Court Opinion

ID: 9479233
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 07:12:03.052094+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:46:53.862711
License: Public Domain

*1068FAGG, Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
Because I believe the evidence obtained after police officers stopped Keith Buchan-non’s car was illegally seized, I respectfully dissent.
To the officers working on the Darnell Parker surveillance, Buchannon was a completely unknown quantity. None of the confidential informants cooperating in the investigation had implicated him in Parker’s suspected drug activities, nor had any facts developed as a result of the ongoing surveillance that tied Buchannon to the operation. When Buchannon left the Parker house on January 7, 1988, his specific identity was unknown to the surveillance team. Indeed, none of the officers even recalled seeing Buchannon before, and so far as the officers knew, Buchannon had not visited Parker’s house before that day. At least one officer, however, did know Buchannon was not the operation’s primary target, Parker.
Buchannon did not exhibit any suspicious or threatening behavior when he entered or left the house. He merely went into the house and emerged carrying his infant daughter and a diaper bag, got into his car, and drove away in the same general direction as the car carrying Parker and two other individuals. None of the officers involved observed Buchannon commit any crime, including so much as a traffic violation, at any time before they stopped his car.
In my view, the initial decision to stop Buchannon’s car was not justified by the collective facts then known to the officers. First, the seizure did not qualify as an investigatory stop based on the reasonable, articulable suspicion that Buchannon was involved in criminal activity. See United States v. Sokolow, — U.S. -, 109 S.Ct. 1581, 1585-86, 104 L.Ed.2d 1 (1989); Reid v. Georgia, 448 U.S. 438, 440, 100 S.Ct. 2752, 2753, 65 L.Ed.2d 890 (1980) (per curiam); Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 21-22, 88 S.Ct. 1868, 1879-80, 20 L.Ed.2d 889 (1968); United States v. Campbell, 843 F.2d 1089, 1093 (8th Cir.1988). The only facts arguably tying Buchannon to the suspected drug house are that he physically appeared there, entered, left at the same time as the target of the investigation, and drove his own car for a short distance in the same general direction as the target. These activities do not, in and of themselves, suggest criminal activity and could be performed by “ ‘a very broad category of predominantly innocent [visitors to the house],’ ” Campbell, 843 F.2d at 1094 (quoted citation omitted).
Furthermore, by far the bulk of the officers’ incriminating information did not “directly relatfe] to [Buchannon] or [his] conduct,” id. at 1093, but to Parker, with whom Buchannon had no known improper connection. In the absence of some additional factors suggesting Buchannon’s involvement in the drug operation or with Parker, I cannot agree these circumstances amount to the objective, reasonable suspicion necessary to conduct a Terry — type stop. Consequently, the officers were not justified in performing any of the searches that followed the initial seizure, regardless of the contraband we now know they yielded.
Second, in view of my position that there was no basis for an investigatory stop, I necessarily disagree with the court’s more factually demanding decision that “[t]here was probable cause to detain [Buchannon] as a purchaser from Parker, a known seller,” ante at 1067. Nor is there any indication Parker sensed his house was under surveillance and had enlisted Buchannon to help “move[] [the drug supply] to a new location.” Id. at 1067. To reach the court’s conclusions based on the facts known about Buchannon at the time requires engaging at this point in nothing more than impermissible, hindsight speculation. In doing so, the court essentially permits the warrantless detention and search of an innocent appearing individual who made an unexceptional contact with the occupants of a suspected drug house.
Thus, I would reverse Buchannon’s conviction and remand the case for a new trial.