Court Opinion

ID: 9495468
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 16:03:39.773444+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:57:02.273548
License: Public Domain

ALARCON, Senior Circuit Judge,
Dissenting.
I respectfully dissent. I cannot join the Majority’s opinion for several reasons:
First. The Majority has failed to discuss the dispositive issue raised by Myers in this appeal: Whether “the warrantless entry to 3203-B Henry Avenue was conducted without probable cause to believe a crime had been committed and without exigent circumstances.” (emphasis added). Instead, the Majority states summarily: “Although we conclude that Officer Azzar-ano’s initial entry into the residence was justified, we hold there was no probable cause to arrest Myers.” Maj. Op. at 255. As I will explain later, this conclusion ignores recent Supreme Court authority and is inconsistent with the law of this circuit which holds that a warrantless entry violates the Fourth Amendment unless the police have probable cause even in the presence of exigent circumstances.
Second. I would affirm the district court’s opinion because the record shows that, prior to entering, Officer Azzarano had probable cause to believe that a person within the residence was armed with a weapon and fighting with a resident.
Third. Exigent circumstances justified the warrantless entry to protect Ms. Bennett from death or serious injury from a man armed with a gun.
Fourth. The record demonstrates that the search of Myers’s backpack was incident to a lawful arrest.
I
In reviewing a district court’s findings of historical facts, we must “give due weight to inferences drawn from those facts by resident judges and local law enforcement officers.” Ornelas v. United States, 517 U.S. 690, 699, 116 S.Ct. 1657, 134 L.Ed.2d 911 (1996). We must also construe the record in the light most favorable to the Government. United States v. Lawes, 292 F.3d 123, 126 (2d Cir.2002); United States v. Runyan, 290 F.3d 223, 234 (5th Cir.2002); United States v. Cook, 277 F.3d 82, 84 (1st Cir.2002).
The “totality of the circumstances” informs a probable cause determination. Illinois v. Gates, 462 U.S. 213, 230-31, 103 S.Ct. 2317, 76 L.Ed.2d 527 (1983). In evaluating the totality of the circumstances in a given case, a court may not consider each fact in isolation. United States v. Arvizu, 534 U.S. 266, 122 S.Ct. 744, 750-51, 151 L.Ed.2d 740 (2002). In United States v. Arvizu, the Court rejected the Ninth Circuit’s “divide and conquer analysis” that considered each circumstance separately to determine whether it was susceptible of an innocent explanation. Id. at 751.
The Majority has concluded, in alternative analyses, that Officer Azzarano did not have probable cause to arrest Myers, and “even if we assume arguendo that the arrest was lawful, we would still find that the gun should have been suppressed as the subsequent search was not incident to the arrest.” Maj. Op. at 266. Clearly, at least one of these conflicting conclusions, if not the entire Majority opinion, is dictum.1
*277My review of the record has persuaded me that the district court did not clearly err in concluding that Officer Azzarano was aware of “reasonably trustworthy information ... sufficient to warrant a prudent man in believing that [Myers] had committed or was committing an offense.” Beck v. Ohio, 379 U.S. 89, 91, 85 S.Ct. 223, 13 L.Ed.2d 142 (1964). Because the reasonably trustworthy information obtained by Officer Azzarano from Diane McKnight was sufficient to warrant him to believe that an armed man was presently threatening the safety of his victim, the officer’s entry into the residence was supported by probable cause and exigent circumstances. His observations within the residence corroborated the information that he received from Ms. McKnight. The record also demonstrates that the district court did not err in concluding that the search of Myers’s backpack was incident to a lawful arrest.
II
Viewed in the light most favorable to the Government, the record demonstrates that Officer Azzarano received a radio dispatch that “a person with a gun” was involved in “a disturbance with a female companion” at 3202 Henry Avenue, Apartment B. When he received the assignment to go to that location, Officer Azzarano was a block and a half or two blocks away. He was so close to the scene that he did not have to activate his emergency lights and siren. At 3202 Henry Avenue, Officer Azzarano observed an adolescent female, Diane McKnight, standing approximately two feet outside the doorway to Apartment B. Ms. McKnight was the source of the 911 call. She is the daughter of the female inside the apartment. She is the oldest of six children. Ms. McKnight appeared to be frightened.
