United States v. Sockwell

RULING ON MOTION TO SUPPRESS

Michael P. Shea, U.S.D.J.

I. INTRODUCTION

On May 4, 2021, a grand jury returned a three-count Indictment charging Defendant Maleke Sockwell with (1) possession with intent to distribute cocaine base and fentanyl, (2) possession of a firearm in furtherance of a drug trafficking crime, and (3) unlawful possession of a firearm by a felon. ECF No. 1. Sockwell moves to suppress all evidence seized by the Waterbury Police Department, the law enforcement agency that arrested him. ECF No. 25 at 1. For the reasons below, I DENY the defendant's motion to suppress.

II. FACTS

I assume familiarity with the parties' briefs and set forth only so much background as necessary to explain the ruling. The facts set forth below are undisputed. ECF No. 28 at 2 n.1.

On March 12, 2021, members of the Waterbury Police Department's Street Crime Unit (“SCU”) conducted surveillance in the parking lot of a Stop and Shop in Waterbury. ECF No. 28-1 at 2. The SCU had received anonymous complaints about drug dealing in that parking lot. Id. Officer Shea observed a Toyota Tacoma parked in the lot and then observed “a vehicle park next to the Tacoma at which time a male party exited ... his vehicle and entered the passenger seat of the Tacoma.” Id. at 3. Afterwards, the male party exited the Tacoma, returned to his

vehicle, and drove out of the parking lot. Id. Later, Officer Shea observed another vehicle and male party do the same. Id. Based on Officer Shea's training and experience, he believed that “this behavior [was] consistent with hand to hand drug transactions.” Id. Officer Shea also knew that “drug dealers ... meet in various places such as parking lots in an attempt to blend in with other people or vehicles in the area to prevent detection by police.” Id.

When the Tacoma left the parking lot, Officer Rivera followed and observed that the driver of the Tacoma failed to give a proper turn signal. Id. at 3-4. The driver of the Tacoma, later identified as Sockwell, parked the vehicle on the sidewalk outside of 385 Wolcott Street. Id. at 4. Sockwell exited the driver side of the Tacoma and shut the door. Id. Police officers parked one vehicle next to the Tacoma and a police cruiser behind the Tacoma and activated emergency lights and sirens. Id. Sockwell, after observing the police cruiser, threw items onto the front yard of 385 Wolcott Street and ran. Id. Officer Cabrera apprehended and arrested Sockwell. Id. at 4-5. Police officers recovered three cellphones from the front yard. Id. Based on Officer Cabrera's experience and training, he believed that drug dealers “use cell phones to facilitate and conduct narcotics transactions.” Id. Officer Cabrera then “looked into the driver side window of the Tacoma” and observed a firearm on the floor in front of the driver seat. Id. Officer Cabrera conducted a search of the Tacoma for any other weapons or contraband and found white glassine bags with a “tan powder like substance, ” a clear bag with “white rock like substance, ” a digital scale, and a “large amount of U.S. currency ... later found to be $8, 759.” Id. At police headquarters, the powder-like substance tested positive for fentanyl and the rocklike substance tested positive for cocaine. Id. at 7.

III. DISCUSSION

A. The Terry Stop

Sockwell moves to suppress the evidence described above, arguing that the police officers lacked reasonable suspicion when they initiated a Terry stop of Sockwell based on the anonymous tips and the individuals entering and exiting the passenger seat of the Tacoma in the Stop and Shop parking lot. ECF No. 25-1 at 4-6. Sockwell argues that he was seized as soon as the police officers parked alongside the Tacoma with activated lights and sirens-and before he jettisoned the cell phones and fled. Id. at 4. The Government counters that Sockwell was seized later, when he was apprehended, and that the analysis of the stop and subsequent search of the car must take account of the information the officers learned after they parked their vehicles, including Sockwell's flight and discarding of three cell phones, all of which satisfied the reasonable suspicion standard necessary to justify a stop. ECF No. 28 at 5-6.

i. Initiation of the Terry Stop

The first issue is when the police officers initiated the Terry stop of Sockwell. “A Terry stop begins when an individual is seized for purposes of the Fourth Amendment, ” United States v. Lopez, 432 F.Supp.3d 99, 110 (D. Conn. 2020), and must be “justified at its inception, ” United States v. Simmons, 560 F.3d 98, 105 (2d Cir. 2009) (quoting Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 19-20 (1968)). “A seizure occurs when (1) a person obeys a police officer's order to stop or (2) a person that does not submit to an officer's show of authority is physically restrained.” Id.

