Court Opinion

ID: 9765137
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 03:53:11.85847+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:30:05.722303
License: Public Domain

*291CARLEY, Presiding Justice,
dissenting.
The majority inexplicably disregards the trial court’s findings with regard to the entire team of police officers involved in the investigatory stop of Miller, and instead considers only the findings with respect to Officer Williams by relying primarily on the trial court’s supposed determination of his credibility.
The trial court itself recognized that it could not focus solely on Williams’ knowledge and testimony. The order of the trial court shows that it, unlike the majority, understood that there exist two possible grounds on which the stop of Miller could be justified. That investigatory stop was constitutional if either Williams or the other officers had the requisite articulable suspicion. As the statement of facts quoted by the majority makes clear, the trial court found that the entire team of officers saw the group of men standing near a car in the vacant lot, the absence of a license plate on the car, and the tinting of the windows, and that those officers, not just Williams, stopped at the scene, exited their van, and approached the group of men. The trial court also specifically found that the observations of “[t]he officers” “do not rise to the level of a reasonable, articulable suspicion” justifying an investigatory stop. Contrary to the majority, the trial court did not hold that “Officer Williams stopped Miller based on a ‘mere hunch’ and only ‘general suspicion[.]’ ” Actually, the trial court did not mention Williams at that point and instead drew the general conclusion that “[t]he stop was based on a mere hunch” and “general suspicion” and immediately explained by making further specific findings regarding the observations and knowledge of the entire team of officers.
The trial court’s comment in a footnote regarding Williams’ omission of any mention of the window tinting and missing tag in his incident report and previous testimony is not dispositive. That notation does not constitute an actual determination of Williams’ credibility in that regard. More importantly, the trial court explicitly accepted the unimpeached and consistent testimony of the other officers regarding the tinting and tag. That testimony by the other officers was relevant, and could therefore be addressed by the trial court, because the undisputed evidence shows that the officers immediately told the men not to move. State v. Miller, 300 Ga. App. 55, 56 (684 SE2d 80) (2009). The group of officers, and not just Williams, decided to effectuate an investigative stop, and all of them announced the stop to the suspects prior to Officer Williams’ actions in stopping Miller. See Burgess v. State, 290 Ga. App. 24, 27 (658 SE2d 809) (2008). It is clear that the trial court implicitly accepted this undisputed evidence because, otherwise, its findings with respect to the observations and knowledge of the entire team of officers would have been irrelevant and indeed nonsensical. It is well *292established that an appellate court, when reviewing a ruling on a motion to suppress, must accept the implicit as well as the explicit findings of the trial court unless they are clearly erroneous. Brantley v. State, 226 Ga. App. 872, 873 (2) (a) (487 SE2d 412) (1997); Garcia v. State, 207 Ga. App. 653, 654 (1) (a) (428 SE2d 666) (1993). See also State v. Davis, 261 Ga. 225, 226 (404 SE2d 100) (1991). Compare Tate v. State, 264 Ga. 53 (440 SE2d 646) (1994) (where, unlike here, the trial court identified the credibility of the sole officer present at the stop as the key issue).
Since Williams’ actions clearly were predicated on the preceding actions of and instructions from the entire group of officers, the appellate court, like the trial court, “must look to the knowledge of [those officers] at the time [they] issued those instructions to determine whether the police had authority to seize [Miller].” Brooks v. State, 206 Ga. App. 485, 487 (2) (425 SE2d 911) (1992).
As the Supreme Court has repeatedly noted, common sense and practical considerations must guide judgments about the reasonableness of searches and seizures. [Cits.] Here, common sense suggests that, where law enforcement officers are jointly involved in executing an investigative stop, the knowledge of each officer should be imputed to others jointly involved in executing the stop. [Cits.] Investigative stops generally occur in a dynamic environment marked by the potential for violence. Officers who jointly make such stops rarely will have an opportunity to confer during the course of the stop. Basing the legitimacy of the stop solely on what the officer who first approaches the suspect knows, rather than on the collective knowledge of all of the officers who participate directly in carrying out the stop, thus makes little sense from a practical standpoint.
