09-05-03

They caught it. They lugged it home on their shoulders in plain view. So what's wrong with having an alligator for dinner?

That's what two Largo men told police Wednesday night after witnesses reported the men had a live 41/2-foot alligator in their bathtub.

Thomas A. Betts, 43, and Michael S. Schuppert, 33, were fishing at Taylor Park when they snagged the gator, officials said. The men used a shoelace to secure the gator's snout and carried it several blocks to Schuppert's house on Third Street NW.

"I walked in and found it in the tub half full of water," said Lt. Roger Young of the Florida Fish & Wildlife Conservation Commission. "One of the men said they just wanted to eat its tail, but if you know anything at all about alligators, you know the tail is the only edible meat on them."

Young said Schuppert denied involvement in the incident, until Young pointed out that the black shoelace around the gator's mouth was an exact match to a shoelace Schuppert was missing on his right sneaker.

"It's pretty rare to find a captured one alive," Young said of gators, which are a protected species. "Usually you only find a carcass. We got there just in time."

Young charged them with illegal taking of an alligator, a second-degree misdemeanor punishable by up to 60 days in jail and a $500 fine.

As for the gator, Young returned it to Taylor Lake. "I saw him swim off," he said. "It was a lucky day for him."

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Prop. 1: Would authorize the Veterans' Land Board to use excess receipts in the Veterans' Land and Veterans' Housing Assistance funds for payment of revenue bonds, and use excess assets in those funds to provide veterans homes.

Prop. 2: Would expand from six months to two years the period in which the former owner of a mineral interest that was sold for unpaid property taxes may buy back the mineral interest.

Prop. 3: Would authorize the legislature to exempt from taxation land owned by a religious organization that is leased for use as a school or that will be used to expand or construct a place of religious worship that yields no revenue.

Prop. 4: Would authorize the legislature to allow conservation and reclamation districts to use taxes to develop and finance certain parks and recreation facilities.

Prop. 5: Would authorize the legislature to exempt from all property taxes certain tangible personal property, which could include a travel trailer not substantially affixed to real estate and not used as a residential dwelling.

Prop. 6: Would authorize a qualified homeowner to refinance a home equity loan with a reverse mortgage loan.

Prop. 7: Would reduce the number of persons who make up the jury in a district court criminal misdemeanor case from twelve to six.

Prop. 8: Would authorize the legislature to permit a person to assume office without an election if the person is the only candidate to qualify in an election for that office and the election is required by the Texas Constitution.

Prop. 9: Would redefine the composition of the permanent and available school funds by requiring during the next two fiscal years, and authorizing thereafter, annual distributions to the available school fund of a percentage of any increase in the value of the permanent school fund's total investment assets.

Prop. 10: Would authorize municipalities to donate surplus fire fighting equipment, supplies, or materials to the Texas Forest Service, which would be authorized to distribute based on need the equipment to rural volunteer fire departments.

Prop. 11: Would authorize the legislature to regulate the operation of wineries in Texas.

Prop. 12: Would immediately authorize the Legislature to limit non-economic damages assessed against a provider of medical or health care and, after January 1, 2005, to limit awards in all other types of cases.

Prop. 13: Would authorize a county, city, town, and junior college district to freeze property taxes on a residential homestead of a person who is disabled or aged 65 or older.

Prop. 14: Would authorize the Texas Department of Transportation to issue notes or borrow money to fund highway improvement projects. The terms of the notes or loans may not exceed two years.

Prop. 15: Would prohibit a local retirement system and the political subdivision that finances the retirement system from reducing or otherwise impairing certain accrued benefits under the local retirement system.

Prop. 16: Would amend the Texas Constitution to allow home equity lines of credit and allow refinancing of a home equity loan with a reverse mortgage loan.

Prop. 17: Would prohibit an increase in school property taxes on residence homesteads of disabled persons.

Prop. 18: Would authorize the legislature to permit a person to assume an office of a political subdivision without an election if the person is the only candidate to qualify in an election for that office and the election is required by the Texas Constitution.

Prop. 19: Would repeal the legislature's authority to create rural fire prevention districts. Effective September 1, 2003, all existing rural fire prevention districts will convert to emergency services districts.

Prop. 20: Would authorize the issuance of general obligation bonds in a total amount not to exceed $250 million that will be used to provide loans for economic development projects that benefit defense-related communities in Texas.

Prop. 21: Would authorize current and retired faculty members of a public institution of higher education to receive compensation for service as a member of the governing body of a water district.

Prop. 22: Would authorize the appointment of a temporary replacement officer to serve on behalf of a state, district, or local public officer who is called into active military duty for longer than 30 days.

After a fourteen-year-old girl disappeared, police learned that she had been having a sexual relationship with her nineteen-year-old half brother, and that he and a friend had been with the girl the day she disappeared. The half brother and his friend, the defendant, were taken to a police station and questioned about the disappearance.

The defendant was permitted to leave, but the half brother failed his third polygraph test and eventually confessed to fatally stabbing the girl. He said that the defendant had been involved in the crime.

After trying and failing to get a warrant for the defendant, three detectives and three uniformed officers went to the defendant’s home and awakened him at 3 a.m. with a flashlight. One of the detectives identified himself and said ‘we need to talk.”

