Opinion
Case No. 4:20-cr-00139-SMR-CFB
2020-10-21
UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff, v. Robert John MANUEL, Jr., Defendant.
Kristin M. Herrera, United States Attorney's Office, Des Moines, IA, for Plaintiff. Melanie S. Keiper, Federal Public Defenders Office, Des Moines, IA, for Defendant.
Kristin M. Herrera, United States Attorney's Office, Des Moines, IA, for Plaintiff.
Melanie S. Keiper, Federal Public Defenders Office, Des Moines, IA, for Defendant.
ORDER ON DEFENDANT'S MOTION TO SUPPRESS
STEPHANIE M. ROSE, JUDGE Defendant Robert John Manuel, Jr. moves to suppress evidence of gun and drug possession he claims was obtained by virtue of an illegal search of the car he was driving. [ECF Nos. 26; 41]. The Court received testimony and evidence at a hearing held on October 2, 2020. For the reasons discussed below, as well as those stated on the record, Manuel's Motion to Suppress is DENIED.
I. BACKGROUND
Officers assigned to the Des Moines Police Department Special Enforcement Team ("SET") were conducting surveillance on a residence in Pleasant Hill, Iowa, where Manuel was known to reside with his girlfriend on July 21, 2020. Officer Brady Pratt, a plain clothes SET officer, observed Manuel drive into the apartment complex parking lot in a silver Chevrolet Impala. He was there only a short time before Officer Pratt observed Manuel return to the car to leave, carrying a black fanny pack. Officer Pratt also observed Manuel adjusting something under the seat and in the area surrounding the driver's side area of the vehicle. Based on the ongoing investigation into Manuel, Officer Pratt knew Manuel to be suspended from driving. Officer Pratt relayed his observations of Manuel's movements in the silver Chevrolet Impala to other SET officers stationed nearby, who in turn communicated their observations of the vehicle to uniformed officers parked a short distance away. The SET officers described the silver Chevrolet Impala and Manuel's clothing to the uniformed officers and requested that they conduct a traffic stop of Manuel for driving with a suspended license.
At the hearing, officers confirmed that SET has jurisdiction to operate within the town of Pleasant Hill for purposes of narcotics investigations.
Manuel drove the silver Chevrolet Impala into a parking space in front of a nearby gas station and had already exited and locked the vehicle when Des Moines Police Officers Jeffrey Davis, Luke Eblen, and Lucas Kramer approached to detain him. After placing Manuel in handcuffs, conducting a pat-down search, and removing him from the immediate vicinity, the officers informed Manuel his license was suspended from driving. Officers examined the interior of the locked car through the windows and observed Manuel's driver's license near the center console in plain view. Also within plain view on the passenger seat was the black fanny pack officers had observed Manuel carrying from the apartment, which had a distinctive, repeating "Puma" brand logo in large white letters across its black strap. The officers asked Manuel for permission to access the silver Chevrolet Impala to retrieve Manuel's driver's license, which he declined to give. Officer Kramer proceeded to unlock the vehicle using Manuel's keys and reached in to grab the driver's license. Upon doing so, he saw a firearm in the pocket of the driver's side door in plain view. Officers at the scene later found marijuana shake under the driver's seat and center console area. Manuel admitted to possessing the handgun and marijuana in post-Miranda admissions to the arresting officers.
Prior to the search, Manuel was known to law enforcement to affiliate with the OTB ("Only the Brothers") street gang. He was also known to law enforcement as having prior firearms convictions. The Government had begun investigating Manuel for gun- and drug-related crimes in early July 2020, after he made a series of posts to his private account on Snapchat showing him in possession of marijuana and a handgun. Using undercover law enforcement accounts, Des Moines Police Officers Ryan Garrett, Brian Minnehan, and Luke Harden connected with Manuel on the social media app and recorded several videos and images he posted in the days and weeks leading up to the search depicting himself with a gun and suspected drugs. See [Gov't Exs. 1–4]. Videos and images posted on Manual's account, and then recorded by Officer Garrett on July 8, 2020, show what appears to be marijuana in the driver's seat of a vehicle consistent in appearance with the silver Chevrolet Impala he was driving when arrested on July 21, 2020, and a handgun wedged between the seat and center console. [Gov't Ex. 1]. On July 14, 2020, Officer Minnehan recorded a video from Manual's account of Manuel carrying what appears to be the same black and white Puma brand fanny pack seized July 21, 2020; the video pans the camera to zoom in on the contents of the fanny pack, revealing a firearm and a baggie containing a green leafy substance. [Gov't Ex. 2]. Yet another video recorded by Officer Harden on July 17, 2020, shows Manuel smoking inside a residence with several individuals, one of whom is a known OTB member; Manuel again has the black Puma fanny pack while what appears to be a digital scale and a handgun rest in front of him. [Gov't Ex. 3]. Finally, Officer Minnehan recorded a video the day before the search on July 20, 2020, that shows Manuel sitting in the driver's seat of a Chevrolet vehicle again consistent with the same interior as that shown in the video recorded on July 8, 2020 with a handgun located in the driver's door pocket.
