CEDRIC SPANN, APPELLANT,
v.
STATE OF FLORIDA, APPELLEE
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The court held that the officer's observations were insufficient to establish a founded suspicion justifying the stop, and the state's abandonment theory was not persuasive.
[1] A police officer's suspicion that a black individual is acting as a drug mule for white individuals, based on the racial composition of a car and the individual entering…
[2] Evidence dropped by a defendant in direct response to an unlawful police order to stop is not admissible under the abandonment theory.
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligencePolice observed a vehicle with a mixed-race group, and a black passenger exited and re-entered the car. When officers approached, the passenger droppe…
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PER CURIAM.
In this drug possession case, while sur-veilling a particular area, the police noticed a vehicle with a white female driver, and a white male front seat passenger, and appellant, a black back seat passenger, stop near the intersection of 27th Avenue and North Gifford Road in a black neighborhood. The car pulled off the pavement onto the shoulder and the car lights were turned off. Appellant got out of the car, walked down the street, and entered a nearby restaurant. In a few minutes he returned to the car; whereupon, the white male exited the car and, as the police approached, they ordered appellant to “freeze, stop.” Appellant stopped and then dropped an aluminum package near his feet; the officers then told him to put his hands on the hood of the car. The police picked up the package and recognized it as cocaine. They then searched appellant and found a bag of marijuana in his rear pocket. Appellant was thereupon arrested for possession of cocaine and marijuana.
At a motion to suppress hearing an officer testified that he had seen other whites using black people to make drug purchases for them so that they would not get “ripped off.” The officer believed that is what was going down here because of the mix of people in the car, the black man going into the restaurant where drugs were known to be sold, and his returning to the vehicle. No exchange or transaction was observed by the officer. We hold the observations made by the officer, even in the light of his experience and knowledge, were insufficient to constitute a founded suspicion that appellant had committed, was committing, or was about to commit a crime justifying a stop under section 901.151, Florida Statutes. Furthermore, based upon the stipulation of the parties filed in this cause that the defendant dropped the cocaine packet as a result of the order of the law enforcement officer to stop, we hold that the state’s abandonment theory is not persuasive.
Accordingly, the judgment and sentence appealed from are reversed.
DOWNEY, GUNTHER, JJ., and VITALE, LINDA L., Associate Judge, concur.
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Cited By (15 total)
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Hollinger v. State, 620 So. 2d 1242 (Fla. 1993)…GRIMES, Justice. We review State v. Hollinger, 596 So. 2d 521 (Fla. 5th DCA 1992), because of certified conflict with Cox v. State, 586 So. 2d 1321 (Fla. 2d DCA 1991), Wallace v. State, 540 So. 2d 254 (Fla. 4th DCA 1989), and Spann v. State, 529 So. 2d 825 (Fla. 4th DCA 1988). We have jurisdiction under article V, section 3(b)(4) of the Florida Constitution. The facts of this case are set out fully in the opinion below. Basically, several members of the Orange County Sheriff’s Department were conduct…1 / 2
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Curry v. State, 570 So. 2d 1071 (Fla. 5th DCA 1990)…y rule. See Jordan v. State, 544 So. 2d 1073 (Fla. 2d DCA 1989); Bastien; Gipson. But here, Curry threw down the contraband under the policeman’s nose without being ordered to do so. This court has not addressed the issue decided in Spann v. State, 529 So. 2d 825 (Fla. 4th DCA 1988), of whether drugs or other evidence thrown down by a suspect after being ordered by police to “stop” or “freeze,” should be suppressed because the police lack a founded suspicion sufficient to allow an investigative stop pursuant…
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Wallace v. State, 540 So. 2d 254 (Fla. 4th DCA 1989)…ing, the Third District found in Oliver that an abandonment occurred. However, the two suspects in that case had ridden off on their bicycles, discarding a bag as they rode away, before the officers ever made any demand. Recently, in Spann v. State, 529 So. 2d 825, 826 (Fla. 4th DCA 1988), this court held that when a police officer stops a defendant in his tracks without founded suspicion, and the defendant drops something, “the state’s abandonment theory is not persuasive.” See also Moore v. State, 181 So. 2…
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