by a magistrate in a nonadversary proceeding on hearsay and written testimony.” Gerstein, 420 U.S. at 120. The municipal judge determined there was probable cause and authorized arrest warrants for murder and manslaughter. There was little on which jurors could rely to find that an effort to contact the municipal judge was made prior to the passage of 48 hours after the arrest. Thus, there are two delays of potential significance. The first is the failure even to try to contact a magistrate until more than 48 hours from the arrest. The other is the additional delay that occurred after a judge was contacted due to his unavailability until the next morning. We note preliminarily that there was no evidence of a history or policy in the Pontotoc Police Department of not seeking a magistrate’s review if the need arose at inconvenient times. In both Gerstein and McLaughlin, objectionable policies at the state and county levels were the moving force behind those opinions. See 3 LaFave, Search and Seizure § 5.1(g) at 53-54. For example under the Florida system reversed in Gerstein, “a person could be arrested without a warrant and subsequently put on trial . . . all without a preliminary hearing or other judicial determination of probable cause.” Id. § 5.1(g) at 54. In 8 Case: 09-60037 Document: 00511791616 Page: 9 Date Filed: 03/16/2012 No. 09-60037 McLaughlin, the County of Riverside had a policy of no magistrate-access on weekends and holidays. See McLaughlin, 500 U.S. at 47. We now examine whether the events causing the delay could be considered extraordinary. Police were concerned about their authority to get a probable cause determination on a crime that may not have occurred within the city. The Supreme Court has said that “delay motivated by ill will” is unreasonable. Id. at 56. There was no evidence that ill will or pretext underlay the effort to determine whether the crime occurred in Pontotoc. In addition, Brown was not arrested without probable cause and then held “for the purpose of gathering additional evidence to justify the arrest.” Id. Holding someone for that reason is an improper restraint when authorities do not have reasonable grounds to believe that person is guilty of an offense justifying an arrest. See Maryland v. Pringle, 540 U.S. 366, 370 (2003). “It is not the function of the police to arrest . . . and to use an interrogating process at police headquarters in order to determine whom they should charge before committing magistrate on ‘probable cause.’” Mallory v. United States, 354 U.S. 449, 456 (1957), limited on other grounds, Corley v. United States, 556 U.S. 303, 321-22 (2009). Once police did have fairly clear evidence that Brown committed the crime in their jurisdiction, we assume at least 50 hours had passed since the arrest. There is evidence that almost immediately, a magistrate was contacted. The magistrate was unavailable then, necessitating an overnight delay. In viewing the legitimacy of that delay, we must not ignore “practical realities” beyond the control of the police. McLaughlin, 500 U.S. at 57. We also weigh that jurors made a decision on reasonableness. Some of our sister circuits have held that, absent evidence of an impermissible purpose, whether a particular length of detention is reasonable “is a question best left open for juries to answer based on the facts presented in each case.” Chortek v. City of Milwaukee, 356 F.3d 740, 747 (7th Cir. 2004) (quotation marks and 9 Case: 09-60037 Document: 00511791616 Page: 10 Date Filed: 03/16/2012 No. 09-60037 citation omitted); Berry v. Baca, 379 F.3d 764, 769 (9th Cir. 2004). There was evidence on which jurors could rely that only a brief time passed beyond 48 hours when police resolved the uncertainties about jurisdiction, and police acted promptly thereafter by seeking a magistrate. The subsequent overnight delay was the result of the magistrate’s unavailability. These reasons could be seen as extraordinary. Brown argues instead that these reasons for delay are impermissible. We now turn to that argument. 2. Unreasonable Conduct and Probable Cause to Arrest Brown alleges that he was arrested for a traffic offense, then held so an investigation into the murder could occur. He relies on another court’s conclusion that police cannot delay the probable-cause inquiry in order to investigate the suspect’s participation in crimes other than those forming the basis for arrest. See United States v. Davis, 174 F.3d 941, 945 (8th Cir. 1999). There is scant evidence, though, that Brown was arrested for driving without proper license plates and then held while being investigated for murder. The arrest report itself, dated Saturday at 2:00 p.m., stated Brown was arrested for the murder. There was a substantial basis by that point to arrest him: (i) Brown’s recent history of violence toward Moore; (ii) the McDonald’s manager’s report that Brown and Moore had argued repeatedly that Friday and had plans to travel together that evening; (iii) information from Moore’s mother that the pregnant victim failed to return home Friday, as well as representations from a neighbor that Brown was neither home when the neighbor retired to bed at 2:00 a.m., nor on Saturday morning; and (iv) the victim’s friend’s corroboration that Moore had weekend plans with Brown. These facts, all known to Officer Sudduth before Brown’s arrest, satisfied the threshold for probable cause of guilt of the crimes, namely, a “fair probability” that Brown was responsible for Moore’s murder and the death of her unborn child. United States v. Garcia, 179 F.3d 265, 269 (5th Cir. 1999); see Miss. Code Ann. § 97-3-19(a) (1999) (outlawing the “killing of a human being . 