Snapchat is a social media application that allows users to post short, temporary videos directly to other users or to their own profile, viewable by the user's connections on the app. The Snapchat posts disappear from view after a period of time.
Manuel pointed out at the hearing that the time and date the videos and images were "posted" by Manuel is necessarily earlier than when they are viewed and recorded by the investigating officers. A small indicator in the upper-left part of the screen of a posted video or image displays an approximated time difference between when the video or image was posted by the user (Manuel) and when it is viewed by the user's connection (investigating officers). For instance, the videos and images recorded in Government's Exhibit 1 show the time difference between when they were posted by Manuel and recorded by law enforcement to be eighteen hours for the first post, seven hours for the second, six hours for the third, and five hours for the fourth. The app shows three hours to have elapsed between when the video in Government's Exhibit 2 was posted from when it was recorded, and a twenty-three hour gap between when Manuel posted the video in Government's Exhibit 4 and law enforcement recorded it. Testimony from Officer Minnehan suggests the video reflected in Government's Exhibit 3 was recorded directly on Manuel's phone, not through the Snapchat app, at a different time than it was posted. Though the video does not provide a similar approximation, a time stamp in the bottom-right part of the screen shows the video was recorded by Manuel at 4:43 pm on July 15, 2020; it was recorded by Officer Harden at 2:58 pm on July 17, 2020.
After his arrest on July 21, 2020, Manuel was charged with one count of Unlawful User in Possession of a Firearm, in violation of 18 U.S.C. §§ 922(g)(3) and 924(a)(2). He presently seeks to suppress evidence of the gun, ammunition, and marijuana collected from the search of the vehicle, as well as the post-arrest admission made in the course of his interrogation resulting from the search.
II. DISCUSSION
The Fourth Amendment forbids "unreasonable searches and seizures." U.S. Const. amend. IV. A search conducted without a warrant is per se unreasonable—unless an exception applies. Katz v. United States , 389 U.S. 347, 357, 88 S.Ct. 507, 19 L.Ed.2d 576 (1967). The automobile exception to the warrant requirement of the Fourth Amendment "allows law enforcement to ‘search a vehicle without a warrant if they have probable cause to believe the vehicle contains evidence of criminal activity.’ " United States v. Brown , 634 F.3d 435, 438 (8th Cir. 2011) (quoting United States v. Davis , 569 F.3d 813, 817 (8th Cir. 2009) ). "Probable cause exists where there is a ‘fair probability that contraband or evidence of a crime will be found in a particular place.’ " United States v. Donnelly , 475 F.3d 946, 954 (8th Cir. 2007) (quoting Illinois v. Gates , 462 U.S. 213, 238, 103 S.Ct. 2317, 76 L.Ed.2d 527 (1983) ). The officer's subjective motivation for the search is irrelevant; common sense and the relevant facts of what was known to the officer under the totality of the circumstances inform whether an officer had probable cause to conduct a search. Brigham City v. Stuart , 547 U.S. 398, 404, 126 S.Ct. 1943, 164 L.Ed.2d 650 (2006) ; see also United States v. Kennedy , 427 F.3d 1136, 1141 (8th Cir. 2005). Finally, there must be a nexus between the evidence sought and the place to be searched. United States v. Johnson , 848 F.3d 872, 878 (8th Cir. 2017) ; cf. United States v. Schermerhorn , 71 F. Supp. 3d 948, 956 (E.D. Mo. 2014).