Ms. McKnight informed Officer Azzara-no that “her mom and her mom’s boyfriend were in the house arguing and having a fight and that her mom’s boyfriend was armed with a gun.” Ms. McKnight’s statement and her distraught demeanor provided Officer Azzarano with reliable information that her mother’s boyfriend was threatening her safety while armed with a gun. “[WJhere an informant is not a paid, unknown tipster but instead an identified eyewitness to a crime who voluntarily reports his observations to the police, the trustworthiness of such a person may be presumed.” Commonwealth v. Weidenmoyer, 539 A.2d 1291 (Pa.1988). See also United States v. Valentine, 232 F.3d 350, 354-55 (3d Cir.2000) (discussing informant reliability). Based on this information alone, an officer would reasonably believe that Ms. McKnight’s mother was facing a threat of serious bodily injury. Thus, probable cause existed to arrest Myers before Officer Azzarano crossed the threshold.
Myers contends that “the warrantless entry of 3202-B Henry Avenue was conducted without probable cause to believe a crime had been committed and without exigent circumstances. Therefore, everything that followed — the arrest and subsequent seizure of the gun — were unlawful, and the gun should have been suppressed for this reason, without more.” The Majority has failed to address this dispositive contention. It has failed to consider *278whether Ms. McKnight’s information was sufficient to cause Officer Azzarano reasonably to believe that her mother was threatened with an assault by an armed man. The Majority has also failed to respond to Myers’s contention that an insufficient showing of exigent circumstances was made that compelled an entry to save lives.
“[Pjrobable cause is an indispensable element for a warrantless search of a dwelling even in the presence of exigent circumstances.” Fisher v. Volz, 496 F.2d 333, 339 (3d Cir.1974) (internal quotation marks omitted). Ms. McKnight’s report that a man armed with a gun was involved in a fight with her mother was sufficient to warrant a person of reasonable caution to conclude that an offense that threatened the life of Ms. McKnight’s mother and endangered the safety of her five brothers and sisters was on-going. Her information provided Officer Azzarano with probable cause to enter and arrest Myers without a warrant.
The Majority has concluded that “Officer Azzarano’s initial entry into the residence was justified.” Maj. Op. at 256. The Majority has also determined, however, that “there was no probable cause to arrest Myers.” Id. The Majority has not explained how Officer Azzarano’s warrant-less entry can be “justified” if he did not have probable cause to arrest Myers. Without probable cause to arrest Myers, Officer Arrazano’s warrantless entry in the residence would not be justified under the Fourth Amendment pursuant to Kirk v. Louisiana, 536 U.S. -, 122 S.Ct. 2458, 2459, 153 L.Ed.2d 599 (2002) (per curiam), and Fisher v. Volz, 496 F.2d at 339.2 I know of no case that holds that the probable cause to make an arrest that is necessary to justify a warrantless entry disappears as soon as an officer steps into the residence. The Majority has cited none. If, as the Majority appears to have concluded, Officer Azzarano did not have probable cause to believe a crime was being committed prior to his entry into the apartment, it would be our duty to reverse the denial of the motion to suppress the seizure of the gun “for that reason, without more,” as requested by Myers.
The Fourth Amendment protects “[tjhe right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures.” U.S. Const, amend IV. Evidence seized as the result of an unreasonable search and seizure must be suppressed. Mapp v. Ohio, 367 U.S. 643, 654-55, 81 S.Ct. 1684, 6 L.Ed.2d 1081 (1961).
In this matter, the narrow question we must decide is whether the warrantless arrest of Myers in Ms. Bennett’s residence, and the search of his person conducted as an incident thereto, were unrea*279sonable under the Fourth Amendment. Ms. Bennett’s residence was not searched. No property of hers was seized. She was not arrested or charged with any crime.
