Opinion
NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN THE OFFICIAL REPORTS
Superior Court County of Santa Barbara, Super. Ct. No. 1280819, Zel Cantor, Judge
Lynn A. Woodward, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant.
Edmund G. Brown Jr., Attorney General, Dane R. Gillette, Chief Assistant Attorney General, Pamela C. Hamanaka, Senior Assistant Attorney General, James William Bilderback II, Supervising Deputy Attorney General, David Zarmi, Deputy Attorney General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.
YEGAN, Acting P.J.
Frank Melendez. Jr. appeals his conviction by plea for unlawful possession of a firearm by a felon (Pen. Code, § 12021, subd. (a)(1)) with a prior prison term enhancement (§ 667.5, subd. (b)), entered after the trial court denied his motion to suppress evidence. (§ 1538.5.) The trial court suspended imposition of sentence and granted probation with 210 days county jail. We affirm.
All statutory references are to the Penal Code.
Facts
On January 24, 2008, Santa Maria Police Officer Francisco Velazquez responded to a disturbance call at a parking lot. Officer Velazquez saw a man, who identified himself as Garcia, standing next to a van.
Garcia was wearing a trench coat and dropped a black object that looked like contraband. Officer Velazquez asked Garcia to show his hands and walk towards him. Garcia consented to a pat-down for weapons and had a metal marijuana pipe in his pants pocket. He said that the driver of the van gave him a ride from Los Alamos and that he just got out of the van.
The officer later determined that the black object was a piece of sandpaper.
Two men approached the van as Officer Velazquez handcuffed Garcia. Concerned about his safety, the officer requested backup and asked everyone in the van to identify themselves "to make sure that the situation was safe." Officer Velazquez told the driver (Frank Melendez, Sr.) that he was conducting an investigation based on "what Garcia had been doing, i.e., . . . the dropping of the black object." The officer asked for identification, asked if anyone was on parole or had any warrants, and asked whether they knew Garcia.
Appellant was in the front passenger seat and said that he had been recently released from parole. A second officer ran a warrant check and determined that appellant had an outstanding arrest warrant.
The driver (Frank Melendez, Sr.) consented to a search of the van. Officer Velazquez found a .22 caliber rifle, a jar of marijuana, and a baggie of marijuana, all within appellant's reach. A woman passenger (Tonett Tucker) said that appellant gave her the marijuana and told her to hide it.
Waiving his Miranda rights (Miranda v. Arizona (1966) 384 U.S. 436 [16 L.Ed.2d 694]), appellant denied that the rifle and marijuana were his.
Officer Velazquez arrested appellant on the warrant and arrested the driver and woman passenger for the marijuana. Garcia was searched again and had a loaded derringer in his waistband.
After appellant was booked, he asked to speak to Officer Velazquez and admitted that he was the owner of the rifle and marijuana.
Investigatory Detention
Appellant argues that the parking lot detention violated his Fourth Amendment rights. The trial court found that Officer Velazquez determined "that Garcia was part of the vehicle, and . . . then he finds the marijuana pipe. So that would lead to a normal suspicion that the vehicle may contain marijuana. [¶] Now he sees two people coming []to the vehicle, and he has a suspicion or has a right to suspect that the vehicle may contain contraband. So he then detains those people for questioning. I think that [the] detention is all right."
On review, we defer to the trial court's express and implied factual findings which are supported by substantial evidence and determine whether, on the facts so found, the detention was reasonable under the Fourth Amendment. (People v. Glaser (1995) 11 Cal.4th 354, 362.) "It is well established that a mere request for identification does not transmogrify a [police] contact into a Fourth Amendment seizure. [Citation.]" (People v. Cartwright (1999) 72 Cal.App.4th 1362, 1370.) Police officers may, during the course of a criminal investigation, ask questions and request identification. (See e.g., People v. Lopez (1999) 212 Cal.App.3d 289, 291.)
