Opinion
No. COA15-485.
01-19-2016
STATE of North Carolina v. John David WATSON.
Attorney General Roy Cooper, by Assistant Attorney General Richard G. Sowerby, for the State. Marie H. Mobley for Defendant.
Attorney General Roy Cooper, by Assistant Attorney General Richard G. Sowerby, for the State.
Marie H. Mobley for Defendant.
Opinion
On writ of certiorari to review order entered on 21 August 2014 by Judge J. Carlton Cole in Hertford County Superior Court. Heard in the Court of Appeals 18 November 2015. Hertford County, Nos. 13 CRS 52090, 14 CRS 610.
STEPHENS, Judge.
Defendant John David Watson argues that the trial court improperly denied his motion to suppress contraband discovered during a search of his home. Watson contends that his motion should have been granted because permission to enter Watson's residence was obtained from his minor child rather than from Watson himself. Our review of this case, however, reveals that the contraband was not discovered as a result of any search. Accordingly, we hold that the trial court properly denied Watson's motion to suppress.
Factual and Procedural History
The contraband Watson sought to suppress was discovered by officers of the Hertford County Sheriff's Department (“HCSD”) during their investigation of a domestic dispute between Watson and his ex-girlfriend, Lori Jean Babb. On 14 December 2013, Babb was attempting to gain entry to Watson's residence despite Watson having told Babb that she was not welcome and should leave. After Babb sustained an injury while trying to get inside the house, she called a friend who then called 911.
HCSD Deputies Benjamin Oliver and Zachary Mize, along with an HCSD sergeant named Archer, responded to Watson's home. Mize spoke to Babb, while Archer spoke to Watson. Oliver wanted to speak to any possible witnesses and asked Watson if there was anyone else at home. Watson told Oliver that his son and current girlfriend were inside the house along with two large dogs.
Archer's first name does not appear in the record on appeal.
Oliver knocked on the side door of the home, and, eventually, Watson's teenage son, William Nock, opened the door. As soon as Nock opened the door, Oliver detected a strong odor of marijuana. Oliver then entered the home and spoke briefly with Nock and Watson's current girlfriend about the events that led to Babb's injury. While inside the home, Oliver noticed a wallet with a marijuana leaf design on a table, but did not see any marijuana or other contraband.
Oliver then returned to the yard, told Watson about the marijuana odor emanating from the house, and asked if Watson “ha[d] anything [the HCSD] needed to know about.” Watson responded that he had marijuana in an incubator inside the house and also possessed firearms, and offered to show the incubator to Oliver. While Watson was showing him the incubator containing marijuana, Oliver noticed Nock heading upstairs. Watson told Oliver that his firearms were in Nock's bedroom, and Oliver followed Nock upstairs. At the top of the stairs, Oliver noticed a glow coming from underneath the door of another room that he discovered was locked. Watson admitted that the room contained more marijuana and unlocked the door for Oliver. When Oliver asked Watson if there was anything else he wanted to tell the officers, Watson admitted that he also had marijuana plants in his barn.
At this point, the officers took Watson into custody, read him his rights, and handcuffed him. Watson waived his rights and showed the officers the marijuana in his barn. Ultimately, the HCSD confiscated 149 marijuana plants from Watson's property, as well as 41 grams of marijuana from the incubator.
On 10 February 2014, Watson was indicted for manufacturing marijuana, possession with intent to manufacture marijuana, possession of drug paraphernalia, and maintaining a dwelling to keep a controlled substance. On 18 June 2014, Watson filed a motion to suppress the marijuana and drug paraphernalia discovered inside his home and barn. Watson was indicted for assault on a female and assault inflicting serious bodily injury on 8 September 2014. The motion to suppress was heard at the 7 July 2014 criminal session of Hertford County Superior Court, the Honorable J. Carlton Cole, Judge presiding. The trial court denied Watson's motion to suppress in open court. A written order memorializing this ruling was entered by the trial court on 21 August 2014. Thereafter, on 16 February 2015, Watson entered into an agreement with the State, pleading no contest to the charges of assault on a female, manufacturing marijuana, and possession with intent to manufacture marijuana in exchange for the dismissal of the other three charges against him. Watson specifically reserved his right to appeal the denial of his motion to suppress. The trial court consolidated the three convictions, sentenced Watson to a term of 6 to 17 months in prison, suspended the sentence, and placed Watson on supervised probation for 60 months. Watson thereupon gave notice of appeal from the denial of his motion to suppress in open court.
Watson's Petition for Writ of Certiorari
Although Watson's trial counsel preserved Watson's right to appeal the denial of his motion to suppress in his transcript of plea and gave oral notice of appeal from that denial after imposition of sentence, Watson's trial counsel did not specifically say that he was also appealing from the judgment entered upon Watson's convictions, as is required to obtain appellate review. See N.C. Gen.Stat. § 15A–979(b) (2013) (“An order finally denying a motion to suppress evidence may be reviewed upon an appeal from a judgment of conviction, including a judgment entered upon a plea of guilty.”); see also State v. Miller, 205 N.C.App. 724, 725, 696 S.E.2d 542, 543 (2010) (dismissing an appeal where the defendant gave written notice of his intent to appeal the denial of his motion to suppress, pled guilty to the charges against him, and filed a written notice of appeal from the denial of his motion to suppress, but did not appeal from his judgment of conviction).
Recognizing this deficiency, on 24 July 2015, Watson's appellate counsel filed with this Court a petition for writ of certiorari asking that we exercise our discretion to address the merits of his argument. See, e.g., State v. McCoy, 171 N.C.App. 636, 638, 615 S.E.2d 319, 320 (“While this Court cannot hear [a] defendant's direct appeal [for failure to properly give notice of appeal], it does have the discretion to consider the matter by granting a petition for writ of certiorari.”), appeal dismissed, 360 N.C. 73, 622 S.E.2d 626 (2005). By order entered 13 August 2015, Watson's petition for writ of certiorari was referred to this panel. As Watson notes in his petition, where a defendant has lost his right to appellate review by failure to timely appeal from the conviction entered after a denial of a motion to suppress despite reserving his right to appeal that denial, certiorari is an appropriate route for obtaining appellate review. State v. Sutton, ––– N.C.App. ––––, ––––, 754 S.E.2d 464, 467–68 (citation omitted), disc. review denied, 367 N.C. 507, 759 S.E.2d 91 (2014). The State has not filed a response to Watson's petition. We allow Watson's petition and address the merits of his argument.
Discussion
Watson argues that the trial court erred in denying his motion to suppress. We disagree.
Our review of a trial court's denial of a motion to suppress is strictly limited to determining whether the trial judge's underlying findings of fact are supported by competent evidence, in which event they are conclusively binding on appeal, and whether those factual findings in turn support the judge's ultimate conclusions of law. Even if evidence is conflicting, the trial judge is in the best position to resolve the conflict. Indeed, an appellate court accords great deference to the trial court in this respect because it is entrusted with the duty to hear testimony, weigh and resolve any conflicts in the evidence, find the facts, and, then based upon those findings, render a legal decision. The trial court's conclusions of law, however, are fully reviewable on appeal.
State v. Derbyshire, 228 N.C.App. 670, 673, 745 S.E.2d 886, 889 (2013) (citations and internal quotation marks omitted), cert. denied, 367 N.C. 289, 753 S.E.2d 785 (2014). Further,
[a] correct decision of a lower court will not be disturbed on review simply because an insufficient or superfluous reason is assigned. The question for review is whether the ruling of the trial court was correct and not whether the reason given therefor is sound or tenable. The crucial inquiry for [the appellate c]ourt is admissibility and whether the ultimate ruling was supported by the evidence.
State v. Austin, 320 N.C. 276, 290, 357 S.E.2d 641, 650 (citations and internal quotation marks omitted), cert. denied, 484 U.S. 916, 108 S.Ct. 267, 98 L.Ed.2d 224 (1987).
Watson challenges the following findings of fact as not supported by competent evidence: (13) that Watson advised Archer and the other officers of the presence of large dogs on the premises, (14) that Nock opened the door for Oliver, (15) that Oliver noticed a strong odor of marijuana emanating from the home when the door was opened, and (16) that Nock allowed Oliver to enter the home. Our review of the evidence presented at the suppression hearing reveals that each of these factual findings is fully supported.
Although Oliver testified at the suppression hearing that he did not recall Watson telling him about the dogs, finding of fact 13 is supported by Watson's own motion to suppress, in which he acknowledged warning the deputies about his dogs because the dogs “could become aggressive, and [he] did not want anything to happen to his dogs[.]” Regarding finding of fact 14, while Nock testified that “the door was slowly coming open” without Nock actually opening the door for Oliver, Oliver testified that Nock opened the door when Oliver knocked. It was for the trial court to resolve this conflict in the evidence, see Derbyshire, 228 N.C.App. at 673, 745 S.E.2d at 889, and Oliver's testimony supports the resolution stated in finding of fact 14. Likewise, finding of fact 15 is supported by Oliver's testimony that he noticed a strong odor of marijuana coming from the house as soon as Nock opened the door.
Watson's challenge to finding of fact 16 is not to the fact that Oliver only entered the home after Nock opened the door and without any objection from Nock, and, in any event, Oliver's testimony at the hearing that he did not enter the house until Nock allowed him inside supports the factual circumstances of his entry. Instead, Watson focuses on the legal question of whether Nock, as a minor, could validly consent to a search of his father's home.
To the extent Watson's challenge to this finding of fact is actually an argument regarding the legal conclusion that Oliver's search was constitutional, we address it along with Watson's challenge to conclusion of law 2, that Watson's constitutional rights under the Fourth, Fifth, and Fourteenth Amendments of the United States Constitution were not violated, and to conclusion of law 3, that Oliver's initial entry into the residence was justified based on the totality of the circumstances such that no search warrant was needed. These conclusions of law suggest that the trial court, like the parties at the suppression hearing, proceeded on the belief that the contraband in Watson's home and barn were discovered as a result of Oliver's brief entry into Watson's home to speak with Watson's son and current girlfriend. That belief was erroneous.
Although Watson asserts that Oliver “would not have detected the odor of marijuana in the residence or observed the wallet or incubator without first going inside the home[,]” the uncontested evidence presented at the suppression hearing was that Oliver smelled a strong odor of marijuana coming from the home as soon as Nock opened the door while Oliver was still standing outside and before he entered the home. This was simply not a search because
no search ... occurs when an officer is in a place where the public is allowed to be, such as at the front door of a house. It is well established that entrance by law enforcement officers onto private property for the purpose of a general inquiry or interview is proper.
State v. Lupek, 214 N.C.App. 146, 151, 712 S.E.2d 915, 919 (2011) (citations, internal quotation marks, and brackets omitted). Here, Oliver knocked on the side door of Watson's home in order to conduct a “general inquiry or interview” about the circumstances of Babb's injury, see id., and, as soon as Nock opened the door, Oliver noticed the pungent odor of marijuana. It was that odor, discovered independent of and prior to any search that may have occurred, that led Oliver to ask Watson if he had anything to tell the officers. In response to Oliver's inquiry, as Watson acknowledges, Watson told the officers about the marijuana and incubator inside his home and not only consented to a search of his home, but, indeed, voluntarily took the officers on a tour of the contraband therein, including the incubator and the plants in the locked upstairs room and his barn. In sum, the discovery of marijuana and other contraband at Watson's home resulted from an admittedly consensual search conducted following Oliver's detection of an odor in a place where Oliver had the right to be. The trial court's ruling that Watson's motion to suppress should be denied is thus correct, even if based on incorrect or flawed reasoning. See Austin, 320 N.C. at 290, 357 S.E.2d at 650. Accordingly, the trial court's denial of Watson's motion to suppress is
AFFIRMED.
Judges HUNTER, JR., and INMAN concur.
Report per Rule 30(e).