In Payton v. New York, 445 U.S. 573, 100 S.Ct. 1371, 63 L.Ed.2d 639 (1980), the Supreme Court held that a New York statute that authorized the warrantless and nonconsensual entry of a private residence to make an arrest based on probable cause to believe a felony had been committed was unconstitutional. Id. at 576, 100 S.Ct. 1371. The Court stated that it would not reach the question whether a warrant-less entry to effect an arrest based on probable cause is reasonable if accompanied by exigent circumstances because “none of the New York courts relied on such justification.” Id. at 582-83, 100 S.Ct. 1371. The Court commented: “Accordingly, we have no occasion to consider the sort of emergency or dangerous situation described in our cases as ‘exigent circumstances’ that would justify a war-rantless entry into a home for the purpose of either arrest or search.” Id. at 583, 100 S.Ct. 1371. In a later passage, the Court stated:
“In terms that apply equally to seizures of property and to seizures of persons, the Fourth Amendment has drawn a firm line at the entrance to the house. Absent exigent circumstances, that threshold may not be crossed without a warrant.” Id. at 590, 100 S.Ct. 1371.
More recently, in Kirk v. Louisiana, the Court paraphrased its holding in Payton v. New York as follows: “As Payton makes plain, police officers need either a warrant or probable cause plus exigent circumstances in order to make a lawful entry into a home.” Id. at 2459. (Emphasis added). Because the Majority appears to have concluded that Officer Azzarano did not have probable cause to cross the entrance to Ms. Bennett’s residence, its conclusion that the entry was justified violates the Supreme Court’s decisions in Payton v. New York and Kirk v. Louisiana.
The Majority’s discussion of Steagald v. United States, 451 U.S. 204, 101 S.Ct. 1642, 68 L.Ed.2d 38 (1981) in footnote 9 of its opinion to refute my rebanee on Kirk v. Louisiana and this court’s decision in Fisher v. Volz is puzzling. Steagald involves a completely distinguishable factual scenario and legal analysis. The Supreme Court summarized the question presented to it in Steagald v. United States in the following words: “[T]he narrow issue before us is whether an arrest warrant — as opposed to a search warrant — is adequate to protect the Fourth Amendment interests of persons not named in the warrant, when their homes are searched without their consent and in the absence of exigent circumstances.” Id. at 212, 101 S.Ct. 1642. The Court held that “warrantless searches of a home are impermissible absent consent or exigent circumstances.” Id. at 216, 101 S.Ct. 1642. (Emphasis added).
In Steagald, police officers entered Steagald’s residence without a search warrant, consent, or exigent circumstances to serve an arrest warrant on Ricky Lyons. Lyons was not in Steagald’s residence. Nevertheless, the officers proceeded to conduct a search of Steagald’s residence. They discovered controlled substances. Steagald was arrested and indicted on federal charges. Steagald moved to suppress the evidence seized in his home on the ground that the officer did not have a search warrant when they entered his residence. Id. at 207-08, 101 S.Ct. 1642. The Supreme Court noted in Steagald that “the Fourth Amendment claim here is not being raised by Lyons. Instead, the challenge to the search is asserted by a person not named in the warrant who was convicted on the basis of evidence uncovered during a search of the residence for Ricky *280Lyons.” Id. at 212, 101 S.Ct. 1642. (Emphasis added.) The Court reversed the Fifth Circuit’s judgment in Steagald holding that the fact that the officers had a warrant for the arrest did not justify the search of Steagald’s residence. Id. at 205, 101 S.Ct. 1642. The Supreme Court concluded in Steagald that, absent consent or exigent circumstances, the police cannot conduct a warrantless search of a residence in order to seize the homeowner’s property. Id. at 216, 101 S.Ct. 1642. Here, the police did not conduct a search of Ms. Bennett’s residence nor did they seize property belonging to her. Thus, Steagald has no relevance to the issues presented in this case.
