Court Opinion

ID: 9496376
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 16:24:58.583341+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:57:32.295476
License: Public Domain

CLAY, Circuit Judge,
concurring.
I concur in the outcome reached by the majority in these consolidated eases. I write separately to speak on the manner in which the various law enforcement agencies arrived on the scene. Although not outcome determinative under the facts of this case, the conduct of the law enforcement officers in arriving on the scene with guns drawn, ordering the occupants of the home to lie on the ground while the officers forced their knees into the backs of the occupants (including both Defendants), and immediately handcuffing and questioning the individuals, all after the officers had blocked ingress and egress to the street on which the residence was located, was not reasonable because the conduct went beyond the “limited intrusions on an individual’s personal security” required by the circumstances. Michigan v. Summers, 452 U.S. 692, 698, 101 S.Ct. 2587, 69 L.Ed.2d 340 (1981) (citing Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 88 S.Ct. 1868, 20 L.Ed.2d 889 (1968)).
A. Governing Fourth Amendment Jurisprudence
The Fourth Amendment provides that “[t]he right of the people to be secure in their persons, ... against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause.... ” U.S. Const, amend IV. Generally, under the Fourth Amendment, an official seizure of an individual must be supported by probable cause, even if no formal arrest is made. Dunaway v. New York, 442 U.S. 200, 208, 99 S.Ct. 2248, 60 L.Ed.2d 824 (1979). As the Supreme Court noted in Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 16, 88 S.Ct. 1868, 20 L.Ed.2d 889 (1968),
[i]t is quite plain that the Fourth Amendment governs “seizures” of the person which do not eventuate in a trip to the station house and prosecution for crime “arrests” in traditional terminology. It must be recognized that whenever a police officer accosts an individual and restrains his freedom to walk away, he has “seized” that person.
Thus, for purposes of the Fourth Amendment guarantee against unreasonable seizures, the “general rule [is that] every arrest, arid every seizure having the essential attributes of a formal arrest, is unreasonable unless it is supported by probable cause.” Summers, 452 U.S. at 699-700, 101 S.Ct. 2587; see also United States v. *472Mendenhall, 446 U.S. 544, 554, 100 S.Ct. 1870, 64 L.Ed.2d 497 (1980) (“[A] person is ‘seized’ within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment only if, in view of all of the circumstances surrounding the incident, a reasonable person would have believed that he was not free to leave.”).
However, in Summers, the Supreme Court recognized that
some seizures significantly less intrusive than an arrest have withstood scrutiny under the reasonableness standard embodied in the Fourth Amendment. In these cases the intrusion on the citizen’s privacy “was so much less severe” than that involved in a traditional arrest that “the opposing interests in crime prevention and detection and in the police officer’s safety” could support the seizure as reasonable.
Id. at 697-98 (quoting Dunaway, 442 U.S. at 209, 99 S.Ct. 2248). The Supreme Court has therefore carved out “narrowly drawn” exceptions to the probable cause warrant requirement for seizures not rising to the level of a formal arrest. United States v. Sharpe, 470 U.S. 675, 689, 105 S.Ct. 1568, 84 L.Ed.2d 605 (1985) (Marshall, J., concurring) (quoting Pennsylvania v. Mimms, 434 U.S. 106, 115, 98 S.Ct. 330, 54 L.Ed.2d 331(1977)); see also Douglas K. Yatter, et al., Warrantless Searches & Seizures, 88 Geo. L.J. 912, 912-13 (2000).
Two of the exceptions recognized by Summers are relevant to the matter at hand. Specifically, the Summers Court recognized the “stop and frisk” exception as set forth in Terry v. Ohio, wherein the Court held that a police officer may briefly stop an individual and conduct a patdown or “frisk” for weapons when the officer has a reasonable suspicion (something less than probable cause) to believe that criminal activity is afoot. See Summers, 452 U.S. at 698, 101 S.Ct. 2587 (citing Terry, 392 U.S. at 16, 88 S.Ct. 1868). The other relevant exception recognized by Summers is 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. (footnotes omitted) In a footnote to this holding, the Court opined that “[a]lthough special circumstances, or possibly a prolonged detention, might lead to a different conclusion in an unusual case, we are persuaded that this routine detention of residents of a house while it was being searched for contraband pursuant to a valid warrant is not such a ease.” Id. at 705 n. 21, 101 S.Ct. 2587. In United States v. Fountain, 2 F.3d 656, 663 (6th Cir.1993), overruled on other grounds, Burchett v. Kiefer, 310 F.3d 937 (6th Cir.2002), this Court extended the exception established in Summers regarding the detention of residents of a home being search pursuant to a valid warrant, to the detention of visitors to the home as well.
