Court Opinion

ID: 9714279
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 05:34:27.800855+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:23:24.938207
License: Public Domain

CASTILLE, Justice,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent. In my opinion, there was sufficient evidence for the trial court to conclude that the currency seized from appellant’s vehicle was contraband. The determination of whether the currency was contraband was necessarily dependent on the facts and circumstances presented to the trial court. Absent an abuse of discretion or an error of law, the trial court’s decision should be affirmed.
Here, the evidence demonstrated that a police officer stopped appellant’s car at 8:30 P.M. for a traffic violation in a neighborhood within the officer’s usual patrol area and known by the officer to be a neighborhood decimated by the effects of illegal drug trafficking. Upon making the car stop, the officer immediately recognized appellant as a known drug dealer in the neighborhood. Specifically, the officer testified: “I am acquainted with [appellant], his father, his grandfather and his stepmother through narcotics activity, ... I patrolled that area for almost fifteen years.” As appellant exited the vehicle, the officer observed a large sum of U.S. currency spill onto the floor of the car from a paper bag. After appellant provided no explanation for this irregular development, the police officer confiscated the money as probable contraband. The police officer took the money to the police station and, after it was inventoried and placed in a desk drawer, summoned a drug-sniffing, dog. The dog successfully alerted to the desk drawer where the money had been placed indicating the presence of illegal substances in the drawer holding the currency.1
*99The question before the trial court was whether the officer had probable cause to believe that the money seized from appellant’s vehicle was related to illegal drug trafficking. Probable cause exists when “the facts available to the officer would ‘warrant a man of reasonable caution in the belief that certain items may be contraband or stolen property or useful as evidence of a crime; it does not demand any showing that such belief be correct or more likely true than false.” Texas v. Brown, 460 U.S. 730, 742, 103 S.Ct. 1535, 75 L.Ed.2d 502 (1983) (citation omitted). The facts available to the officer in determining whether there was probable cause to believe that the money in this case was contraband include: (1) the amount of money; (2) the method of transport of the money; (3) the officer’s prior contacts with appellant and knowledge of appellant as a drug dealer; (4) the location of the stop; and (5) the time of the stop. In my opinion, these factors, in combination, support the trial court’s finding that the police officer had probable cause to seize the money as contraband.
Additionally, the trial court concluded that a sufficient nexus between illegal drug activity and the money was established. The trial court relied on the totality of the police officer’s credible testimony concerning the circumstances of the traffic stop and the fact that the officer had knowledge that appellant and his family had involvement in drug trafficking. Additional evidence included the officer’s testimony that a drug-sniffing dog found the money after it was placed inside a desk drawer. The trial court also properly considered evidence in the form of appellant’s subsequent arrest after a police officer found cocaine and approximately $4700 in cash in appellant’s car. This evidence supports the trial court’s conclusion that there was a sufficient nexus between illegal drug activity and the money.
Because I believe that the trial court did not err or abuse its discretion in its determination, I am compelled to dissent.

. The proper weight to be given to this evidence was within the province of the trial court.