I agree with the Majority’s conclusion that Officer Azzarano’s entry was “justified” but on totally discrete grounds. Officer Azzarano’s undisputed testimony demonstrates that he received information from a credible informant that exigent circumstances compelled a warrantless entry because an armed man was fighting with the informant’s mother. This information also was sufficient to demonstrate that there was probable cause to arrest Myers for the commission of a serious crime.
I also agree with the district court that failure to enter the residence and arrest Myers under these circumstances would have been a grave dereliction of Officer Azzarano’s duty to protect the safety of his fellow citizens. The record, viewed in the light most favorable to the Government, demonstrates that Officer Azzarano had probable cause to believe a serious crime was being committed and that exigent circumstances required an immediate entry based on Ms. McKnight’s report.
Ill
When Officer Azzarano entered the apartment, he heard raised voices and a lot of movement which he characterized as “what appeared to be some type of fight occurring on the second floor.” Officer Azzarano called out “police.” He did not receive a response. At the top of the stairs, Officer Azzarano encountered Lydia Bennett. He testified that she “seemed upset to me and seemed that she had just been involved in some type of altercation.” He further testified that her “demeanor seemed to be consistent with someone who had been involved in some type of dispute. Her voice was shaky, she seemed upset.”
Officer Azzarano asked Ms. Bennett where the person was who had been upstairs with her. She replied there was no one upstairs with her. Based on Officer Azzarano’s police experience in responding to domestic-dispute calls, her response suggested to him that “she had, in fact, been involved in some type of dispute and there was someone nearby.” Officer Az-zarano was aware that Ms. Bennett’s statement that she had been alone was not true because he had heard at least two voices, and more than one set of footsteps. He inferred from her false response that she was afraid that Myers would retaliate if she complained of his conduct.
As of the date of the suppression hearing, Officer Azzarano had been a member of the Philadelphia Police Department for three years. During that time, he had responded to at least one domestic disturbance call a day. He testified that such calls are very dangerous because the anger level of the persons engaged in the altercation is elevated and “lots of times you don’t exactly know what you’re walking into.” In United States v. Arvizu, the Supreme Court instructed that the totality of the circumstances standard “allows officers to draw on their own experience and specialized training to make inferences from and deductions about the cumulative information available to them that might well elude an untrained person.” 122 S.Ct. at *281750-51 (internal quotation marks omitted). Thus, it was reasonable, based on his experience in investigating domestic violence, for Officer Azzarano to infer from her distraught condition, and her denial that anyone was upstairs with her, that she feared that revealing where Myers was hiding might endanger her safety.
Officer Azzarano’s own observations corroborated Ms. McKnight’s information that her mother was involved in an altercation with an armed man. After receiving Ms. Bennett’s deceptive reply, Officer Az-zarano saw Myers hiding behind a partially open bedroom door. The fact that the person behind the door was attempting to avoid detection caused Officer Azzarano to conclude that there was no reason for Myers “to hide from me if, in fact, it was just a simple argument between two parties.” 3 Thus, based on Ms. McKnight’s request for police intervention to protect her mother from a man with a gun, and his independent observations, Officer Azzara-no aimed his gun at Myers and ordered him to step out from behind the door. When Myers stepped out, he was carrying a black backpack. Officer Azzarano ordered Myers to lie down on the floor. Myers complied and while doing so, placed the backpack on the floor approximately three feet away from his body. Officer Azzarano handcuffed Myer’s hands behind his back and placed him under arrest for domestic assault. Officer Azzarano defined the Pennsylvania crime of domestic assault as “assault or some type of threat level towards someone who [Myers] had a previous relationship with.” Officer Az-zarano checked Myers’s waistband to see if he was carrying a concealed weapon. Myers was not carrying a weapon on his person.