The Government first contends probable cause existed for officers to enter the locked vehicle in order to retrieve Manuel's driver's license as evidence of his crime of driving while suspended. But the license was not needed to identify Manuel—the arresting officers' statements to and about Manuel clearly show and leave no question that they knew exactly who he was. In fact, their knowledge of his identity can be the only way the stop was justified under this theory of probable cause. Several officers were already surveilling Manuel and communicated his identity and the fact of his suspended license to the arresting officers. At the scene of the arrest, many of the officers addressed Manuel by name; Manuel never attempted to conceal his identity or claimed to be anyone other than himself. Cf. Arizona v. Gant , 556 U.S. 332, 335–36, 129 S.Ct. 1710, 173 L.Ed.2d 485 (2009). And contrary to the Government's position, the driver's license itself is not evidence of a crime. The license, itself, would not state whether or not Manuel's driving privileges had been suspended; its usefulness to officers in this instance does not associate it with criminal activity. See United States v. Hatten , 68 F.3d 257, 261 (8th Cir. 1995) ; cf. United States v. Hines , 449 F.3d 808, 814–15 (7th Cir. 2006) (holding probable cause existed to believe evidence of defendant's alias and false identification used for his suspected fraud); United States v. Murphy , 261 F.3d 741, 744 (8th Cir. 2001) (finding driver's license to be evidence of a crime to support probable cause because its visibility suggested the defendant had violated Iowa law by providing police with false information about his identity when he told officers he did not have any form of identification on his person).
Probable cause did exist, however, for the officers to search the vehicle for drugs and firearms. This case is similar to United States v. Blaylock , 535 F.3d 922 (8th Cir. 2008), where probable cause existed to support a search of the defendant's car parked next to his house when an undercover investigation had revealed a pattern of drug dealing involving the use of that vehicle. Law enforcement officers conducting a sting operation observed the defendant walk to a blue Nissan four-door car and reach into the vehicle before returning to the undercover agent to sell him drugs. Id. at 924. After conducting surveillance on the defendant's residence, officers set up another controlled-buy operation where the defendant's associate left the residence in the blue Nissan to travel to where the undercover agent was located, where they exchanged money for drugs before returning to the defendant's residence. Id. The United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit affirmed the denial of the defendant's motion to suppress drugs obtained from a warrantless search of the blue Nissan while executing a search warrant for the defendant's residence because the search was supported by "more than sufficient probable cause for the officers to conclude the Nissan contained evidence of illegal activity." Id. at 927.
Here, too, officers observed a pattern that established a fair probability they would find a handgun and marijuana in the silver Chevrolet Impala. In the days and weeks leading up to his July 21, 2020 arrest, SET officers had observed a pattern of Manuel possessing marijuana and a handgun through his Snapchat posts. In two videos Manuel is seen with a gun and the same black Puma fanny pack observed in plain view through the windows of his car, and officers testified this is a common method of transporting illicit firearms. See [Gov't Exs. 2, 3]. Officer Kramer testified he observed this fanny pack in plain view sitting in the front seat of the car. In two other videos, Manuel is seen in a vehicle with an interior consistent with that of the silver Chevrolet Impala with a firearm, and one of these shows the handgun in the same driver's door pocket as it when was found. See [Gov't Ex. 4]; see also [Gov't Ex. 1]. Like the circumstances in Blaylock , repeated observations in the days leading up to the search of the Impala "demonstrate[ ] a clear link between the car and drug trafficking sufficient to provide probable cause." 535 F.3d at 927. And once officers had accessed the car, the presence of the handgun in plain view of the open driver's side door presented further probable cause to continue and expand the search. See United States v. Brooks , 645 F.3d 971, 976 (8th Cir. 2011) ("Hidden guns, even badly hidden guns, are by their nature incriminating.").