Fleeing suspects are not seized until they are physically restrained or otherwise submit to a police officer's show of authority. In California v. Hodari D., the Supreme Court held that where a suspect fled at the sight of the police and was pursued and tackled, the police's pursuit “constituted a ‘show of authority' enjoining [the defendant] to halt, ” and because the defendant did not comply, “he was not seized until he was tackled.” 499 U.S. 621, 629 (1991). The Second Circuit reached a similar conclusion in United States v. Swindle, 407 F.3d 562, 564 (2d Cir. 2005),

where the police officers had followed the defendant's car, activated their police strobe light, and ordered the defendant to pull over, but the defendant continued driving, violated multiple traffic laws, jettisoned a bag of crack cocaine, and the officers apprehended him only after he pulled over and fled on foot. Id. Rejecting the defendant's argument that the officers had seized him when they “activated their police light because no reasonable driver would have felt free to ignore that order to stop, ” the court held that the defendant “was not seized until the police physically apprehended him.” Id. at 571-72. Even though the defendant may “have felt restrained in the face of the flashing police strobe light, there was no immediate physical force applied or submission to the assertion of authority.” Id. at 572-73 (internal quotation marks omitted).

Thus, under Hodari and Swindle, Sockwell was seized when he was physically apprehended. The police officers' actions-parking by the Tacoma and activating lights and sirens-constituted a “show of authority” but did not amount to a seizure because Sockwell failed to submit to their authority and fled until he was physically restrained. See id. at 566 (noting that “any reasonable driver would understand a flashing police light to be an order to pull over” but “such an order would not give rise to a ‘stop' unless the driver submitted to the order or was physically apprehended”). Because Sockwell did not submit to the officers' show of authority, he was not seized until he was physically restrained.

Sockwell likens this case to United States v. Lopez, 432 F.Supp.3d 99, 110 (D. Conn. 2020), where the court held that a vehicle stop started once the police officer exited his car and approached the defendant's car while shouting instructions. In finding that the stop began at that moment, the court relied, in part, on the fact that the police officer effectively boxed in the defendant by parking his car in such a way that the defendant would have had to hit him to drive

away. Id. at 110-11. Unlike in this case, the defendant did not attempt to flee and never left the car. Id. at 105. Because he remained in his car and his car was boxed in, he was, to a much greater extent than Sockwell, restricted in his ability to move, even though he did not “stop moving and show his hands” in accordance with the officer's instructions until the officer used a “pain compliance technique.” Id. at 108; compare Marcano v. City of Schenectady, 38 F.Supp.3d 238, 252 (N.D.N.Y. 2014) (finding that the plaintiff did not submit to the police officers' show of authority when he fled in response to the officers shining a spotlight on him and telling him to stop). By contrast, Sockwell had already exited his vehicle and had-and used-a route of escape on foot.

Because I find that Sockwell was seized when he was apprehended, any items that he “abandoned before being apprehended were ... not the product of a Fourth Amendment seizure.” Swindle, 407 F.3d at 573. Thus, I deny the motion to suppress as to the cell phones recovered from the front yard after Sockwell discarded them.

ii. Reasonable Suspicion

The second issue is whether the Terry stop was supported by reasonable suspicion. Reasonable suspicion is more than a “hunch” and requires “specific and articulable facts which, taken together with rational inferences from those facts, provide detaining officers with a particularized and objective basis for suspecting wrongdoing.” United States v. Bailey, 743 F.3d 322, 332 (2d Cir. 2014) (internal quotation marks and citations omitted). However, “[t]he standard is not high” and “less than probable cause.” Id. When assessing reasonable suspicion, a “court must view the totality of the circumstances through the eyes of a reasonable and cautious police officer on the scene.” Id. (internal quotation marks and citation omitted).

The discussion above about the timing of the seizure supports the Government's...