IV
In a well-reasoned discussion of the pertinent facts and the applicable legal principles, the district court held that Officer Azzarano had probable cause to believe that a domestic disturbance was in progress involving a man armed with a gun and that these exigent circumstances justified a warrantless entry of the residence. I am persuaded that each of the district court’s factual findings is supported by evidence in the record and that it did not commit any legal errors.
A.
The district court determined that Officer Azzarano had probable cause to arrest Myers for the crime of simple assault pursuant to 18 Pa.C.S. § 2701(a)(3) (2000). Section 2701(a)(3) provides that “a person is guilty of assault if he ... attempts by physical menace to put another in fear of imminent serious bodily injury.” At the time of Myers’s arrest, a police officer had the right to arrest a person for simple assault that did not take place in the presence of the police officer if “he has probable cause to believe that the defendant has violated section ... 2701 (relating to simple assault) ... against his spouse or other person with whom he resides or has formerly resided.” 18 Pa.C.S. § 2711(a) (2000). An officer may not arrest a person under section 2711 “without first observing recent physical injury to the victim or other corroborative evidence.” 18 Pa.C.S. § 2711(a) (2000) (emphasis added). It is quite true that Officer Azzarano did not see Myers assault Ms. Bennett, nor did he observe recent physical injury. The record, however, is replete with corroborative *282evidence known to Officer Azzarano that would support an inference that Myers “attempted] by physical menace to put[Ms. Bennett] in fear of imminent serious bodily injury.” 18 Pa.C.S. § 2701(a)(3).
As summarized above, before arresting Myers, Officer Azzarano was aware of the following circumstances:
1. The Philadelphia Police Department had received a 911 telephone call that a person with a gun was involved in a disturbance with a female companion.
2. Officer Azzarano was told by Ms. McKnight that her mother and her boyfriend were involved in a fight and the boyfriend was armed with a gun.
3. Officer Azzarano heard what sounded like a fight on the second floor.
4. When Officer Azzarano observed Ms. Bennett, she appeared to be upset as if she had been involved in an altercation.
5. When asked about the whereabouts of the other participant in the dispute, Ms. Bennett falsely represented she had been alone.
6. Based on his prior experience in investigating domestic disputes, Officer Az-zarano inferred from her false response that she was afraid to respond truthfully because she was afraid of violent retribution.
7. Myers did not respond when Officer Azzarano announced his presence as a police officer, and instead hid behind a partially open bedroom door.
8. Myers was holding a backpack just prior to being placed under arrest.
The totality of these circumstances provided corroborative evidence that Myers had attempted to place Ms. Bennett in fear of bodily injury.
In rejecting the district court’s findings, the Majority has made its own credibility findings, reweighed the evidence, and failed to consider the record in the light most favorable to the Government, in contravention of clearly established principles of appellate review. See United States v. Igbonwa, 120 F.3d 437, 440-41 (3d Cir.1997). The Majority also appears to have confused the quantum of evidence required to demonstrate probable cause for an arrest with the heavy burden placed on the Government to present sufficient evidence of each element of a crime that persuades the trier of fact of the guilt of the defendant beyond a reasonable doubt. Draper v. United States, 358 U.S. 307, 312, 79 S.Ct. 329, 3 L.Ed.2d 327 (1959).
B.
The district court’s findings concerning the circumstances that demonstrated probable cause for an arrest for simple assault under Pennsylvania law read as follows:
Now, with reference to the arrest and the information that the officer had available to him at that time, Pennsylvania Statute defines an assault as— among other things, as an attempt to cause or intentionally, knowingly or recHessly causing bodily injury to another and also includes attempts by physical menace to put another in fear of serious bodily injury.
In this regard, I find that there was an ongoing simple assault in the presence of Officer Azzarano and, therefore, conclude that he had probable cause to arrest for that ongoing assault at that time, since it was occurring in his presence. This is based on the totality of the circumstances that I have mentioned, including the 9-1-1 report, the conversation with McKnight, the statement that McKnight said they were fighting and that the boyfriend has a gun, that he heard the raised voices *283upstairs and the movement which suggested an ongoing fight, his conversation with Bennett and her denial of his presence and also her demeanor, and that the house was in array (sic) and that the defendant was hiding and she denied that he was there. So, I conclude, therefore, that he did have the probable cause to make an arrest for simple assault at that time.
