Court Opinion

ID: 9762243
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 02:17:27.806923+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:29:32.316940
License: Public Domain

Justice COATS,
dissenting.
Because I believe the majority misses the analysis in this case, as the district court before it, and arrives at the same erroneous conclusions, I respectfully dissent. The district court appears to have misperceived the extent of the defendant's legal obligation to comply with the officers' demand to stop. The majority, however, simply declines to address the district court's obvious error on the grounds that the prosecutor has failed to recite certain magic words in his appeal.
The five baggies of cocaine taken from the defendant's pocket were clearly the product of a valid search incident to arrest. Although the undisputed testimony about the defendant's violent reactions was considerably more graphic and detailed, even the district court grudgingly found that when the police attempted an investigatory stop, for which it also found they had reasonable artic-ulable suspicion of his involvement in a drug transaction, the defendant swore, flailed his arms, and attempted to walk away. Unlike a consensual encounter, an investigatory stop is a constitutionally cognizable seizure, with which a suspect is legally obligated to cooperate, at least to the extent of remaining stopped for brief questioning. See United *1098States v. Place, 462 U.S. 696, 702, 103 S.Ct. 2637, 77 L.Ed.2d 110 (1983) (acknowledging "the authority of the police to make a forcible stop of a person when the officer has reasonable, articulable suspicion that the person has been, is, or is about to be engaged in criminal activity." (emphasis in original)).
When the defendant refused to stop and made clear his unwillingness to cooperate, even if only (in the court's terminology) by becoming agitated, swearing, and flailing his arms, the officers had probable cause to arrest him for disorderly conduct, § 18-9-106, C.R.S. (2010), obstructing government operations or a peace officer, §§ 18-8-102,-104, C.R.S. (2010), or perhaps even assault, § 18-3-201, et seq., C.R.S8. (2010). At that point, a search of the defendant's pockets incident to his arrest was permitted, without additional justification. See United States v. Robinson, 414 U.S. 218, 285, 94 S.Ct. 467, 38 L.Ed.2d 427 (1973) (following lawful custodial arrest, full search of the person requires "no additional justification"). It has long been resolved that onee there is probable cause for an arrest and at least some degree of seizure ripening into an arrest thereafter, a search of the suspect will not be brought into question by speculation about the precise point at which the arrest occurred. See Peters v. New York, 392 U.S. 40, 67, 88 S.Ct. 1912, 20 LEd.2d 917 (1968); 3 Wayne R. LaFave, Search and Seizure § 5.l(a), at 18 (4th ed.2004).
The majority expressly declines to address the question of search incident to arrest on the grounds that the People did not argue the police had probable cause for an arrest prior to Vigil's confession or couch their appeal in terms of a search incident to arrest. See maj. op. at 1096, n.1. The point is, however, that the drugs were indisputably discovered during a search of the defendant contemporaneously with his seizure for failing to comply with a lawful order to stop. Even though the district court disbelieved the officers' testimony that they were in fear for their safety, its own findings of fact necessar-fly established justification for an arrest. Whether or not the police officers also believed they had the defendant's valid consent, they were therefore independently entitled to search him incident to his seizure, which, if not already an arrest, unquestionably ripened into one at some point during the encounter.
I consider the majority's cramped reading of the prosecutor's assignments of error to be inappropriate for a challenge to the suppression of key evidence in a criminal case. The prosecutor clearly challenged the court's finding that the police exceeded the permissible scope of an investigatory stop and by doing so rendered all subsequent evidence obtained by them suppressible as the fruit of the poisonous tree. Where the validity of the defendant's seizure and contemporaneous search were expressly at issue, and the court's findings of historical fact establish probable cause and a valid search incident to arrest as a matter of law, I consider it the very height of hyper-technicality to allow an erroneous suppression order to stand on the grounds that the appropriate exception to the warrant requirement went unnamed. Cf. Roberts v. Am. Family Mut. Ins. Co., 144 P.3d 546, 551 (Colo.2006) ("At least where a misreading of the controlling law leads a trial court to grant summary judgment in the face of undisputed facts to the contrary, a reviewing court cannot be constrained by the failure of a party to specifically identify the misreading and bring it to the trial court's attention."). I therefore believe the majority errs in affirming suppression of the drugs found on the defendant.
While the totality-of-cireumstances analysis required of a voluntariness determination makes the district court's error in suppressing the defendant's statements less clear, I nevertheless believe its ruling cannot be sustained on the record before us. Assuming that the defendant's initial disclosure of the drugs in his pocket was actually an attempt to relieve pain rather than an attempt to gain some advantage by cooperating seconds before the drugs would be discovered anyway, his subsequent detailed statement implicating other participants was in no way a mere repetition or exploitation of his earlier statement. - Especially in light of testimony to the effect that the defendant himself declined further medical assistance and sought the benefits of cooperation, the district court's *1099conclusory finding that the People failed to prove the voluntariness of his statement made six hours later, after waiving his Miranda rights, hardly contains the findings of historical fact needed to support a totality-of-cireumstances assessment. See People v. Sutherland, 886 P.2d 681, 688 (Colo.1994) (noting importance of sufficient findings of fact for appellate review of voluntariness determination}.
It seems apparent to me that the district court believed the officers used excessive foree in subduing the defendant when he refused to comply with their demand to stop. While I do not believe that to be at all clear from the record before us, such a determination would not in and of itself justify the suppression of contraband found during a valid search or the suppression of uncoerced statements made after an effective waiver of Miranda rights. If the defendant has legitimate grievances against the police, he may pursue them in a proper forum, but he is not entitled to exoneration from a serious drug offense of which there is abundant admissible evidence.
Because I believe the district court's orders suppressing contraband found at the time of the defendant's arrest, as well as his post-Miranda statements, to be unsupported by the record before us, I would reverse. Therefore, I respectfully dissent.