Opinion
Appeal No. 270
12-22-2021
The PEOPLE of the State of New York, Respondent, v. James D. DOYLE, Appellant.
ROBERT SHOEMAKER, ATTORNEY FOR THE PEOPLE/RESPONDENT JAMES D. DOYLE, ESQ., PRO SE
ROBERT SHOEMAKER, ATTORNEY FOR THE PEOPLE/RESPONDENT
JAMES D. DOYLE, ESQ., PRO SE
Charles N. Zambito, J.
Defendant appeals from a judgment of the Pembroke Town Court, under which he was convicted upon his plea of guilty of driving while intoxicated (VTL1192 (3)) and sentenced to, inter alia, a conditional discharge.
In this appeal, the defendant claims that the trial court (Hon. D O'Connor, presiding) committed error by denying his motion to suppress evidence which he claimed was obtained as the result of an illegal approach and subsequent entry of his vehicle. For the reasons that follow, the defendant's claims must be rejected and the judgment of the trial court must be affirmed.
The record of the suppression hearing reveals that on August 27, 2017, Trooper Timothy Pickering was investigating several call-in complaints of a vehicle being operated erratically on the eastbound New York State Thruway. The vehicle was described as weaving from lane to lane without signaling and failing to maintain a constant speed over a distance of 15 miles before it pulled into the Pembroke rest stop. The person reporting the incident stopped nearby and later provided a written statement to the State Police.
Trooper Pickering located a vehicle in the rest area parking lot with a license plate number that matched the one provided by the complainant. Upon his approach of the vehicle he noticed that the engine was still running and that it was straddling two parking spots. The defendant was discovered slumped over the wheel in the driver seat, apparently asleep or otherwise unconscious. A front seat passenger was also slumped over and unconscious. The Trooper attempted more than once to awaken the defendant by knocking on the drivers side window, without success. He's an opened the driver side door and was eventually able to rouse the defendant.
The Trooper's actions were justified at every stage of his encounter with the defendant relevant to the issues raised at the hearing. The initial approach of the vehicle was a level one intrusion under the four-tier analysis set forth in People v. DeBour (40 NY± 210), which requires only an "objective credible reason, not necessarily indicative of criminality." In this case, the objective, credible reason was supplied by the report of the identified civilian complainant (People v Ocasio , 85 NY± 982; People v Witt , 129 AD 1449).
Further, the facts and circumstances known to the Trooper at the time, i.e. the recent and substantial report of the defendant's erratic driving behavior, the manner in which the defendant's vehicle was parked, the fact that the vehicle was still running, and the defendants unresponsive state, provided him with reasonable cause to believe that the defendant had operated the vehicle while intoxicated or impaired in violation of Vehicle and Traffic Law § 1192, and justified the minimally intrusive act of opening the defendant's car or door to continue his investigation into the event ( People v Ballman , 64 AD 9 ).
The Trooper's actions were also justified under the emergency doctrine, which allows police officers to take action which might otherwise violate the Constitution when seeking to help someone in immediate danger (People v Doll , 21 NY 665; People v Molnar , 98 NY± 328; People v Samuel , 152 AD 1202). Here, the "search" complained of by the defendant was merely that the Trooper opened the driver's door of the vehicle so he could better ascertain the defendant's condition. This was simply an extension of the Trooper's attempts to wake the defendant from outside the vehicle by knocking on the driver side window, which were unsuccessful and which added to the Trooper's concern that the defendant and/or passenger were experiencing a medical emergency. The scope of the search was thus sufficiently limited by, and reasonably related to, the exigencies of the situation (People v. Garcia , 39 AD 666; People v Alster , 28 AD 490).
The actions taken by the Trooper were an objectively reasonable response to the circumstances of his encounter of the defendant, and satisfy the elements which define the emergency exception (People v Doll , ibid). The defendant's motion to suppress the fruits of the search was properly denied (accord, People v McCaul , 73 Misc 126(A); People v Suncar , 66 Misc 672; People v Smith , 59 Misc 1211(A)).
The judgment of the Pembroke Town Court is affirmed. The foregoing constitutes the Decision and Order of the Court.