Despite these exceptions, it must be remembered that the exceptions are just that, and the “general rule [is that] every arrest, and every seizure having the essential attributes of a formal arrest, is unreasonable unless it is supported by probable cause.” Summers, 452 U.S. at 699-700, 101 S.Ct. 2587; Mendenhall, 446 U.S. at 554, 100 S.Ct. 1870 (finding that a seizure has occurred when a reasonable person under the circumstances “would not have believed that he was free to leave”). The essential attributes of a formal arrest, or stated differently, the point at which the detention ripens into a de facto arrest requiring probable cause, is decided on an individual basis. See Sharpe, 470 U.S. at 685, 105 S.Ct. 1568 (“Much as a ‘bright line’ rule would be desirable, in evaluating whether an investigative detention is unreasonable, common sense and ordinary *473human experience must govern over rigid criteria.”); see also Gardenhire v. Schubert, 205 F.3d 303, 313 (6th Cir.2000) (“When a detention rises to the level of a full-fledged arrest, ... the Fourth Amendment demands that the seizure be supported by probable cause.”).
For purposes of determining whether a Terry stop has exceeded its permissible scope, this Court has found that “ ‘[w]hen police actions go beyond checking out the suspicious circumstances that led to the original stop, the detention becomes an arrest that must be supported by probable cause.’ ” United States v. Butler, 223 F.3d 368, 374 (6th Cir.2000) (quoting United States v. Obasa, 15 F.3d 603, 607 (6th Cir.1994)). This Court has also found that when officers restrained an individual in a police cruiser after he refused to consent to a search of a storage locker and truck, the scope of the seizure went beyond the bounds of Terry and ripened it into a custodial arrest under the Fourth Amendment. See United States v. Richardson, 949 F.2d 851, 857-58 (6th Cir.1991).
For purposes of determining whether the scope of the detention has exceeded the Summers exception 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,” Summers, 452 U.S. at 705, 101 S.Ct. 2587 (footnotes omitted), it would appear that so long as the officers do not detain the occupants beyond the point of the premises’ search, the detention has not exceeded its permissible scope. This conclusion comports with the legitimate government interests which the Summers Court believed justified the detention, such as preventing flight in the event that incriminating evidence is found, minimizing the risk of harm to the officers by allowing officers to exercise unquestioned command of the situation, and facilitating the orderly completion of the search. See id. at 702-03 & 705 n. 21, 101 S.Ct. 2587 (noting that a “prolonged detention” might have led the Court to reach a different result). However, it is not merely the length of the detention that is looked at in determining whether the detention was reasonable. Rather, the “scope and nature of the restraints placed on an individual’s liberty” is also considered. Yatter, supra at 920. As the Court noted in Summers, “special circumstances” and a “prolonged detention,” might have led to a different result. See Summers, 452 at 705 n. 21, 101 S.Ct. 2587.
B. Application of the Law to the Facts of Defendants’ Motions to Suppress
As noted, the exceptions to the Fourth Amendment’s requirement of probable cause in this case are two. First, under Summers, the reasonable detention exception as to the occupants of a residence for which a valid search warrant has been issued applies. See Summers, 452 U.S. at 705, 101 S.Ct. 2587. Second, the “stop and frisk” exception under Terry also applies inasmuch as the officers not only detained Defendants, but made a decision prior to the search that they would invoke Terry and conduct a “patdown” for weapons on the belief that drugs may be on the premises. However, when officers from several different law enforcement agencies, including the INS, arrived on the scene with guns drawn, ordered the occupants to lie on the ground, forced their knees into the backs of the occupants (including both Defendants), and immediately handcuffed and questioned the individuals, all after the officers had blocked ingress and egress to the street on which the residence was located, the officers’ actions exceeded the reasonableness of Summers and Terry. Instead, the officers’ actions in this regard were tantamount to a de facto arrest inas*474much as the seizure had all of the attributes of a formal arrest. See Mendenhall, 446 U.S. at 554, 100 S.Ct. 1870 (“[A] person is 'seized’ within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment only if, in view of all of the circumstances surrounding the incident, a reasonable person would have believed that he was not free to leave.”); Summers, 452 U.S. at 698, 700, 101 S.Ct. 2587 (noting that the “general rule [is that] every arrest, and every seizure having the essential attributes of a formal arrest, is unreasonable unless it is supported by probable cause” and that Terry authorizes “limited intrusions on an individual’s personal security”).
