United States v. Clay

File Name: 06a0342n.06
Filed: May 12, 2006
NOT RECOMMENDED FOR FULL-TEXT PUBLICATION
No. 05-3556
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff-Appellee,
v. ON APPEAL FROM THE
UNITED STATES DISTRICT
SOLOMON CLAY, COURT FOR THE NORTHERN
DISTRICT OF OHIO
Defendant-Appellant.
/
Before: MERRITT, MARTIN, and McKEAGUE, Circuit Judges.
BOYCE F. MARTIN, JR., Circuit Judge. Solomon Clay appeals the district court’s decision
denying his motion to suppress evidence in a criminal case against him for felony possession of a
firearm. 18 U.S.C.A. § 922(g)(1). The evidence in question was a firearm and ammunition found
as a result of a Terry stop. For the reasons discussed within, we AFFIRM the district court’s
decision.
I.
All of the relevant events occurred on October 12, 2003. Youngstown Police Officer John
Scott Aeppli was patrolling the south side of Youngstown, Ohio, including West Florida Street.
Based on Officer Aeppli’s experience, he considered the West Florida Street area to be a high crime
and drug area. Upon his arrival, Aeppli observed a vehicle parked behind the house at 104 West
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United States v. Clay
Page 2
Florida Street, which he believed to be abandoned. As he drove by the house, Aeppli saw two
individuals in the car, including Solomon Clay in the driver’s seat. Aeppli testified that both
passengers in the car intently watched him pass.
Aeppli decided to drive around the block in order to make a second pass of the vehicle. On
his second drive by the residence, Aeppli witnessed the passengers in the car make furtive motions
with their hands in the direction of the dashboard. Based on his observations of the passengers in
the car and his experience and knowledge of the area, Officer Aeppli decided to approach the
vehicle, and he pulled into the driveway of the residence and blocked the car from exiting.
Shanita Law, seated in the passenger seat, stated that she resided at 104 West Florida Street;
however, upon Aeppli’s request, Law was unable to produce identification or any other proof of her
place of residence. After asking the two to exit the vehicle, Aeppli passed the driver’s side of the
vehicle and noticed an open box of .9mm ammunition in plain view on the driver’s side floor of the
car. Upon suspicion that a firearm was present in the automobile, Aeppli conducted a thorough
search of the car and discovered a loaded .9mm firearm in the glove box. Aeppli then arrested Clay
for mishandling a firearm in a motor vehicle, a violation of Ohio state law.
Clay was later charged with being a felon in possession of a firearm. 18 U.S.C.A. §
922(g)(1). Clay pled not guilty and, on March 15, 2004, filed a motion to suppress the firearm and
ammunition seized from the vehicle. After a suppression hearing, the district court denied Clay’s
motion to suppress on August 9, 2004. On January 4, 2005, Clay entered a conditional plea of guilty
to the charge of felon in possession of a firearm and reserved his right to challenge the denial of his
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Page 3
motion to suppress. On March 29, Clay was sentenced to twenty-seven months incarceration. Clay
filed a timely appeal to this Court on April 1.
II.
This Court reviews a district court’s factual findings in a suppression hearing for clear error
and the district court’s conclusions of law de novo. United States v. Richardson, 385 F.3d 625, 629
(6th Cir. 2004). “The primary interests that the Fourth Amendment protects include an interest in
freedom of movement and insulation from the fear and anxiety produced by unlawful seizure.” Id.
Under the Fourth Amendment, there are three types of permissible encounters
between police and citizens: consensual encounters in which contact is initiated by
a police officer without any articulable reason whatsoever and the citizen is briefly
asked some questions; a temporary involuntary detention or Terry stop which must
be predicated upon “reasonable suspicion;” and arrests which must be based on
probable cause.
United States v. Alston, 375 F.3d 408, 411 (6th Cir. 2004) (quoting United States v. Bueno, 21 F.3d
120, 123 (6th Cir. 1994)). In Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 27 (1968), the Supreme Court held that
officers have the authority to stop and temporarily detain citizens so long as the officer has
reasonable suspicion to justify the stop. An unlawful seizure occurs when an officer, without
reasonable suspicion, “by means of physical force or show of authority . . . in some way restrain[s]
the liberty of a citizen.” Id. at 19 n.16. “One’s liberty is restrained when a reasonable person would
not feel free to walk away and ignore the officer’s requests.” Richardson, 385 F.3d at 629 (citing
United States v. Mendenhall, 446 U.S. 544, 554 (1980)).
According to Terry, a warrantless search is legal if
a reasonably prudent man in the circumstances would be warranted in the belief that
his safety or that of others was in danger . . . And in determining whether the officer
acted reasonably in such circumstances, due weight must be given . . . to the specific
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Page 4
reasonable inferences which he is entitled to draw from the facts in light of his
experience.
Id. at 27. In United States v. Cortez, 449 U.S. 411, 417-18 (1981), the Court discussed Terry, stating
that
[a]n investigatory stop must be justified by some objective manifestation that the
person stopped is, or is about to be, engaged in criminal activity . . . the totality of
the circumstances – the whole picture – must be taken into account. Based upon that
whole picture the detaining officers must have a particularized and objective basis
for suspecting the particular person stopped of criminal activity.
As with any Terry stop, this Court must first determine when the stop took place and then
decide whether, at that time, the officer had reasonable suspicion for the stop. See Richardson, 385
F.3d at 629-631. It is uncontested that a seizure took place at the instant when Aeppli pulled his car
into the driveway of 104 West Florida Street and detained the vehicle Clay and Law were
occupying.
From the moment Aeppli pulled into the driveway, this Court must evaluate the totality of
the circumstances to determine whether Aeppli had reasonable suspicion to detain the vehicle at that
time. See Richardson, 385 F.3d at 630; see also United States v. Patterson, 340 F.3d 368, 370-71
(6th Cir. 2003) (“At this point, the officers needed to have reasonable suspicion in order to stop the
defendant”). “We view the evidence offered in support of reasonable suspicion using a common
sense approach, as understood by those in the field of law enforcement.” Richardson, 385 F.3d at
630 (citing Cortez, 449 U.S. at 417-18).
In support of the search, the government presents the following factors: 1) Officer Aeppli’s
belief that the house at 104 West Florida Street was abandoned, 2) the area was, based on Aeppli’s
knowledge and experience, considered a high crime area, 3) the occupants of the vehicle watched
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Officer Aeppli drive by, and 4) the rapid hand movements by the occupants of the vehicle. The
government attempts to add factors which came to Aeppli’s attention after he had detained the
vehicle, such as the presence of ammunition which the government alleges “heightened or extended
the officer’s previous reasonable suspicions.” Any factors, however, discovered after the car was
seized do not belong in the Terry analysis for determining whether Aeppli had reasonable suspicion
in initially detaining the vehicle. Richardson, 385 F.3d at 630; Patterson, 340 F.3d at 370-71.
Therefore, based on the belief that the house was abandoned, the high crime area, the fact that Clay
and Law stared at Aeppli during his drive and their rapid hand movements, Aeppli had reasonable
suspicion to detain the vehicle.
III.
Upon careful review of these factors, the entire record, and the parties’ briefs, we conclude
that the district court correctly concluded that Officer Aeppli had sufficient reasonable suspicion that
Clay was engaged in illegal conduct to justify a Terry stop. Accordingly, we adopt the reasoning
of the district court and affirm.