United States v. Cook, 277 F3d 82, 86 (II) (1st Cir. 2002) (also noting that taking “into account only the knowledge of officers present at the scene and directly involved in effectuating a stop, is unlikely to encourage illegal police activity”). By examining the knowledge of the other officers, the trial court was plainly evaluating their authority to detain the men in the vacant lot prior to Williams’ attempt to enforce the investigative stop. Even if the trial court did resolve any inconsistency in Williams’ testimony, it clearly credited other testimony regarding the reasons for the investigative stop, and no such inconsistency affected its ruling. Silva v. State, 278 Ga. 506, 507 (604 SE2d 171) (2004). Compare State v. Guyton, 295 Ga. App. 786, 787 (673 SE2d 290) (2009); State v. Hester, 268 Ga. App. 501, 504 (602 SE2d 271) (2004).
*293Careful examination of the order on appeal reveals that the trial court evaluated the observations of all of the officers and decided that they amounted to a mere hunch and did not rise to the level of a reasonable, articulable suspicion.
The only conclusion that can be reached on review is that the trial court credited the officer[s’] testimony,.. . and decided the motion on an issue of law rather than on any issue of conflicting evidence. The de novo standard of review was the correct one to be applied by the Court of Appeals.
Silva v. State, supra at 508.
The only possible conclusion from application of that correct standard is that the police officers had a lawful basis for their investigative detention. Miller separately analyzes each factor on which the Court of Appeals relied. However, in making de novo determinations of reasonable suspicion,
reviewing courts .. . must look at the “totality of the circumstances” of each case to see whether the detaining officer has a “particularized and objective basis” for suspecting legal wrongdoing. [Cit.] This process 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.” [Cits.]
United States v. Arvizu, 534 U. S. 266, 273 (122 SC 744, 151 LE2d 740) (2002).
In this case, the undisputed testimony showed that the appearance of stolen cars is often altered by quickly and temporarily tinting the windows. Consistent with such concealment of a theft is the evidence of a missing tag and the testimony that the group of men was standing around the car in a vacant lot during the process of tinting. Indeed, the uncontroverted evidence shows that the group here was standing “around,” and not merely “near,” the automobile. Thus, the Court of Appeals properly relied on the officers’ undisputed testimony that, based on their experience, tinting the outside of windows “was often performed on stolen cars, this car was being worked on in a vacant lot, it had no tag on it, and the men were gathered around the car in a way that could be construed as trying to conceal a stolen automobile.” State v. Miller, supra at 58. The undisputed testimony was that all of these circumstances caused the officers to suspect illegal activity, based upon their experience and training. That suspicion was not required to be focused exclusively *294on a single individual, and instead may be established by evidence of possible wrongdoing by at least one of a discrete group of individuals at a particular time and place. Drake v. County of Essex, 646 A2d 1126, 1128-1130 (N.J. Super. 1994).
Decided November 22, 2010.
Michael L. Edwards, for appellant.
Larry Chisolm, District Attorney, Christine S. Barker, Assistant District Attorney, for appellee.
A determination that reasonable suspicion exists . . . need not rule out the possibility of innocent conduct. [Cit.] Undoubtedly, each of these factors alone is susceptible to innocent explanation, and some factors are more probative than others.
United States v. Arvizu, supra at 277. Taken together, however, under the “totality of the circumstances” test, the factors found by the trial court and relied upon by the Court of Appeals sufficed to form a particularized and objective basis for the officers to detain the group of men for a brief investigation and, therefore, that detention was reasonable within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment. See United States v. Arvizu, supra at 277-278; Bishop v. State, 299 Ga. App. 241, 243 (682 SE2d 201) (2009). Compare Young v. State, 285 Ga. App. 214, 215-216 (645 SE2d 690) (2007); Black v. State, 281 Ga. App. 40 (635 SE2d 568) (2006).
Accordingly, the Court of Appeals was correct in concluding that the officers made a valid stop under Terry v. Ohio, 392 U. S. 1 (88 SC 1868, 20 LE2d 889) (1968) and that Miller was not free to leave, and in reversing the trial court’s grant of the motion to suppress. I therefore respectfully dissent to the reversal of the Court of Appeals’ judgment.
I am authorized to state that Justice Hines and Justice Nahmias join in this dissent.