Court Opinion

ID: 9584214
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 22:45:35.294918+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:07:06.938198
License: Public Domain

BARNES, Chief Judge,
dissenting.
Because I cannot accept the majority’s conclusion that Patton’s warrantless arrest was supported by probable cause, I must respectfully dissent.
While the information provided about Patton arguably had “sufficient indicia of reliability’ to give police reasonable suspicion to stop and briefly detain Patton to investigate the informant’s tip that he had methamphetamine, it did not provide a basis for Patton’s warrantless arrest. Slocum v. State, 267 Ga. App. 337-338 (599 SE2d 299) (2004).
The majority contends that Patton’s “reckless and dangerous” driving through the Dairy Queen parking lot could have provided grounds for Patton’s warrantless arrest. However, the officer never testified that Patton was arrested for reckless driving. He testified that Patton was pulled over “[d]ue to the fact that I had information that the subject was carrying — coming to sell drug in that location.” He was then asked if there was any other reason that Patton was stopped and he answered “[d]ue to the fact him [sic] speeding through the parking lot which he did.” The officer continued that he and two other officers approached Patton with their guns drawn and told Patton to get to the ground and handcuffed him. He testified that he looked into the vehicle, saw the drugs in plain view, and, at that point, “[p]laced Mr. Patton and the passenger under arrest.”
“[P]robable cause need not be defined in relation to any one particular element, but may exist because of the totality of circumstances.” (Punctuation omitted.) Howie v. State, 218 Ga. App. 45, 46 (1) (459 SE2d 179) (1995). In ascertaining the totality of the circumstances this Court takes into account consideration of objective observations, patterns of operations of certain kinds of lawbreakers, and information from police reports, because a trained police officer draws inferences and makes deductions from these data. Lambright v. State, 226 Ga. App. 424, 426 (1) (487 SE2d 59) (1997). Especially troubling in this case is that the police report contained nothing about Patton talking with the informant in the parking lot or speeding through the parking lot. The report states that Patton pulled into the parking lot driving slowly and “turned around and headed back towards Hwy 20.” There is no mention of the informant being present at the location or Patton’s excessive speed in the parking lot. As noted previously, the information contained in the police reports is important to this Court’s review of the totality of the circumstances. Police *23officers draw inferences and make deductions from the data in the reports which represents the information known to police at the time of the incident, not representations made for the first time over 18 months later at the motion to suppress hearing.
Decided July 16, 2007
Reconsideration denied July 31, 2007.
Diana L. Davis, Leigh S. Schrope, for appellant.
Tommy K. Floyd, District Attorney, John A. Pipkin III, Assistant District Attorney, for appellee.
Thus, while the evidence might have been sufficient to support a Terry stop, the facts known to police were not sufficient, even under the totality of the circumstances, to establish probable cause for the full-blown arrest that occurred when Patton’s vehicle was stopped. Accordingly, I believe that the trial court erred by denying the motion to suppress, and, therefore, the judgment of the trial court should be reversed. Accordingly, I must respectfully dissent.