Opinion
NOT TO BE PUBLISHED
APPEAL from the Superior Court of Riverside County No. RIF128329, Edward D. Webster, Judge. Affirmed.
Harry Zimmerman, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant.
Edmund G. Brown, Jr., Attorney General, Gary W. Schons, Assistant Attorney General, Jeffrey J. Koch and Scott C. Taylor, Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.
OPINION
Gaut, J.
All statutory references are to the Penal Code unless stated otherwise.
The police apprehended defendant Denise Anne Barbee and her companion, Arminetta Elaine Wardlaw, outside a University Avenue liquor store in Riverside, in possession of 60 pieces of rock cocaine, packaged for sale.
Defendant pleaded guilty to one count of possessing cocaine base for sale. (Health & Saf. Code, § 11351.5.) In addition, defendant admitted to 10 previous drug convictions and six prison priors.
After an earlier appeal by the district attorney (E042175), the case was remanded and the trial court sentenced defendant to 15 years in state prison.
Defendant appeals, challenging the court’s order denying her pretrial motion to suppress. We affirm the judgment.
2. The Pretrial Hearing and the Suppression Motion
The facts are derived from the preliminary hearing and the hearing on defendant’s motion to suppress evidence.
A Riverside police officer, Camillo Bonome, testified that he was on patrol on December 28, 2005 in the area of University and Ottawa. He saw defendant and Wardlaw at 10:00 p.m. in front of Western Liquor, an area known for narcotics transactions. The two women appeared to conduct a furtive hand-to-hand transaction, what may have been an exchange of a small item or package. Bonome also saw a man, a known cocaine user, walking away from the women. Bonome parked his patrol car next to the women. They both appeared to be alarmed and each put a hand in her pocket.
It was a cool night and the women wore jackets. Defendant acted evasively and Bonome detained her for questioning. Meanwhile, Wardlaw began fiddling with her clothing and her pockets. Bonome questioned Wardlaw, who explained she lived in Los Angeles and her car was parked down the street. Bonome touched Wardlaw’s pocket and felt a large bag. He also touched her purse and felt a large lump with smaller interior granules and consistent with cocaine. Wardlaw’s agitation increased. Bonone handcuffed Wardlaw and returned his attention to defendant. He seized her hand, pulling it out of her pocket. He located another lump, which he recognized as cocaine. He arrested defendant.
Defendant had possession of nine grams of cocaine, including packaging. Wardlaw had possession of 10.4 grams, including packaging. Defendant also was holding $362 and three cell phones. Wardlaw had $265 and one cell phone.
The court denied defendant’s suppression motion. The court then proceeded to receive defendant’s plea of guilty and to pronounce defendant’s sentence.
3. Discussion
The standard of review is well-established: “‘In ruling on a motion to suppress, the trial court must find the historical facts, select the rule of law, and apply it to the facts in order to determine whether the law as applied has been violated. (People v. Ayala (2000) 24 Cal.4th 243, 279.) We review the court’s resolution of the factual inquiry under the deferential substantial evidence standard. The ruling on whether the applicable law applies to the facts is a mixed question of law and fact that is subject to independent review. (Ibid.)’ (People v. Ramos (2004) 34 Cal.4th 494, 505.) In evaluating whether the fruits of a search or seizure should have been suppressed, we consider only the Fourth Amendment’s prohibition on unreasonable searches and seizures. (People v. Carter (2005) 36 Cal.4th 1114, 1141.)” (People v. Brendlin (2008) 45 Cal.4th 262, 268.)
The court announced its ruling denying the motion to suppress as follows: “When a police officer is in a situation where he observes unusual conduct which leads him to conclude, in light of his experience, that criminal activity may be afoot, in that the person or persons with whom he is dealing may be armed or potentially dangerous, he is entitled to conduct an investigative detention proceeding.
“In the situation here, University Avenue at this location, as the officer has testified to, and as just about any citizen in Riverside County could confirm, University Avenue at this location is known, it is an area of high criminal activity and heavy use and sales of narcotics.
