Court Opinion

ID: 9637596
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 15:11:44.45385+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:39:04.816282
License: Public Domain

Dissenting Opinion by
Hoffman, J.:
Appellant was sentenced to a term of two years probation following his conviction in Municipal Court for a violation of the Uniform Firearms Act. He filed a petition for a writ of certiorari in the Common Pleas Court of Philadelphia challenging the legality of the seizure of the firearm. The writ was subsequently dismissed and this appeal followed:
At the suppression hearing in Municipal Court, Officer John Madden was the only witness. He testified that on May 25, 1978 at approximately 12:00 a.m. he observed appellant standing in the doorway of a closed laundromat on Lancaster Avenue in Philadelphia. When the police officers approached in a patrol car, appellant walked away “hurriedly”. Officer Madden and his partner stopped appellant and frisked him, finding an unloaded .32 caliber revolver in appellant’s right coat pocket and .32 caliber cartridges in his left.
Officer Madden testified that he and his partner suspected appellant of attempting to burglarize the laundromat, but did not specify any acts upon which the suspicion was based. The officers did not see him tampering with the door or in any way attempting to gain entry. Subsequent inspection of the door disclosed no indication that any attempt to gain entry had been made. On these facts, I believe that appellant’s fourth amendment rights were violated and that the court below erred in refusing to suppress the evidence.
A limited stop and frisk may be conducted even if probable cause for arrest is lacking “if the police officer observes unusual and suspicious conduct on the part of *97the individual seized which leads [the officer] reasonably to conclude that criminal activity may be afoot and that the person with whom he is dealing may be armed and dangerous.” Commonwealth v. Hicks, 434 Pa. 153, 158-159, 253 A. 2d 276 (1969). Suspicions not based upon specific acts or circumstances are insufficient to justify such an intrusion. Rather, “the police must be able to point to articulated facts which give rise to the reasonable belief that criminal activity is afoot.” Commonwealth v. Jeffries, 454 Pa. 320, 325, 311 A. 2d 914 (1973); Commonwealth v. Berrios, 437 Pa. 338, 341, 263 A. 2d 342 (1970).
In the instant case, there are no “articulated facts” to indicate that appellant was engaging or about to engage in criminal activity. Surely, appellant’s mere presence near a doorway on a public sidewalk does not give rise to an inference that criminal activity is afoot. To sustain a “stop and frisk” on these facts would mean that anyone who stopped to gaze into a store window or door late at night would be susceptible to a search.
Nor does the fact that appellant turned and walked quickly away as the patrol car approached render his conduct any more suspicious or indicative of criminal activity. Even if this conduct is considered to be “flight”, it would not, absent other indicia of criminal activity, be sufficient to justify the intrusion. United States v. Margeson, 259 F. Supp. 256 (E.D. Pa. 1966); Commonwealth v. Pegram, 450 Pa. 590, 301 A. 2d 695 (1973); Commonwealth v. Jeffries, supra; see Harvey Appeal, 222 Pa. Superior Ct. 222, 295 A. 2d 93 (1972). I must conclude, therefore, that the intrusion was not based on any reasonable suspicion of criminal activity, and that the seizure was illegal and the evidence obtained thereby should have been suppressed.
The judgment of sentence should be reversed and a new trial granted.