(emphasis added).
The Majority appears to have concluded that the term “fighting” as used by Ms. McKnight in describing the ongoing crime being committed against her mother refers solely to a “physical altercation or struggle.” Maj. Op. at 259. The term “fight,” however, includes “a verbal disagreement.” Webster’s Third New International Dictionary 847 (1976). It is undisputed that Officer Azzarano heard raised voices, observed Ms. Bennett’s distraught condition, and saw that the upstairs area was in disarray, as if there had been a struggle. He had also been informed by a person whose information is presumed to be trustworthy that Myers was armed with a gun. Officer Azzarano’s independent visual and auditory perception of these circumstances involving an armed man would lead a reasonable person to conclude that the information he had received from Ms. McKnight was accurate and that there was probable cause to believe Myers was attempting to place Ms. Bennett in fear of imminent serious bodily injury.
The Majority has made a factual finding that the upstairs area where Officer Azzar-ano encountered Ms. Bennett was not in disarray. The district court’s contrary finding that the area was in disarray was based on Officer Azzarano’s undisputed testimony. The Majority states:
“The record is devoid of any suggestion that the level of disarray was excessive to the point of being probative of a physical altercation. The most that we can conclude from the officer’s description of the state of the apartment is that it was messy.” (Emphasis added.)
Maj. Op. at 260.
The Majority’s finding that the apartment was “messy,” and not in disarray, violates the rule that appellate courts cannot reweigh the evidence, or engage in fact-finding. Igbonwa, 120 F.3d at 440-41. Officer Azzarano’s description of the condition of the apartment was undisputed. The Majority’s finding also ignores Officer Azzarano’s daily experience in investigating domestic disputes and his prior observations of the condition of residences where violations of section 2701(a)(3) had occurred.
The quoted language also ignores the fact that evidence of a physical altercation is not required to prove a violation of section 2701(a)(3). That crime is committed if a person attempts to put another in fear of imminent serious bodily injury by physical menace. 18 Pa.C.S. § 2701(a)(3). Proof of a physical injury is not required.
The Majority states that “there is no evidence that Myers pointed a gun at Bennett in Azzarano’s presence or otherwise, and nothing supports the inference that Azzarano thought he had.” Maj. Op. at 257. In fact, Officer Azzarano testified that he arrested Myers for “domestic assault” because of his “terrorist threats” with a handgun. The refusal of the Majority to accept Officer Azzarano’s undisputed testimony concerning the inferences he drew, based on the totality of the circumstances, is contrary to our duty as appellate judges to construe the record in the light most favorable to the Government in reviewing the denial of a motion to suppress. Cook, 277 F.3d at 84.
*284C.
In reweighing the evidence in the record, the Majority has also minimized what Azzarano saw, finding that “the only thing Myers did in [Azzarano’s] presence was hide behind a door.” Maj. Op. at 257. This finding is also inconsistent with Officer Azzarano’s undisputed testimony. As Officer Azzarano ascended the stairway, Myers attempted to conceal himself behind a partially open doorway. The threat of imminent harm to Ms. Bennett from an armed man did not cease. It continued— but with Officer Azzarano as an additional victim of Myers’s menacing behavior. Officer Azzarano testified:
When I saw the defendant was hiding behind the door, my fear level increased greatly. I figured something had, in fact — something happened or something was happening and there would be no reason for him to hide from me if, in fact, it was a simple argument between two parties.
(emphasis added).