Manuel contends probable cause is lacking because there is insufficient evidence the arresting officers had knowledge of his Snapchat posts recorded by the investigating officers and therefore could not have reasonably suspected evidence of drugs or guns in the car at the time of arrest. The "collective knowledge" doctrine provides that probable cause for a search may be based on the "collective knowledge of law enforcement officers conducting an investigation" and that such shared knowledge "can be imputed to the individual officer who initiated the traffic stop when there is some communication between the officers." United States v. Thompson , 533 F.3d 964, 969 (8th Cir. 2008) ; see also United States v. Banks , 514 F.3d 769, 776 (8th Cir. 2008) ("The collective knowledge doctrine imputes the knowledge of all officers involved in an investigation upon the seizing officer in order to uphold ‘an otherwise invalid search or seizure.’ " (citation omitted)). The Court finds the record sufficiently demonstrates the undercover officers conducting surveillance on Manuel's residence communicated their observations of Manuel's drug and firearm possession from the recordings of his Snapchat posts to the arresting officers. Officers Garrett, Pratt, and Harden had personally viewed Manuel's Snapchat posts and testified they shared their observations of his recordings of himself with a gun and suspected drugs at numerous SET roll call meetings prior to entering the field for surveillance. Officer Pratt testified the SET team specifically discussed them at the roll call meeting on July 21, 2020, the day of his arrest, and Officer Kramer testified he remembered viewing several Snapchat recordings of Manuel with guns and drugs—one of which he described is consistent with what is depicted in Government's Exhibit 3. He also testified Officer Pratt specifically called out Manuel leaving his apartment with the fanny pack and appeared to be placing or adjusting something in the front driver's side area of the Impala before he drove to the gas station, minutes before his arrest. This is sufficient to establish the arresting officers had knowledge of the facts giving rise to probable cause.
Defendant points out that federal courts disagree as to the extent of communication required by the collective knowledge doctrine, and whether probable cause may still be found when those facts supporting probable cause are not among the communications between the arresting and investigating officers. See generally United States v. Gorham , 317 F. Supp. 3d 459, 471–72 (D.C. Cir. 2018) (outlining split in authority). Because the record sufficiently establishes that the arresting officers had knowledge of the recordings as evidence of Manuel's recent drug and gun possession, the Court need not wade into this morass.
Finally, Manuel challenges the staleness of the information from the recorded Snapchat posts as the basis for his arrest. "It is axiomatic that probable cause must exist at the time of the search and not merely at some earlier time." Kennedy , 427 F.3d at 1141. The timeliness of the information justifying a warrantless search "depends on the circumstances of the case, including the nature of the crime under investigation and the property sought in the search." Id. Here, Manuel was being investigated under suspicion of being in possession of drugs and guns. The nature of gun possession in particular makes the time lapse from when the Snapchat videos were posted, recorded, and ultimately acted on less important because of the continuing nature of the possession offense and tendency for firearm owners to keep their weapons for long periods of time. United States v. Maxim , 55 F.3d 394, 397 (8th Cir. 1995) ; see also Kennedy , 427 F.3d at 1142 ("Where suspected criminal activity is continuing in nature and the property is not likely to be destroyed or dissipated, the passage of time may be less significant."). Moreover, Manuel's posts demonstrate a clear and consistent pattern over the course of several weeks of Manuel using the black Puma fanny pack in connection with storing or transporting drugs and guns. The most recent of these occurred only one or two days prior to his arrest. See United States v. Gragg , 576 F. App'x 656, 658 (8th Cir. 2014) (upholding search warrant executed forty-two days after controlled buy of narcotics because law enforcement suspected the defendant of having distributed meth for six years and nothing indicated he had stopped in the intervening time). When Officer Kramer received information from Officer Pratt that he saw Manuel place the black Puma bag into the Impala and adjust something under the driver's seat—a location he testified is commonly used to transport concealed firearms—and Officer Kramer saw the black Puma bag in plain view through the window of the car, he had information that was sufficiently immediate to give him probable cause to search the vehicle. Blaylock , 535 F.3d at 927.
Because probable cause supports the search of the vehicle for narcotics and firearms, the Court need not address Manuel's argument that, under Arizona v. Gant , 556 U.S. 332, 129 S.Ct. 1710, 173 L.Ed.2d 485 (2009), the search was not justified as a protective sweep. United States v. Webster , 625 F.3d 439, 445 (8th Cir. 2010) ("Warrantless searches need only be justified by one exception to the Fourth Amendment warrant requirement.").
III. CONCLUSION
For the reasons discussed above, Defendant Robert John Manuel, Jr.'s Motion to Suppress, [ECF No. 26], is DENIED.