Two officers handcuffed the defendant and took him outside to the patrol car. The defendant was wearing only boxer shorts and a t-shirt, but no shoes. He was not told that he could refuse to go with the officers.

After driving the defendant to the place where the victim’s body had been found, the officers took him to the police station where he was given Miranda warnings. Although he first denied involvement in the killing, the defendant eventually admitted taking part.

The defendant later moved to suppress the confession, claiming that it was the product of an illegal arrest. His motion was denied, and he was convicted and sentences to 55 years in prison.

In denying the defendant’s motion to suppress, the state court found that he had consented to accompany the officers when he said, “Okay” to the detective’s statement that “we need to talk.”

It further found that handcuffing the defendant would not change a reasonable person’s belief regarding his freedom of movement because he cooperated and “did not resist the use of handcuffs.”

Holding: A “seizure” of a person occurs when, “taking into account all of the circumstances surrounding the encounter, the police conduct would have communicated to a reasonable person that he was not at liberty to ignore the police presence and go about his business.”

While reasonable suspicion may suffice for brief detentions, probable cause always has been required for the “involuntary removal of a suspect from his home to a police station and his detention there for investigative purposes.” The State did not claim in this case to have probable cause when it seized the defendant at his home.

The Supreme Court has noted factors that indicate a person has been seized. These include the “threatening presence of officers,” displaying a weapon, physical contact of the suspect by the officers, or the use of language or a tone of voice that indicated the person must comply with an officer’s request.

All of these factors were present in this case. The young defendant was awakened at three in the morning by several officers, one of whom said, “we need to go and talk.” The suspect was taken barefooted, wearing only underwear in January, in handcuffs, and placed in a police car.

After being taken to the crime scene, the defendant was taken to the sheriff’s offices and interrogated. Under these circumstances, it is clear that the defendant was under “arrest” at the time of the questioning.

The defendant did not consent to being taken to the station house. He did no more than submit to “a claim of lawful authority.” Even an encounter that is consensual initially can become a seizure under certain circumstances.

No one in the defendant’s situation would have thought that he was free to leave the interrogation room and go home to bed. The nature of the encounter was not changed by whether it was “routine” to transport individuals, or whether the defendant “did not resist the use of handcuffs.”

“Failure to struggle with a cohort of deputy sheriffs is not a waiver of Fourth Amendment protection, which does not require the perversity of resisting arrest or assaulting a police officer.”

Not every confession following an illegal arrest is tainted by that arrest, however. Whether the confession must be suppressed depends on factors such as the “temporal proximity” of the arrest to the confession, the presence of intervening circumstances, and the purpose and flagrancy of the official misconduct.

Only the giving of Miranda warnings works in favor of the State in this case. But “Miranda warnings worked in favor of the State in this case. But “Miranda warnings alone and per se, cannot always…break the causal connection between the illegality and the confession.”

Here, there was only a short time between the illegal arrest and the confession. During that time, he was held, partially clothed, in the presence of a number of officers. There was no meaningful “intervention event” that would remove the taint of his unlawful removal from his home in handcuffs when the confession was given.

COMMENT: The Supreme Court does not break any new ground in this decision. Rather, it demonstrates that an “arrest,” as opposed to an investigative detention or consensual encounter, is determined by the circumstances as they would be viewed by the reasonable person. What is “routine” for a law enforcement agency, is not determinative, and cooperation by a suspect does not always equal consent. Kaupp v. Texas, 123 S.Ct. 1843 (2003)

Ever Wonder

If money doesn't grow on trees then why do banks have branches?

Since bread is square, then why is sandwich meat round?

Why do you have to "put your two cents in"...but it's only a "penny for your thoughts"? Where's that extra penny going to?

Why does a round pizza come in a square box?

What did cured ham actually have?

How is it that we put man on the moon before we figured out it would be a good idea to put wheels on luggage?

Why is it that people say they "slept like a baby" when babies wake up like every two hours?

Why are you IN a movie, but you're ON TV?

How come we choose from just two people for President and fifty for Miss America?

Why do doctors leave the room while you change? They're going to see you naked anyway.

Why is "bra" singular and "panties" plural?

The key to guarding against spam, experts say, is keeping your e-mail address private.

This means deleting incoming chain letters before even opening them, because hidden code in the e-mail might confirm your address as soon as you open the message.

And you should ask friends not to forward you chain letters, said Bill Orvis, of the U.S. Department of Energy. That will keep your address from showing up in a forwarded message that could eventually make it to the hands of a spammer.

"If your e-mail address is being put out there, the bad guys are going to get it," he said.

A minister stopped by a man’s house to invite him to visit his church the next Sunday, mentioning at the same time that the man’s neighbor went to that church. On hearing this, the man said he would never go there because he wanted nothing to do with a religion that would have a man like his neighbor in it. In fact, he said, his neighbor was the worst neighbor he had ever had.

The minister, seeing that the man had a piano, asked the man’s little girl to play a piece by Beethoven that was lying on the piano. The man said that Beethoven’s music was far too advanced for his daughter. But the minister insisted, and the little girl gave it a try. Needless to say, she almost destroyed the piece.

When the little girl was finished, the minister said, “Boy, that Beethoven sure wasn’t much of a composer, was he?” On hearing this, the man suddenly realized that he, too, had been judging the music of Christian living by the player rather than the composer.

Let’s all try to be good players, but let’s not judge the composer by the player!