Appellate judges spend their days cloistered in secure buildings guarded by United States Marshals, protected from strangers and the public by electronically controlled doors and elevators. We have no expertise in the investigation of volatile domestic altercations. We have no firsthand experience regarding the threat of violence presented by persons involved in a domestic dispute when a police officer attempts to act as a peacemaker in calming their fury. Instead of engaging in a reductio ad absurdum dissection of an officer’s recitation of the totality of the circumstances confronted in making an arrest under life-threatening conditions, in clear violation of the Supreme Court’s instruction in United States v. Arvizu, we should adhere to this court’s admonition that “when the district court’s decision is based on testimony that is coherent and plausible, not internally inconsistent and not contradicted by external evidence, there can almost never be a finding of clear error.” Igbonwa, 120 F.3d at 440-41 (internal quotation marks and citations omitted). The district court did not clearly err in concluding that Officer Azzarano had probable cause to believe that Myers committed a violation of section 2701(a)(3) in the officer’s presence.
V
The district court denied the motion to suppress because it was persuaded by the totality of the circumstances that Officer Azzarano had probable cause to arrest Myers and that the search of the backpack was incident to a lawful arrest. The Majority has concluded that Officer Azzarano did not have probable cause to arrest Myers for any crime.4 This observation, if correct, would invalidate the warrantless entry of the residence and eliminate the need to determine whether the search of the backpack was incident to a lawful arrest. In a discussion which lacks any precedential value because it is unnecessary to its decision, and casts doubt on its conclusion that Azzarano did not have probable cause to arrest Myers, the Majority has opined that the search of the backpack was not incident to Myers’s arrest.
The Majority states that, because Myers was handcuffed behind his back and covered by two armed police officers, the backpack was not accessible to Myers be*285cause “he was neither an acrobat [nor] a Houdini” Maj. Op. at 267. (quoting United States v. Abdul-Saboor, 85 F.3d 664, 669 (D.C.Cir.1996)). The quoted language from Abdul-Saboor is dictum. In Abdul-Saboor, the D.C. Circuit affirmed the denial of a motion to suppress. Id. at 666. In that matter, the record showed that the search was conducted after the defendant was handcuffed and sitting on a chair in a hallway about four feet outside the bedroom door in the custody of at least one armed police officer. Id. at 669-70. The D.C. Circuit held in Abdul-Saboor that the subsequent search of the bedroom was a lawful search incident to an arrest. Id. at 670. Thus, Abdul-Saboor supports the conclusion of the district court here that the search of the backpack was accessible to Myers and incident to a lawful arrest, notwithstanding the fact he was handcuffed and in the custody of an officer.
Other circuits have also upheld searches conducted as an incident to an arrest where the defendant was handcuffed and in the presence of police officers. In United States v. Queen, 847 F.2d 346 (7th Cir.1988), the Seventh Circuit affirmed the denial of a motion to suppress a loaded revolver seized from the floor of a closet as incident to an arrest although the defendant’s hands were handcuffed behind his back and he was guarded by two armed Federal Bureau of Investigation agents. Id. at 353.
In United States v. Silva, 745 F.2d 840 (4th Cir.1984), the arrestees were handcuffed behind their backs, and as they sat on a motel room bed, an officer searched a locked, zippered bag which contained two firearms and ammunition. Id. at 847. The Fourth Circuit upheld the search as incident to a lawful arrest. Id.
In United States v. Palumbo, 735 F.2d 1095 (8th Cir.1984), the Eighth Circuit rejected the appellant’s argument that a search was not incident to his arrest because “the cocaine, hidden behind a dresser drawer, was inaccessible to him because he was handcuffed and in the presence of several officers.” Id. at 1097.
The Majority has failed to cite any decision that supports its theory that the fact that a person is handcuffed and covered by more than one police officer makes a weapon three feet away inaccessible. Its dictum to that effect is contrary to the express holdings of four of our sister circuits.
