United States of America v. Hudson et al

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IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE WESTERN DISTRICT OF OKLAHOMA
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, 	)
)
Plaintiff, 	)
)
v. 	) 	Case No. CR-16-119-R
)
ZANE P. YARGEE, et al. 	)
)
Defendants. 	)
ORDER
Before the Court is Defendant Yargee’s Motion to Suppress evidence seized in a
purported traffic stop on July 4, 2016, Doc. 1128.1 The Court held a suppression hearing on
January 3, 2018, and denied the Motion based on the evidence presented and the parties’
arguments. The Court finds that the traffic stop was justified at its inception, officers had
reasonable suspicion to extend the stop, and in the alternative, Defendant Yargee fails to show
a factual nexus between his alleged illegal seizure and the challenged evidence.
The facts surrounding this stop and drug seizure are largely undisputed. Four officers
from the Oklahoma City Police Department—informed by the FBI’s contemporaneous
wiretap evidence and ground surveillance of an Irish Mob drug deal that occurred only twenty
minutes earlier—stopped a maroon Audi vehicle on the highway in Oklahoma City after
observing an expired tag in violation of 48 Okla. Stat. § 1151(A)(5) (“It shall be unlawful for
any person to . . . operate a vehicle without proper license plate or decal . . . .”). Defendant
1 The Court denied Defendant Potts’ motion (Doc. 1136) to join this Motion to Suppress because Potts lacks
standing. See Doc. 1266. Defendant Brown did not join this Motion, nor would he be able to show standing.
See Docs. 1138, 1139.
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Yargee was a backseat passenger in the Audi. Oklahoma City Sergeant Patrick Morgan
testified that (1) Yargee and another passenger appeared abnormally nervous during the traffic
stop, (2) passengers gave implausible and inconsistent responses to the officers’ questions
regarding their travel plans, and (3) passengers exhibited various Irish Mob insignia on their
persons. An officer asked and was denied consent from the driver to search the vehicle, after
which the officer called for a drug-sniffing dog. The officers then removed the driver and
passengers one-by-one, handcuffed them, and placed them in separate police vehicles while
officers waited for the dog to arrive. The dog arrived around twenty minutes after the stop
began and alerted officers to the presence of drugs. A subsequent search revealed a loaded .32
caliber Bryce semi-automatic handgun in the glovebox and a Dillard’s bag in the trunk
containing about a pound of methamphetamine. See Doc. 1189, at 3. Defendant Yargee now
moves to suppress the gun and drugs as fruit of an unlawful search and seizure.
“To suppress evidence as the fruit of his unlawful detention, [a defendant] must make
two showings: (1) ‘that the detention did violate his Fourth Amendment rights’; and (2) that
there is ‘a factual nexus between the illegality and the challenged evidence.’” United States
v. DeLuca, 269 F.3d 1128, 1132 (10th Cir. 2001) (quoting United States v. Nava–Ramirez,
210 F.3d 1128, 1131 (2000)). The Court’s Fourth Amendment inquiry into whether a search
or seizure was reasonable is twofold: “first, one must consider ‘whether the action . . . was
justified at its inception’ . . . ; second, one must determine whether the search as actually
conducted ‘was reasonably related in scope to the circumstances which justified the
interference in the first place.’” New Jersey v. T.L.O., 469 U.S. 325, 341 (1985) (quoting Terry
v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 20 (1968)).
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The Police Department’s stop was justified at its inception for two reasons. First, under
the 	“vertical 	collective 	knowledge doctrine,” 	officers 	reasonably 	relied 	on 	the FBI’s
information that a maroon Audi with a specified license plate was leaving Walmart eastbound
in possession of illegal drugs from an Irish Mob deal. United States v. Whitley, 680 F.3d 1227,
1235 (10th Cir. 2012). FBI Special Agent David Wardlaw testified that on the afternoon of
July 4, 2016, wiretap intercepts from Defendants Potts and Brown’s cellphones revealed the
location, timing, and cars that would soon exchange “pizza,” or methamphetamine. See
Government’s Suppression Hearing Exhibits 3-G through 3-Q. Law enforcement then
surveilled those cars in the Walmart parking lot, as predicted, and confirmed a package
exchanged into the maroon Audi. To stop the Audi, officers could have relied on the wiretap
intercepts and surveillance alone; they provided reasonable suspicion, if not probable cause,
to believe the car and its passengers were involved with drug-trafficking. However, the FBI
wanted to protect ongoing wiretaps of two Irish Mob leaders. Therefore, with the help of aerial
surveillance and the FBI’s tip, officers conducted a pretextual traffic stop at 6:30 P.M. that
same day based on an expired tag. Even without disclosing their true motive for the stop,
officers’ suspicion of drug-trafficking was sufficient. See Whren v. United States, 517 U.S.
806, 813 (1996) (“Subjective intentions play no role in ordinary, probable-cause Fourth
Amendment analysis.”).
Second, the stop was justified at inception because the officers observed a traffic
violation. See Rodriguez v. United States, 135 S. Ct. 1609, 1614 (2015). Defendant’s
argument that taxes were owed to the sovereign Cherokee nation, and not to the State of
Oklahoma, is meritless. The statute clearly prohibits both operating a car “on which all taxes
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due the state have not been paid” and driving with an “[im]proper license plate or decal.” 48
Okla. Stat. § 1151(A)(5). Thus, the plate’s expired tag justified the stop. See Doc. 1189-1.
The stop was also “reasonably related in scope to the circumstances which justified the
interference in the first place.” Terry, 392 U.S. at 20. Again, officers had two grounds to stop
the Audi. Looking to the drug-trafficking justification, a twenty-minute detention was
reasonable. The Supreme Court held in Rodriguez “that a police stop exceeding the time
needed to handle the matter for which the stop was made violates the Constitution’s shield
against unreasonable seizures.” 135 S. Ct. at 1612. To examine whether their suspicions of
drug-trafficking were correct, officers reasonably waited twenty minutes for the drug-sniffing
dog to arrive. Alternatively, assuming officers stopped the Audi because of the expired tag,
officers presented additional evidence needed to extend the traffic stop, which is typically a
“relatively brief encounter.” Knowles v. Iowa, 525 U.S. 113, 117 (1998). The Court is
skeptical that passengers’ nervousness was abnormal after four uniformed officers’ flanked
both sides of the vehicle in an abrupt show of force. Nonetheless, officers found reasonable
suspicion in passengers’ statements, which reflected inconsistent and implausible travel
plans,2 and their apparent affiliation with the Irish Mob. Therefore, the stop was reasonable
in scope based on either justification.3
2 Sergeant Morgan testified that one passenger told an officer they were headed to Tulsa, whereas another said
they were headed to a different location. Additionally, a passenger allegedly said they were driving to pick up
his uncle, even though the vehicle was already at capacity with five passengers.
3 Morgan also testified that had he been able to disclose and rely on the wiretap evidence, he would have
conducted a probable cause search of the car even before the drug-sniffing dog arrived. The Court will not
speculate whether probable cause existed when officers first initiated the stop. Reasonable suspicion was
enough to conduct the stop, and the “tolerable duration” of that stop is “determined by the seizure’s ‘mission.’”
Rodriguez v. United States, 135 S. Ct. 1609, 1614 (2015) (quoting Illinois v. Caballes, 543 U.S. 405, 407
(2005)). Either mission, in light of officers’ observations during the encounter, justified the twenty minute stop
in this case. The Court also declines to decide whether the manner in which the stop was effectuated—
handcuffing the passengers and placing them in separate vehicles before the dog arrived—constituted an
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Otherwise, even if officers unconstitutionally seized Defendant Yargee, he lacks
standing to suppress the gun and drugs because he failed to demonstrate a “factual nexus”
between his unlawful detention and discovery of the evidence. DeLuca, 269 F.3d at 1133. The
defendant has the burden to show Fourth Amendment standing or factual nexus—“that the
methamphetamine would never have been found but for his, and only his, unlawful
detention.” Id. To do so, Yargee would have to show that “had he requested to leave the scene
of the traffic stop, he would have been able to do so in the [seized car].” The maroon Audi
appeared to belong to Defendant Derek Soeten, and Yargee does not claim he had permission
to use the car. See Government’s Exhibit 3-K, at 1. “[W]ithout any evidence to the contrary,
we must assume that regardless of [Defendant Yargee’s] presence, the car and its owner would
have continued to be detained and the officer would still have found the methamphetamine.”
DeLuca, 269 F.3d at 1133. Therefore, Defendant Yargee’s Motion to Suppress, Doc. 1128, is
DENIED.
IT IS SO ORDERED this 4 th day of January, 2018.
unconstitutional arrest, rather than a valid “Terry stop,” Knowles v. Iowa, 525 U.S. 113, 117 (1998). As the
Court discusses herein, Yargee has failed to meet his burden of showing the required “factual nexus” for
suppression. United States v. DeLuca, 269 F.3d 1128, 1133 (10th Cir. 2001).
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