“That being the case, when the officer arrives and approaches the location and observes furtive glances or startled looks or people that appear to be surprised, in conjunction with a known rock cocaine addict briskly walking away from the scene, based upon his experience, as he’s described to us, it would cause an experienced officer to conclude that there may be criminal activity afoot, and he’s therefore entitled to conduct a limited search, including of the outer clothing of such persons in an attempt to determine whether or not there’s potentially a weapon present.
“That’s language taken pretty much directly out of Terry versus Ohio [(1968) 392 U.S. 1]. It’s a Terry situation. He’s entitled to conduct a frisk or a pat-down, and it’s a part of that investigation at that point in time. There was certainly reasonable suspicion for the officer to inquire. So the motion is denied for that reason.”
Therefore, the facts, as the trial court found them, were that defendant was present at a known drug location, behaving furtively, and apparently consorting with a known drug user and another drug dealer. Substantial evidence supports the trial court’s factual findings.
This case strongly resembles People v. Souza (1994) 9 Cal.4th 224, 240-241, from which we quote liberally: “In assessing the sufficiency of these facts, we heed the United States Supreme Court’s admonition that the evidence relied on by police officers to justify the seizure of a person ‘must be seen and weighed not in terms of library analysis by scholars, but as understood by those versed in the field of law enforcement.’ [Citation.]
“At approximately 3 a.m., Officer Stackhouse was on patrol in a residential area he described as a ‘high crime area.’ In almost complete darkness, two people stood near a parked car. One of the two (defendant) leaned toward the car as if talking to someone inside. When Officer Stackhouse directed his patrol car’s spotlight into the car’s interior, two people in the front seat immediately bent down toward the floorboard, and defendant took off running. From these circumstances—the area’s reputation for criminal activity, the presence of two people near a parked car very late at night and in total darkness, and evasive conduct not only by defendant but by the two occupants of the parked car—Officer Stackhouse reasonably suspected that criminal activity was afoot.
“An area’s reputation for criminal activity is an appropriate consideration in assessing whether an investigative detention is reasonable under the Fourth Amendment. [Citations.] As the Court of Appeal aptly observed in People v. Holloway (1985) 176 Cal.App.3d 150, 155, ‘it may be fairly said that our entire nation is a high crime area,’ particularly with respect to drug-related crimes. Unfortunately, this sad state of affairs has seen little improvement in the intervening decade since Holloway was decided. As Holloway noted, mere presence in a high crime area is not, standing alone, ‘sufficient to justify interference with an otherwise innocent-appearing citizen.... Nevertheless, it would be the height of naiveté not to recognize that the frequency and intensity of these sorry conditions are greater in certain quarters than in others. Consequently, we must allow those we hire to maintain our peace as well as to apprehend criminals after the fact, to give appropriate consideration to their surroundings and to draw rational inferences therefrom, unless we are prepared to insist that they cease to exercise their senses and their reasoning abilities the moment they venture forth on patrol.’ (Ibid., citation omitted.)
“The time of night is another pertinent factor in assessing the validity of a detention....
“When in the course of investigating what he thought to be an auto burglary in progress, Officer Stackhouse directed his patrol car’s spotlight toward the parked Ford, the car’s occupants immediately bent down, and defendant fled. These evasive actions added support to the officer’s suspicion that criminal activity was afoot, and that defendant was involved in that activity.”
In summary, the presence of defendant and Wardlaw, loitering in a high crime area at night in the company of a drug user, and coupled with evasive conduct by him and the women, justified a brief, investigative detention to enable the officer to resolve the ambiguity in the situation and to find out whether the activity was in fact legal or illegal, using the “‘totality of the circumstances’” test that the United States Supreme Court has enunciated in assessing the validity of a temporary detention and patdown. (People v. Souza, supra, 9 Cal.4th at p. 242.)
4. Disposition
We affirm the judgment.
We concur: McKinster, Acting P. J., Miller, J.