In People v. Spicer (1984) 157 Cal.App.3d 213 an officer made a traffic stop and requested that the driver submit to a sobriety test. A second officer ordered defendant, a car passenger, to produce her driver's license and shined a flashlight in the car. As defendant rummaged though her purse, the officer saw a handgun in the purse. The Court of Appeal found, based on the totality of the circumstances, that it was a seizure for Fourth Amendment purposes because the officer, without explanation or prefatory remarks, ordered defendant to produce her driver's license. (Id., at p. 219.) "It is especially pertinent to this case that the officer did not explain to Ms. Spicer his reason for requesting her driver's license." (Ibid.) The Spicer court emphasized that not "every encounter between the police and a citizen must be prefaced by a 'Spicer warning' . . . Nor are we holding that every time a police officer converses with an automobile passenger in a situation like this it inevitably constitutes a detention. What was involved here was not causal banter but a direct request the defendant search for and produce a document." (Id., at p. 220.)
Unlike People v. Spicer, Officer Velazquez advised everyone in the van that he was investigating Garcia's actions and asked if they knew Garcia. The inquiry was reasonable because Garcia had dropped an object that looked like contraband, was carrying a marijuana pipe, and had just gotten out of the van. Association with someone who has just committed a crime is good cause for a detention. (See e.g., In re Antonio B. (2008) 166 Cal.App.4th 435, 441 [investigative detention where defendant walking with juvenile smoking marijuana]; People v. Holguin (1989) 213 Cal.App.3d 1308, 1316 [association with criminals at specific location where crime was recently committed supports reasonable suspicion for detention]; People v. Soun (1995) 34 Cal.App.4th 1499, 1520 [30 minute parking lot detention reasonable].).)
The trial court did not err in finding that Officer Velazquez had reasonable cause to believe that Garcia and the van were involved in criminal activity. Where the totality of the "circumstances ' "are consistent with criminal activity," they permit – even demand – an investigation . . . .' [Citation.] A different result is not warranted merely because circumstances known to an officer may also be ' " consistent with lawful activity." ' [Citation.] " (People v. Souza (1994) 9 Cal.4th 224, 233.)
Officer safety was an important factor because Officer Velazquez was responding to a parking lot disturbance call, saw Garcia drop an object near the van, and requested that Garcia consent to a pat-down for weapons.
The officer determined that Garcia had just gotten out of the van and saw two other men approach the van. Officer Velazquez requested backup and asked everyone in the van to identify themselves "to make sure that the situation was safe." It was not a swiftly developing situation and, "in such cases the court should not indulge in unrealistic second-guessing." (United States v. Sharpe (1985) 470 U.S. 675, 616 [84 L.Ed.2d 605, 616].) In People v. Collier (2008) 166 Cal.App.4th 1374, 1378, we noted that " 'guns often accompany drugs' " and that the lives and safety of police officers weigh heavily in the balance of Fourth Amendment considerations.
The same principle applies here. "[L]aw enforcement officers do not violate the Fourth Amendment by merely approaching an individual on the street or in another public place, by asking if he is willing to answer some questions, by putting questions to him if the person is willing to listen, or by offering in evidence in a criminal prosecution his voluntary answers to such questions. [Citations.]" (Florida v. Royer (1983) 460 U.S. 491, 497 [75 L.Ed.2d 229, 236].)
Jailhouse Statement
Appellant asserts that his jailhouse statement was the fruit of an unlawful detention but it is uncontroverted that he was arrested on an outstanding warrant. Substantial evidence supports the finding that the statement was free, voluntary, and attenuated. (People v. Boyer (2006) 38 Cal.4th 412, 448-449.) After appellant was arrested and Mirandized in the parking lot, he denied that the rifle and marijuana were his. Appellant was booked, placed in a cell, and later asked to speak to Officer Velasquez. One can reasonably infer that appellant admitted ownership of the rifle and marijuana to help his father (the van driver) get out of jail. There is no evidence that appellant was coerced or that the statement was the product of an unlawful detention.
The judgment (order denying suppression motion) is affirmed.
We concur: COFFEE, J., PERREN, J.