The undisputed evidence, when viewed in the light most favorable to the Government, shows that Officer Azzarano decided to search the backpack when he noted that Myers kept looking at the bag and “he was getting more and more nervous as he answered my questions. His voice was more shaking and halting.” Officer Azzarano further testified that based on his experience as an officer “[t]he defendant’s demeanor led me to believe that there was something in the bag that he didn’t want me to see.” As discussed in the authorities cited above, whether or not Myers could get to the bag to open it is not relevant in determining whether the search was incident to the arrest. In discussing the question of accessibility at the time of a search, the D.C. Circuit reasoned as follows in United States v. Lyons, 706 F.2d 321 (D.C.Cir.1983):
Custodial arrests are often dangerous; the police must act decisively and cannot be expected to make punctilious judgments regarding what is within and what is just beyond the arrestee’s grasp. Thus, searches have sometimes been upheld even when hindsight might suggest that the likelihood of the defendant reaching the area in question was slight.
Id. at 330 (citing United States v. Mason, 523 F.2d 1122, 1125-26 (D.C.Cir.1975)).
*286CONCLUSION
I would affirm the district court’s denial of the motion to suppress. Based on Ms. McKnight’s report, when Officer Azzarano entered Ms. Bennett’s residence, he had probable cause to believe that she was threatened with imminent bodily harm by an armed man. Officer Azzarano’s entry into the apartment without a warrant was also justified by exigent circumstances — to protect Ms. Bennett and her children from physical injury. The facts he observed after entering the apartment confirmed the eye witness report of Ms. McKnight that Myers was committing a serious crime.
Officer Azzarano’s search of Myers’s backpack was incident to a lawful arrest for a violation of section 2701(a)(3), based on Ms. McKnight’s reliable information that a serious crime was being committed within the residence, and the corroborating facts the officer perceived within Ms. Bennett’s residence. Myers’s conduct in Officer Azzarano’s presence constituted an attempt by physical menace to put Ms. Bennett in fear of imminent serious bodily injury. The fact that Myers was in the custody of two officers and handcuffed did not invalidate the search as incident to a lawful arrest.

. "Indeed, any time the Court relies on alternative reasoning, both analyses are not neces*277sary to the decision of the case, and are therefore dicta. Thus, by adding additional reasons for its decision, the Court is effectively undermining what precedential value the opinion may have.” Matthew F. Weil & William C. Rooklidge, Stare Un-Decisis: The Sometimes Rough Treatment of Precedent in Federal Circuit Decision-Making, 80 J. Pat. & Trademark Off. Soc'y 791, 795 (1998) (emphasis added) (internal quotation marks and citation omitted).

. In footnote 19, the Majority relies on Sheik-Abdi v. McClellan, 37 F.3d 1240 (7th Cir.1994) in support of its finding that Azzarano did not have probable cause to arrest while conceding that his entry was "justified.” The Majority states that "[t]he court in Sheik-Abdi distinguished between exigent circumstances that would justify a warrantless entry into a home, and probable cause needed for arrest.” Maj. Op. at p. 265, n. 19. The Majority’s reliance on Sheik-Abdi is misplaced. The Sheik-Abdi decision does not involve the validity of a warrantless entry based on exigent circumstances. The Seventh Circuit noted that “Sheik-Abdi does not challenge the lawfulness of the officers’ presence in his home.” Id. at 1245. In fact, Sheik-Abdi ”concede[d] that while in the home, the officers presumably could have prevented any breach of the peace that occurred or as likely to occur.” Id. The Seventh Circuit's decision in Sheik-Abdi does not support the Majority’s finding that a warrantless entry can be "justified” without probable cause and exigent circumstances, as required by the Supreme Court in Kirk v. Louisiana and this circuit’s decision in Fisher v. Volz.

. Nor were Myers and Bennett "in the middle of a peaceful dinner, sharing jokes and laughing.” See Maj. Op. at 264 n.17.

. As discussed above, the Majority's holding is starkly inconsistent with its determination that the warrantless entry of the residence did not violate the Fourth Amendment because it was "justified.” A warrantless entry of a dwelling must be supported by probable cause "even in the presence of exigent circumstances.” Fisher v. Volz, 496 F.2d at 339 (internal quotation marks omitted).