10 Case: 09-60037 Document: 00511791616 Page: 11 Date Filed: 03/16/2012 No. 09-60037 . . [w]hen done with deliberate design”); id. § 97-3-37 (criminalizing the “willful killing of an unborn quick child” as manslaughter). “Probable cause exists when the facts available at the time of the arrest would support a reasonable person’s belief that an offense has been . . . committed and that the individual arrested is the guilty party.” United States v. Hearn, 563 F.3d 95, 103 (5th Cir. 2009) (quotation marks and citation omitted). The delay was not for any reason previously recognized as impermissible. Instead, delay was for the purpose of discovering whether Brown committed his crimes within the officers’ jurisdiction. We are not concluding that the indefinite holding of a prisoner while jurisdictional doubt is resolved can be justified, only that the few hours beyond 48 that passed here before seeking a magistrate’s ruling could be found by jurors not to violate the Fourth Amendment. We are also not concluding that any jurisdictional dilemma will excuse a delay. As summarized for the jury during closing argument: [Police] knew a murder had taken place all right. They had a young woman dead. There was no question about the crime. It was just a question about where . . . . And that caused a jurisdictional issue. Which police department? Which law enforcement agency handles it? . . . In all [Sudduth’s] years working for the Pontotoc Police Department, there’s [sic] been two murders, and this was one of them. And he had never had anything like this.” Police were diligent once jurisdiction was determined, and then confronted the practical reality of having to wait overnight for a magistrate. On these facts, jurors were not prohibited from finding delay was justified as an “emergency” or “extraordinary circumstance” due to law enforcement’s late discovery of facts to support that the crime occurred within the relevant jurisdiction. McLaughlin, 500 U.S. at 57. II. Illegal Arrest Claim & Other Issues Brown also claims he was subjected to an illegal arrest. Police may arrest a suspect “in a public place without a warrant if they have probable cause to 11 Case: 09-60037 Document: 00511791616 Page: 12 Date Filed: 03/16/2012 No. 09-60037 believe that the individual committed a felony.” Garcia, 179 F.3d at 268 (citing United States v. Watson, 423 U.S. 411, 423-24 (1976)). This principle explains why the district court was correct not to attribute significance in its jury charge to Brown’s arrest having been warrantless. The facts already recounted furnished probable cause, for which hearsay can be used. United States v. McCarty, 36 F.3d 1349, 1356 (5th Cir. 1994). Brown also argues that police needed to prepare sworn affidavits before the arrest. His argument misreads the Fourth Amendment, which only specifies that “no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation.” U.S. Const. amend. IV. By its plain terms, the Amendment requires an oath or affirmation when a warrant is sought and has no application to the warrantless arrest for a felony. We reject Brown’s myriad arguments concerning alleged trial errors. Brown did not object to the errors and can succeed only if he can show error that is plain and affected his substantial rights; if that much is shown, then this court has discretion to correct if leaving the error undisturbed would “seriously affect[] the fairness, integrity, or public reputation of judicial proceedings.” United States v. Mason, 668 F.3d 203, 208 (5th Cir. 2012) (quotation marks and citation omitted). Brown failed to show that the district court committed plain error by informing the jury venire that Brown was an inmate and a convicted felon. Throughout the trial, Brown himself discussed that he was an inmate. We disagree with Brown that instruction one was confusing. It was intelligible in defining probable cause for an arrest and detailing when an arrest could be made. Instruction four also was valid, as it accurately stated the law under Gerstein and McLaughlin and tracked the language from Baker v. McCollan, 443 U.S. 137, 143 (1979). The court did not abuse its discretion in (1) allowing the defendants to impeach Brown with his deposition testimony, (2) refusing to allow Brown to admit affidavits purportedly undermining Sudduth’s testimony, or (3) denying Brown’s request for subpoenas. See Learmonth v. Sears, Roebuck & Co., 631 12 Case: 09-60037 Document: 00511791616 Page: 13 Date Filed: 03/16/2012 No. 09-60037 F.3d 724, 733 (5th Cir. 2011); United States v. Gonzales, 79 F.3d 413, 424-25 (5th Cir. 1996). Brown’s contention that the district court erred in presenting the issue of qualified immunity to the jury is meritless. A jury may be given the issue of qualified immunity if that defense was not resolved on summary judgment. Melear v. Spears, 862 F.2d 1177, 1184 (5th Cir. 1989). It was not an abuse of discretion by the district court, after receiving a jury note and hearing counsels’ arguments, not to define the term “judicial determination” beyond what the original instructions conveyed. We review a judge’s response to a jury note for an abuse of discretion and for harmfulness of any error. United States v. Ramos-Cardenas, 524 F.3d 600, 610 (5th Cir. 2008). There was no abuse of discretion. Finally, the record does not support Brown’s allegation that the defendants violated discovery disclosure rules. The motions to file untimely reply briefs and to amend exhibits are GRANTED. The judgment is AFFIRMED. 13