01-12-01

Dumb Crooks^TM

In the early afternoon two Tacoma Police bicycle officers contacted a known suspect in a full-sized pickup for Driving While License Suspended (a misdemeanor). As the officers were preparing to issue a ticket, the male suspect put the truck in gear and quickly drove away. One officer was struck by the truck's side-view mirror injuring him slightly. The other officer jumped out of the way however, the suspect drove over his bicycle destroying it.

Minutes later a third officer (in a car) began a pursuit with the now felony suspect. After a few minutes the officer ended the chase because of the level of danger the pursuit had reached. About two hours later a State Trooper located the unoccupied truck outside of a Fife, Washington hotel along Interstate 5. As officers attempted to surround the hotel the suspect (now wanted on numerous felonies) jumped out a hotel room window and began to run toward Interstate 5.

A Tacoma K9 team was just arriving and deployed the dog. At this time the suspect was climbing the 8 foot highway fence on the shoulder of I-5. As the suspect jumped down on the other side of the fence it appeared that he was once again going to elude police and the K9 now barking through the fence at the suspect. Instead of continuing with his short-lived freedom, the suspect turned and began kicking dirt through the fence and into the face of the frustrated K9; appearing not like a desperate fugitive, but more like an angry baseball player kicking dirt at the umpire. The suspect then laughed and turned to continue running across I-5. He was immediately struck by a car, breaking his right leg and causing multiple injuries, including a punctured lung.

Was that enough...nooooo! With a bad leg and one working lung, the suspect gimped his way across the rest of the 8 lane freeway and continued out of sight near the Puyallup river. While injured seriously, the suspect found the perfect hiding place in bushes on the river's bank. The K9 team made it over the fence and successfully across the Interstate. The K9 dog, as you would expect, was just a tad bit angry. While his nostrils were still full of dirt and gravel from the suspects earlier rudeness, he was hot on the trail of the bad guy. The suspect was fully concealed in bushes as the K9 neared his location. Only a small part of the suspect could be seen by the approaching K9; the section from the suspects belly button down to the mid-thigh was the only target. Wham! The K9 located and hit the target. Yep, right between the suspects legs....two in custody....oops, one in custody! This truly reminded the suspect what a "real man" he was!

So, from a simple traffic ticket to serious injuries, multiple felony charges, and a premature end to the suspects future family plans. Now that’s what I call a bad day!

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Chief Deputy’s Corner

As we grow in our assignment and become more confident in our own work, we must also maintain our "EDGE." What I mean by "EDGE" is being ever vigilant and having a sharp intuition when handling and having contact with offenders. It’s so easy to slip into an attitude of being LAX. This is especially true when we are working in a detention area.

Legal Issues - Search and Seizure

TRAFFIC STOP DID NOT RENDER DRIVER’S CONSENT INVOLUNTARY.

DPS officers stopped the defendant’s car for driving without a front license plate. The defendant and his passenger could not tell the officer exactly where they were going, who they were seeing, or where they were staying.

The defendant acted nervous during his conversation with the officers, who issued the driver a warning citation for driving without a front plate. They then asked the defendant for consent to search his car.

After first refusing, the defendant verbally consented to the search, and one of the officers discovered what he thought was cocaine in packages in a gold pillow, inside a terry-cloth bag. The pillow was discovered in the back of the vehicle, an area the defendant unlocked for the officers to search. The zipper on the pillow was open and the officer could see three packages wrapped in duct tape, one of which had white powder leaking from a cut in the package.

The driver and passenger were arrested and charged with possession with intent to deliver the cocaine. Before trial, the defendant moved to suppress the drugs, claiming that he had been detained at the time his consent was obtained; that the consent was involuntary; and that the search of the car exceeded the scope of his consent.

Holding: The defendant conceded that he had been lawfully stopped, but he argued that because he was questioned after being issued a warning citation he was illegally detained at the time he gave verbal consent for the search.

In this case, the question is whether the officers “conveyed a message to [the defendant] that compliance with the request to search was required.” If so, the defendant would not feel free to leave, and he would have been detained. The officers were in uniform, but there was no evidence that they did anything to intimidate the defendant. Their guns were not drawn; they did not threaten to obtain a warrant if the defendant withheld his consent; and only one of the officers questioned the defendant.

The defendant agreed to allow one of the officers, but not the other one, to search the car.

This “weighs against any inference that the actions of the troopers required compliance with their request.”

Based on the totality of circumstances, the evidence supported a finding that the defendant was not detained at the time he gave consent for the search.

When a person consents to a search, the scope of that search is limited by the consent that is given. A court considers what the “typical reasonable person would have understood by the exchange between the officer and the individual” in determining the scope of consent.

Although the officer to whom the defendant gave his consent said that he had nothing to fear from a search if he had no contraband in the car, this statement did not render the consent involuntary. The defendant was not under arrest or handcuffed; he was not promised anything in exchange for his consent; he and he was told that he could refuse to consent.

The defendant expressly consented to a search by one officer, but not the other; an indication that his consent was voluntary, and that “there were no limitations on the search other than who could conduct it.”

The defendant gave no indication that he did not understand his right not to consent, or that he did not know what he was being asked. While the defendant said that the officer could “look” in the vehicle, the context of the statement does not indicate that he meant to limit the officer’s search to a visual inspection.

It was reasonable for the officer to believe that the defendant consented voluntarily to a general search of the interior of the vehicle and any container that might contain contraband. The pillow was such a container, and searching it did not exceed the scope of the defendant’s consent.

Vargas v. State, 18 S.W.3d 247 (Tex. App. – Waco 2000).

Gun Control Australian Style

It has now been 12 months since gun owners in Australia were forced by new law to surrender 640,381 personal firearms to be destroyed by our own government, a program costing Australia taxpayers more than $500 million dollars.

The first year results are now in:

Australia-wide, homicides are up 3.2 percent. Australia-wide, assaults are up 8.6 percent. Australia-wide, armed robberies are up 44 percent (yes, 44 percent!)

In the state of Victoria alone, homicides with firearms are now up 300 percent. (Note that while the law-abiding citizens turned guns in, the criminals did not and criminals still possess their guns!)

While figures over the previous 25 years showed a steady decrease in armed robbery with firearms, this has changed drastically upward in the past 12 months, since the criminals now are guaranteed that their prey is unarmed.

There has also been a dramatic increase in break-ins and assaults of the elderly.

Australian politicians are at a loss to explain how public safety has decreased, after such monumental effort and expense was expended in successfully ridding Australian society of guns.

Cyber Space—Murphy’s Laws of Computers

1. When computing, whatever happens, behave as though you meant it to happen.
2. When you get to the point where you really understand your computer, it's probably obsolete.
3. The first place to look for information is in the section of the manual where you least expect to find it.
4. When the going gets tough, upgrade.
5. For every action, there is an equal and opposite malfunction.
6. To err is human . . . to blame your computer for your mistakes is even more human, it is downright natural.
7. He who laughs last probably made a back-up.
8. If at first you do not succeed, blame your computer.
9. A complex system that does not work is invariably found to have evolved from a simpler system that worked just fine.
10. The number one cause of computer problems is computer solutions.
11. A computer program will always do what you tell it to do, but rarely what you want it to do.
    

From the Chaplain - Marilyn Featherstone