The case law from this circuit and our sister circuits support this conclusion. See United States v. Bohannon, 225 F.3d 615, 619 (6th Cir.2000) (Batchelder, J., dissenting) (“A police officer’s verbal command— if heeded — is often sufficient to seize a person” for purposes of taking the matter out of the bounds of the limited and brief nature of Terry stops) (citation and internal quotation marks omitted); Butler, 223 F.3d at 374 (“The brevity and limited nature of Terry-type stops have been repeatedly affirmed.”) (citing United States v. Obasa, 15 F.3d 603, 607 (6th Cir.1994)); Richardson, 949 F.2d at 857-58 (finding that the scope and nature of the detention exceeded the bounds of Terry when officers restrained an individual in a police cruiser after he refused to consent to a search of a storage locker and truck); Oliveira, 23 F.3d at 642, 645-46 (2d Cir.1994) (finding that a Terry stop ripened into a custodial arrest when six police cruisers surrounded the suspects, ordered them from their vehicles at gunpoint, handcuffed the suspects, and placed them in separate police cruisers); United States v. Anderson, 981 F.2d 1560, 1566 (10th Cir.1992) (finding that a Terry detention ripened into a custodial arrest when officers blocked suspect with cars and one officer approached the suspect with his gun drawn); United States v. Codd, 956 F.2d 1109, 1111 (11th Cir.1992) (finding that the Terry stop resulted in a custodial arrest when suspect was seized, handcuffed, and held for two and one-half hours); United States v. Ricardo D., 912 F.2d 337, 340 (9th Cir.1990) (finding that a custodial arrest occurred when officer gripped the arm of a juvenile, patted him down, ordered the juvenile not to run, and seated him in the back of a patrol car).
Thus, although the officers had a legal basis to detain the occupants of the residence, including Defendants, under Summers and Terry, the scope and nature of the detention was not reasonable “in view of all of the circumstances surrounding the incident.” Mendenhall, 446 U.S. at 554, 100 S.Ct. 1870; see also Summers, 452 U.S. at 698, 101 S.Ct. 2587 (citing Terry, 392 U.S. at 16, 88 S.Ct. 1868).
It is true that the officers had made a decision prior to executing the warrant that any individuals found on the premises would be “detained” and frisked for weapons because of the marijuana seeds found in the trash pull conducted earlier that day; however, when asked whether by the term “detained” the officers meant “arrested” or just “monitored,” Secret Service Agent Monica Woods replied “monitored.” (J.A. at 143.) Specifically, the questioning of Agent Woods went as follows:
Q: [P]rior to the execution of the warrant, was there a meeting of the various agencies and individuals who’re part of the search warrant execution team?
A: Yes. Everyone who was part of the search warrant was involved in a briefing just prior to the search warrant.
Q: Had the issue of whether or not people who were on the property, if *475people on the property, were encountered, what if anything would be done with those people during the execution of the warrant?
A: All of those people would be patted down for weapons and detained until we decided what steps to take next.
Q: Now, by detained, do you mean placed under arrest or just put to the side and monitored?
A: Yes, monitored.
(J.A. at 142-43 (emphasis added).)
Indeed, under the agent’s own testimony, the scope and nature of the detention went well beyond that which had been agreed to prior to the time the search warrant was executed. Had the officers followed the plan attested to by Agent Woods — arriving on the scene, patting down the occupants of the home, and putting them to the side until the search had been completed, at which point the occupants may or may not have been arrested depending upon whether evidence of criminality had been found — the conclusion would be different inasmuch as the officers’ actions would have been within the reasonableness of Summers and Terry.
C. Conclusion
Although the law enforcement officials’ actions upon arriving on the scene were unreasonable, I concur in the outcome reached by the majority because, under the facts of this case, the evidence was otherwise discovered through lawful means.