State of Maine v. Taft

STATE OF MAINE UNIFIED CRHv1INAL DOCKET
KENNEBEC, ss. AUGUSTA
DOCKET NO. CD-CR-18-189

STATE OF MAINE

v. ORDER ON DEFENDANT'S
MOTION TO SUPPRESS

KIJAUME TAFT,
Defendant

This matter was heard and argued to the Court on July 1, 2019 with respect
to the Defendant's Motion to Suppress filed August 2, 20181. The issues for the
Court were reduced by counsel at hearing to whether there was reasonable
articulable suspicion to stop the vehicle Defendant was driving, and whether
Defendant was "de facto arrested during the stop" without probable cause to do
so.

After hearing, and after the Court has had the opportunity to review the
file, the notes taken during the hearing, and the post-hearing briefs filed by counsel
of record on July 29, 2019, the Court makes the following Findings of Fact and
Conclusions of Law upon which the Order set forth below is based:

I. Findings of Fact:

1. On February 1, 2018 at about 9:50 a.m. Officer Nathan Walker
(hereinafter "Walker") received a call from fellow Special Agent King (hereinafter
"King") of the Maine Drug Enforcement Agency that there was going to be a drug
transaction taking place shortly, and that King was seeking assistance from
Walker. Walker had been in law enforcement since 2003. Walker was given a
description of the motor vehicle thought to be involved, and began following what
turned out to be a silver Chevrolet Impala from Windsor into Waterville. Other
drug enforcement agents were also following the Impala.

2. The vehicle was followed into the Burger King parking lot on College
Avenue in Waterville. A woman exited the Impala and met another woman who
exited a Ford Explorer. The two women got inside the Explorer for a short period
of time. Then the first woman got back into the Impala and drove away, while the

, This motion has been scheduled, only to be continued, eleven times in the past.
other woman went first to a red sedan, then next to a pickup truck, all for short
periods of time.

3. From his education and experience Walker believed a drug
transaction(s) had just taken place based upon the conduct of the two women.

4. While watching the Explorer the registration plate was "run", with the
information coming back that the vehicle was registered to the Defendant. Walker
had information from a reliable informant' that the Defendant was dealing drugs
in the central Maine area.

5. The Explorer left, and Walker followed the vehicle. The Explorer drove
into Winslow, with Walker following. The Explorer stopped at a Subway shop,
where the occupants got out and went into the shop to eat.

6. Walker was told the vehicle was going to be stopped. The vehicle was
in fact stopped on the bridge connecting Winslow with Waterville after the
occupants got back in.to the Explorer and drove away.

7. Offic.er Daniel Ames (hereinafter "Ames") is an experienced police
officer with the Waterville Police Department for 31 years, the last seven years
with the Maine Drug Enforcement Agency. He was another officer who followed
the Explorer to Subway. While the occupants were in Subway Ames was told by
his superior that the vehicle's occupants had engaged in a drug deal, that there
were "pre-marked bills" in the vehicle, and that the vehicle should be stopped.

8. The vehicle was thereafter stopped by law enforcement with their blue
lights on their vehicles activated. The officers approached the vehicle at gunpoint
and ordered the occupants out of the vehicle.' The Defendant was shortly
handcuffed thereafter. The Defendant was found with a large wad of money,
some of which were pre-marked bills. A drug-sniffing dog was brought to the
scene of the stop by law enforcement. The woman (Ms. McNeil) initially denied
possessing any drugs. When advised that the dog was going to "sniff" her to
ascertain whether drugs were present on her, Ms. McNeil turned over a quantity
of material that the officers believed were illegal drugs from her person•, informing
the officers that the Defendant had passed the drugs to her after seeing the law
enforcement officers. The suspected drugs were not field-tested . Law enforcement
subsequently conducted a "canine sniff" of the vehicle that resulted in the
suspicion that drugs were present. The dog "hit" on the passenger side of the
vehicle.

' Walker estimated the reliability of the informant in the past as "close to 100%."
•Counsel stipulated that Defendant would testify that he was removed from the vehicle at gunpoint
shortly after the vehicle was stopped. Although the Court is .free to reject the stipulation, there was
no evidence presented by the State to the contrary.
· Ms. McNeil acknowledged that she had what she termed "drugs" in her bra and turned the
material over to law enforcement. Officer Ames testified that the quantity was sufficient to charge
trafficking. This actually occurred before the dog "sniffed" the Ford Explorer.

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II. Conclusions of Law:

9. The Defendant challenges the conclusion that there was reasonable,
articulable suspicion to stop the Defendant's vehicle while it was on the bridge
connecting Waterville and Winslow. The Defendant also contends that his
interaction with the police after the stop of his vehicle amounted to a de facto arrest
without probable cause, and therefore illegal. The Court will discuss both
contentions below.

A. The stop of the Defendant's vehicle on the bridge was illegal.

10. The Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution protects
citizens from unreasonable intrusions of police officers and other government
agents. State v. Blier, 2017 NIE 103, <[ 8. To conduct a constitutionally permissible
traffic stop, law enforcement must have, at the time of the stop, "an articulable
suspicion that criminal conduct has taker:i, place, is occurring, or imminently will
occur, and the officer's assessment of the existence of specific and articulable facts
sufficient to warrant the stop [must be] objectively reasonable in the totality of the
circumstances." State v. Donatelli, 2010 ME 43, <I[ 11.

11. "Reasonable and articulable suspicion" to conduct an investigatory
stop can rest on the collective knowledge of law enforcement. State v. Carr, 1997
:ME 221, <I[ 7. Reasonable and articulable suspicion is considerably less than proof
of wrongdoing by a preponderance of the evidence, but the suspicion needs to be
based on more than speculation or an unsubstantiated hunch. An investigatory
stop based upon a tip need not be corroborated by an officer's observation of
suspicious conduct for the stop to be constitutionally reasonable. State v. Burgess,
2001 ME 117, <I[ 8.

12. In this matter, law enforcement's collective knowledge revealed the
following: a drug transaction was to occur in Kennebec County. Various law
enforcement agents followed a suspected vehicle through the town of China into
Waterville. The vehicle stopped in the Burger King parking lot, whereupon the
driver of the suspected vehicle got out and briefly interacted with a woman
occupant of a Ford Explorer that was registered to the Defendant. Law
enforcement had received information that Defendant was dealing drugs. The
interaction between the two women was short, and subsequently the first woman
drove away. The woman from the Explorer thereupon proceeded to interact
briefly with occupants of two other vehicles, then proceed to drive away, never
entering Burger King. This was all, based upon the officers' education, training,
and experience, consistent with possible drug transactions ta.king place.

13. Law enforcement also received information that "buy money" would
be found inside the Ford Explorer. Accordingly, law enforcement at the time the
decision was made to stop the Explorer had both "tip" information plus personal
observation of suspicious activity after having received the "tip" information.

14. Based upon the above, it is very difficult for the undersigned not to
find that the collective knowledge of law enforcement provided law enforcement

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with reasonable and articulable suspicion to conduct an investigatory stop of the
Ford Explorer. The Motion to Suppress based upon the alleged illegal stop is
accordingly denied.

B. The resulting arrest of the Defendant was illegal because there was
insufficient probable cause to arrest Defendant.

15. There is no bright line that distinguishes an investigative detention
from an arrest. For a detention to qualify as merely investigative, it must be
limited in scope and executed through the least restrictive means. State v. White,
2013 ME 66, 9I 13. The undersigned is not going to take the time to discuss whether
the Defendant was arrested or not once the vehicle was stopped because it is
crystal clear to the undersigned that Defendant was, in fact, arrested by law
enforcement shortly after the vehicle he was driving was stopped. To argue
otherwise would be to engage in legal gymnastics that the undersigned declines
to engage in. See State v. Cunneen, 2019 ME 44, <JI 15. The real issue for the Court
is whether there was probable cause to arrest the Defendant.

16. Probable cause to.arrest exists when facts and circumstances within the
knowledge of the officers and of which they have reasonably trustworthy
information would warrant a prudent and cautious person to believe that the
arrestee did commit or was committing a crime. State v. Parkinson, 389 A.2d 1, 8
(Me. 1978). Again, although requiring more than mere suspicion, probable cause
to arrest can be satisfied on less than the quantum of proof necessary to establish
by a fair preponderance of the evidence. State v. Flint, 2011 ME 20, 9I 12.

17. Based upon the Findings of Fact set forth above, the Court finds there
was probable cause to arrest the Defendant, and thus the Motion to Suppress
based upon the argument that Defendant was subjected to an illegal arrest is
denied as well.

Date: 8/14/19

BY Ku~JJJL
Robert E. Mullen, Deputy Chief Justice
Maine Superior Court

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