Court Opinion

ID: 9487526
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 12:19:24.506291+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:52:20.147724
License: Public Domain

ALEXANDER HARVEY, II, Senior District Judge,
concurring in the judgment:
I am in agreement with the majority that appellant’s conviction and sentence should be affirmed. I fully concur with the majority’s conclusion in Part III of the opinion that the armed career criminal provision applies in the circumstances here and that Mobley’s sentence should be affirmed. I would also affirm the judgment of conviction, but for reasons different from those set forth in the opinion.
I do not believe, as the majority has held in Part II-A of the opinion, that New York v. Quarles, 467 U.S. 649, 104 S.Ct. 2626, 81 L.Ed.2d 550 (1984) should be construed as narrowly as indicated nor that the questioning of Mobley by the FBI agent was in this case in a violation of Edwards v. Arizona, 451 U.S. 477, 101 S.Ct. 1880, 68 L.Ed.2d 378 (1981). I would therefore affirm the district court’s denial of Mobley’s motion to suppress his statement and would affirm this conviction on that ground rather than on the ground of harmless error.
Although Quarles is an exception to Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966), it is an important one when considered in terms of police and public safety. As stated in Quarles, the doctrinal underpinnings of Miranda do not require “that it be applied in all its rigor to a situation in which police officers ask questions reasonably prompted by a concern for the public safety.” 467 U.S. at 656, 104 S.Ct. at 2632. As noted in Quarles, “police officers can and will distinguish almost instinctively between questions necessary to secure their *697own safety or the safety of the public and questions designed solely to elicit testimonial evidence from a suspect.” 467 U.S. at 658-659, 104 S.Ct. at 2633. The Quarles exception was defined in the following terms:
The exception which we recognize today, far from complicating the thought processes and the on-the-scene judgments of police officers, will simply free them to follow their legitimate interests when confronting situations presenting a danger to the public safety. Id. at 659, 104 S.Ct. at 2633.
As the majority has held, the Quarles exception applies only where there is “an objectively reasonable need” to protect the public or police. In this case, the trial court, after receiving evidence and hearing argument on Mobley’s motion to suppress, determined that there was indeed an objectively reasonable need for protection of the agents making the arrest and of the public. Special Agent Martin testified at the suppression hearing that she directed her question to Mobley because she feared that there might be weapons or booby traps in the apartment which could harm the agents during the search. As she testified, it is not uncommon for a crack cocaine dealer to retain a booby trap type weapon in his apartment to protect against one who might try to burglarize him.1 In holding that the Quarles exception applied, the district court specifically found that the agent knew that drug dealers do booby trap their apartments so that they can protect their stash of drugs and cash and that the agent, because of her own safety and her desire to protect other agents from firearms, addressed the question to Mobley to ascertain whether there were weapons or other dangerous firearms in the apartment. These findings were not clearly erroneous and would, I believe, support the district court’s determination that an objectively reasonable need existed here to protect the police and the public from danger resulting from firearms or weapons being in the apartment.
This Court and other courts have long recognized that drug dealers use firearms to protect their narcotics and the large amount of cash in their possession. In United States v. Kennedy, 32 F.3d 876, 882 (4th Cir.1994), this Court said:
To begin with, “the law has ‘uniformly recognized that substantial dealers in narcotics possess firearms’” and that “entrance into a situs of drug trafficking activity carries all too real dangers to law enforcement officers.” [United States v.] Bonner, 874 F.2d [822] at 824, 827 [(D.C.Cir.1989)] (quoting United States v. Payne, 805 F.2d 1062, 1065 (D.C.Cir.1986)); see also Singer, 943 F.2d at 763 (noting the “federal judiciary’s recognition that firearms are an integral part of the drug trade”).
See also, United States v. Coslet, 987 F.2d 1493, 1495 (10th Cir.1993) (“Guns are a ubiquitous part of the drug trade, facilitating transactions by providing protection to dealers, drugs and money.”); United States v. Young-Bey, 893 F.2d 178, 181 (8th Cir.1990) (“The presence and availability of firearms are often crucial to the ‘sources’ of the drug enterprise.”); United States v. Wiener, 534 F.2d 15, 18 (2d Cir.) (“Experience on the trial and appellate benches has taught that substantial dealers in narcotics keep firearms on their premises as tools of the trade”), cert. denied, 429 U.S. 820, 97 S.Ct. 66, 50 L.Ed.2d 80 (1976).
I would agree with the majority that Quarles does not compel a per se approach and that each case must be examined on its own facts to determine whether the exception is justified. But in this particular case, as in Quarles, “we have before us no claim that [appellant’s] statements were actually compelled by police conduct which overcame his will to resist.” 467 U.S. at 654, 104 S.Ct. at 2630-31. No evidence was presented at the suppression hearing that the agents were conducting a fishing expedition or were otherwise attempting to avoid the strictures of Miranda. Certainly, if evidence of this sort were credited by a trial court, the Quarles exception should not be applied.
The majority opinion cites with approval United States v. DeSantis, 870 F.2d 536 (9th Cir.1989), but adopts as the law of this Cir*698cuit a much narrower rule than that recognized by the Ninth Circuit. As the majority opinion notes, the Ninth Circuit in that case was faced with facts quite similar to those here. Based on circumstances similar to those before the district court in this case, the Ninth Circuit viewed the totality of the facts objectively and, concluding that the agent’s question was not intended to elicit testimonial evidence but rather to secure the officer’s own protection, held that the statements and the firearm were properly admitted into evidence at the trial. 870 F.2d at 541. I would follow DeSantis in its entirety and would, as did the Ninth Circuit in that case, affirm the trial court’s denial of the defendant’s suppression motion.
Except as discussed herein, I am in agreement with the remainder of the majority opinion, and I therefore join in holding that Mobley’s conviction and sentence should be affirmed.2

. Although Mobley was later acquitted when the narcotics charges came on for trial, the agents clearly had probable cause to believe that he had drugs and money on his premises connected to a large scale crack cocaine operation.

. In particular, I agree that even if Mobley's response to the agent's questioning had been erroneously admitted at trial, the error was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt.