State v. Bustle

An unpublished opinion of the North Carolina Court of Appeals does not constitute
controlling legal authority. Citation is disfavored, but may be permitted in accordance
with the provisions of Rule 30(e)(3) of the North Carolina Rules of Appellate Procedure.
NO. COA14-65
NORTH CAROLINA COURT OF APPEALS
Filed: 19 August 2014
STATE OF NORTH CAROLINA
Mecklenburg County
v.
No. 10 CRS 227936
CHARNA ANN BUSTLE
Appeal by defendant from judgment entered 1 March 2013 by
Judge Sharon Tracey Barrett in Mecklenburg County Superior
Court. Heard in the Court of Appeals 4 August 2014.
Attorney General Roy Cooper, by Assistant Attorney General
John W. Congleton, for the State.
Anna S. Lucas for defendant-appellant.
ERVIN, Judge.
Defendant Charna Ann Bustle appeals from a judgment
imposing a suspended sentence and placing her on unsupervised
probation based upon her conviction for driving while subject to
an impairing substance. On appeal, Defendant contends that the
trial court erred by denying her motion to suppress evidence
seized as a result of the stopping of the vehicle that she was
driving. After careful consideration of Defendant’s challenge
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to the trial court’s judgment in light of the record and the
applicable law, we conclude that the trial court’s judgment
should remain undisturbed.
I. Factual Background
A. Substantive Facts
The relevant facts underlying Defendant’s challenge to the
trial court’s judgment are set out in its order denying
Defendant’s suppression motion, in which the trial court found
as fact that:
1. In the early morning hours of June 13,
2010, Officer Som Brinton of the
Cornelius Police Department received a
call for service. . . .
2. This dispatch directed Officer Brinton
to respond to a domestic disturbance at
19829 Bustle Road in Cornelius,
Mecklenburg County.
3. The dispatch also indicated that an
individual who resided at the address
called to report that his ex-wife had
attempted to run him over with her
vehicle.
4. The dispatch further indicated that the
suspect was driving a gray Ford
Windstar van and was driving away from
the scene. The [d]ispatch also
included the license plate number for
the vehicle.
5. Officer Brinton immediately responded
to the dispatch and traveled toward the
Bustle Road address.
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6. Moments later, while Officer Brinton
was en route to the address, he
observed a Ford Windstar van traveling
on Jetton Road in the opposite
direction at approximately 4 a.m. in
the morning when there were few
vehicles on the road.
7. At that time, Officer Brinton turned
his vehicle around in order to follow
the van.
8. Officer Brinton noticed that the Ford
van’s license plate number matched the
tag number contained in the dispatch.
9. Officer Brinton conducted a traffic
stop on the Ford Windstar van.
10. This traffic stop occurred
approximately ¼ of a mile from the
address on Bustle Road provided to the
officer by dispatch.
11. The defendant was the driver of the
Windstar van when Officer Brinton
conducted the traffic stop.
B. Procedural History
On 13 June 2010, a citation charging Defendant with driving
while subject to an impairing substance was issued. On 24 March
2011, Defendant entered a plea of guilty to driving while
subject to an impairing substance in the Mecklenburg County
District Court. Based upon her plea, Judge Sean P. Smith
entered a judgment sentencing Defendant to a term of 30 days
imprisonment, with this sentence being suspended and Defendant
being placed on unsupervised probation for a period of 12 months
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on the condition that she pay a $150.00 fine, a $250.00
community service fee, and the costs; obtain a substance abuse
assessment and complete all recommended treatment; surrender her
driver’s license and not drive until properly licensed to do so;
complete 24 hours of community service within 30 days; and
comply with the usual terms and conditions of unsupervised
probation. Defendant noted an appeal to the Mecklenburg County
Superior Court from Judge Smith’s judgment for a trial de novo.
On or about 22 February 2013, Defendant filed a motion
seeking to have any evidence obtained as a result of the
stopping of her vehicle suppressed. After a hearing held on 22
February 2013, the trial court entered an order denying
Defendant’s suppression motion on 1 March 2013. At the
conclusion of the suppression hearing and after the trial court
indicated the intention to deny Defendant’s suppression motion,
Defendant notified the State and the trial court that she
planned to seek appellate review of the denial of her
suppression motion following the entry of a guilty plea.
The charges against Defendant came on for hearing at the 25
February 2013 criminal session of the Mecklenburg County
Superior Court. On 1 March 2013, Defendant entered a plea of
guilty to driving while subject to an impairing substance.
Based upon Defendant’s plea, the trial court entered a judgment
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sentencing Defendant to a term of 60 days imprisonment, with
this sentence being suspended and with Defendant being placed on
unsupervised probation for a period of 12 months on the
condition that Defendant pay a $100.00 fine, a $250.00 community
service fee, and the costs; obtain a substance abuse assessment
and complete any recommended treatment; surrender her drivers
license and not drive until properly licensed to do so; perform
24 hours of community service within 30 days; and comply with
the usual terms and conditions of unsupervised probation.
Defendant noted an appeal to this Court from the trial court’s
judgment.
II. Substantive Legal Analysis
In her sole challenge to the trial court’s judgment,
Defendant contends that the trial court erred by denying her
motion to suppress evidence obtained as a result of the stopping
of her vehicle. More specifically, Defendant contends that
Officer Brinton did not have a reasonable articulable suspicion
that she was engaging in criminal conduct at the time that he
stopped her vehicle. We do not find Defendant’s argument
persuasive.
A. Standard of Review
An appellate court’s review of a trial court order denying
a motion to suppress is “strictly limited to determining whether
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the trial judge’s underlying findings of fact are supported by
competent evidence, in which event they are conclusively binding
on appeal, and whether those factual findings in turn support
the judge’s ultimate conclusions of law.” State v. Cooke, 306
N.C. 132, 134, 291 S.E.2d 618, 619 (1982). However, “[t]he
trial court’s conclusions of law . . . are fully reviewable on
appeal.” State v. Hughes, 353 N.C. 200, 208, 539 S.E.2d 625,
631 (2000). As a result of the fact that Defendant has not
challenged the sufficiency of the evidentiary support for the
trial court’s findings of fact and the fact that such
unchallenged findings of fact are binding for purposes of
appellate review, see State v. Roberson, 163 N.C. App. 129, 132,
592 S.E.2d 733, 735-36, disc. review denied, 358 N.C. 240, 594
S.E.2d 199 (2004), the sole question raised by Defendant’s
challenge to the denial of her suppression motion is whether the
trial court’s factual findings support its conclusion that
Officer Brinton had a right to stop Defendant’s vehicle.
B. Validity of the Stopping of Defendant’s Vehicle
The essential basis for Defendant’s challenge to the denial
of her suppression motion is a contention that Officer Brinton
did not have the reasonable articulable suspicion necessary to
support the stopping of her vehicle. More specifically,
Defendant contends that the information provided in the 911 call
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to which Officer Brinton was responding did not provide
sufficient information to support the investigative detention to
which she was subjected. We disagree.
Reasonable suspicion is a “less demanding
standard than probable cause and requires a
showing considerably less than preponderance
of the evidence.” Only “‘some minimal level
of objective justification’” is required.
This Court has determined that the
reasonable suspicion standard requires that
“[t]he stop . . . be based on specific and
articulable facts, as well as the rational
inferences from those facts, as viewed
through the eyes of a reasonable, cautious
officer, guided by his experience and
training.” Moreover, “[a] court must
consider ‘the totality of the circumstances–
the whole picture’ in determining whether a
reasonable suspicion” exists.
State v. Maready, 362 N.C. 614, 618, 669 S.E.2d 564, 567 (2008)
(quoting State v. Barnard, 362 N.C. 244, 247, 658 S.E.2d 643,
645 (citations omitted), cert. denied, 555 U.S. 914, 129 S. Ct.
264, 172 L. Ed. 2d 198 (2008)). The reasonable suspicion
necessary to support an investigative detention need not be
based solely on the officer’s personal observation; instead, an
officer may conduct an investigative detention based upon
information supplied by another person in appropriate
circumstances. See Adams v. Williams, 407 U.S. 143, 147, 92 S.
Ct. 1921, 1924, 32 L.Ed.2d 612, 617 (1972). As a result, “[a]n
informant’s tip may provide the reasonable suspicion necessary
for an investigative stop” as long as “the tip possesses
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sufficient indicia of reliability.” State v. Hudgins, 195 N.C.
App. 430, 434, 672 S.E.2d 717, 719 (2009).
An anonymous tip does not possess the same indicia of
reliability that a tip from a known informant possesses. As
this Court has previously explained:
Where the informant is known or where the
informant relays information to an officer
face-to-face, an officer can judge the
credibility of the tipster firsthand and
thus confirm whether the tip is sufficiently
reliable to support reasonable suspicion.
See Adams, 407 U.S. at 146–47, [92 S. Ct. at
1923-24,] 32 L. Ed. 2d at 617 (tip from
known source); United States v. Christmas,
222 F.3d 141, 144 (4th Cir. 2000) (face-to-
face tip from unknown source), cert. denied,
531 U.S. 1098, [121 S. Ct. 830,] 148 L. Ed.
2d 712 (2001). Where a tip is anonymous, it
must be accompanied by some corroborative
elements that establish the tip’s
reliability. See [Florida v.] J.L., 529
U.S. [266,] 270, [120 S. Ct. 1375, 1378,]
146 L. Ed. 2d [254,] 260 [(2000)]; [Alabama
v.] White, 496 U.S. [325,] 329-31, [110 S.
Ct. 2412, 2415-17,] 110 L. Ed. 2d [301,]
308-09 [(1990)]. In determining whether the
informant was anonymous or confidential and
reliable the Court has adopted a “totality
of the circumstances” test.
Id. at 434, 672 S.E.2d at 719-20. Thus, the essential issue
that we must resolve in order to address the validity of
Defendant’s challenge to the denial of her suppression motion is
the extent, if any, to which the information provided by the
caller had been sufficiently corroborated to support an
investigative detention.
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In Hudgins, this Court upheld a reasonable suspicion
determination in a case in which an officer “received a call
from dispatch informing him that a man . . . was driving his car
and being followed.” Id. at 431, 672 S.E.2d at 718. “The
caller did not identify himself to the dispatcher, but stated
that he was being followed by a man armed with a gun[.]” Id.The anonymous caller described the vicinity in which he was
driving and the make, model, and color of the vehicle. Id.After proceeding to the location described by the information,
the officer “observed vehicles that matched the description
given by the caller stopped at a red light[,]” id., and
conducted an investigatory detention. After identifying
defendant as the man who had been following him, the caller left
the scene of the stop. Id. In upholding the validity of the
investigative detention, we emphasized that:
(1) the caller telephoned police and
remained on the telephone for approximately
eight minutes; (2) the caller provided
specific information about the vehicle that
was following him and their location; (3)
the caller carefully followed the
instructions of the dispatcher, which
allowed [the officer] to intercept the
vehicles; (4) defendant followed caller over
a peculiar and circuitous route that doubled
back on itself, going in and out of
residential areas between 2 and 3 a.m.; (5)
the caller remained on the scene long enough
to identify defendant to [the officer]; (6)
by calling on a cell phone and remaining at
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the scene, caller placed his anonymity at
risk.
Id. at 435, 672 S.E.2d 720; see also Maready, 362 N.C. at 620,
669 S.E.2d at 568 (holding that an informant’s willingness to
place her anonymity at risk by approaching officers at the scene
of the traffic stop was a “circumstance [that] weigh[ed] in
favor of deeming her tip reliable”).
Although the circumstances at issue in Hudgins differ from
those at issue here, we still find Hudgins instructive. In this
case, as in Hudgins, the caller provided specific information
about the defendant and the vehicle that she was driving. Based
on the information given by the caller, Officer Brinton was able
to immediately proceed to the vicinity of the caller’s address,
encounter the vehicle that Defendant was driving, corroborate
the description of the vehicle provided by the caller, and
conduct an investigative detention only one-quarter of a mile
from the caller’s address. More importantly, as in Hudgins, the
amount of personal information given by the caller placed his
anonymity at significant risk. By giving the dispatcher his
address and his ex-wife’s name, investigating officers could
have readily determined the caller’s identity. Indeed, given
the purpose of his call, the caller likely anticipated that law
enforcement officers would investigate the domestic dispute that
he reported had occurred at his home and discover who he was.
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The much greater extent to which the caller placed his anonymity
at risk in this case makes it readily distinguishable from the
anonymous tip cases upon which Defendant places principal
reliance. Moreover, although Defendant is correct in pointing
out that the record contained no indication that Defendant was
driving in an unlawful manner, that fact is of limited
importance given that Officer Brinton was investigating a
domestic disturbance rather than a driving-related problem. As
a result, in light of our decision in Hudgins, we hold that the
caller’s tip was sufficiently corroborated to support an
investigative detention and that the trial court did not, for
that reason, err by denying Defendant’s suppression motion.
III. Conclusion
Thus, for the reasons set forth above, we conclude that
Defendant’s challenge to the trial court’s judgment lacks merit.
As a result, the trial court’s judgment should be, and hereby
is, affirmed.
NO ERROR.
Judges ROBERT C. HUNTER and STEPHENS concur.
Report per Rule 30(e).