United States Court of Appeals
For the First Circuit
No. 06-1462
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Appellee,
v.
CHARLES ST. PIERRE,
Defendant, Appellant.
APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE DISTRICT OF MAINE
[Hon. D. Brock Hornby, U.S. District Judge]
Before
Boudin, Chief Judge,
Cyr and Stahl, Senior Circuit Judges.
Peter J. Cyr, with whom Law Offices of Anthony J. Sineni III,
LLC, was on brief, for appellant.
Margaret D. McGaughey, Appellate Chief, with whom Paula D.
Silsby, United States Attorney, was on brief, for appellee.
June 13, 2007
STAHL, Senior Circuit Judge. Charles St. Pierre appeals
the denial by the United States District Court for the District of
Maine of his motion to suppress evidence. We affirm.
On February 17 and 24, 2005, government agents made two
controlled purchases of crack cocaine from Elmer Larson. At the
time of the second purchase, the agents provided Larson with $500
in marked bills, which he then took to St. Pierre's apartment at
the Gray Terrace Apartments in Gray, Maine. At 8:30 a.m. Larson
returned to the agents with 2.2 grams of crack cocaine. After
giving the drugs to one of the government agents, Larson was
arrested and then quickly agreed to cooperate with the government.
He identified a resident of the Gray Terrace Apartments named
"Charlie" as the person who had supplied him with the drugs.
That same morning, the agents fitted Larson with a
listening device and had him return to St. Pierre's apartment.
Although Larson and St. Pierre had a discussion there, the agents
were unable to understand much of it over the device. After a few
minutes, Larson left the apartment and returned to the agents. He
told them that St. Pierre had discussed doing a transaction later
that day, around 3:00 p.m. Larson also told them that St. Pierre
had sent him out to fetch a soda and that St. Pierre had said that
he would give him "a line" when he returned.
With that knowledge, the agents faced a dilemma because
they were unwilling to allow Larson to do drugs while cooperating
-2-
with the government. But Larson also told the agents that if he
did not return with the soda within a few minutes, St. Pierre might
become suspicious. The agents on the scene considered applying for
a search warrant immediately, but decided that there was simply not
enough time to wait for a warrant to be issued. Concerned that St.
Pierre would soon become suspicious that something was amiss and
then destroy evidence, the agents decided to secure the apartment
without a warrant.
At around noon, the agents knocked on the door and
announced their presence. St. Pierre opened the door, wearing a
tee-shirt and boxer shorts. One agent grabbed him to make sure
that he was unarmed, and in the commotion St. Pierre and the agent
tripped and fell backwards into the apartment. St. Pierre was
handcuffed and, because his underpants were "soiled," the agents
retrieved a pair of pants off the floor and helped St. Pierre to
put them on. How those pants came to be on St. Pierre is the focal
point of his appeal, although the record is unclear whether they
were put on at the suggestion of St. Pierre or at the insistence of
the agents.
Because St. Pierre's girlfriend gave consent to search
the apartment, the agents did not seek a search warrant. In the
search that ensued, the agents discovered a quantity of drugs and
a large amount of U.S. currency.
-3-
St. Pierre was arrested and brought to the U.S. Marshal's
office in Portland, Maine, where, following standard procedure, he
was strip-searched before being put in a holding cell. In his
pants pocket, the marshals discovered $380 of the marked $500 that
the agents had used to purchase drugs from Larson. St. Pierre was
charged with three counts of distribution of cocaine base, in
violation of 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1).
On May 3, 2005, St. Pierre filed a motion to suppress
"any and all evidence seized as a result of the warrantless search
of Defendant's residence." The government initially opposed the
motion, but withdrew its opposition on July 1, and the motion was
granted on July 5.1 A dispute later arose as to whether the
suppression motion also covered the money that was found in St.
Pierre's pants at the time of his booking.
On August 16, the court allowed the defendant's original
suppression motion to be orally amended to include the $380 found
in St. Pierre's pants at his booking, and a hearing on that issue
followed. On August 30, the district court denied the motion to
suppress with respect to the $380. The trial proceeded, and the
jury found St. Pierre guilty of the two remaining counts. He was
sentenced to seventy months' imprisonment and five years'
supervised release. This timely appeal followed.
1
Following this, one of the three counts was dismissed, since
it had been based on evidence seized during the warrantless search.
-4-
"The district court's conclusions of fact are reviewed
for clear error, but we afford plenary review to the district
court's ultimate conclusion regarding exigent circumstances."
United States v. Samboy, 433 F.3d 154, 158 (1st Cir. 2005). "'We
will uphold a denial of a motion to suppress if any reasonable view
of the evidence supports it.'" United States v. Kornegay, 410 F.3d
89, 93 (1st Cir. 2005) (quoting United States v. Mendez-de Jesus,
85 F.3d 1, 2 (1st Cir. 1996)).
"[I]t is settled beyond peradventure that a search of an
individual's person made incident to a valid arrest is itself
valid, despite the absence of an arrest warrant." United States v.
Winchenbach, 197 F.3d 548, 552 (1st Cir. 1999); accord United
States v. Robinson, 414 U.S. 218, 224 (1973). For the arrest of
St. Pierre to be valid, the agents had to be both lawfully inside
the apartment and to have probable cause based on evidence other
than that found during the search. Winchenbach, 197 F.3d at 554.
The parties do not dispute that probable cause existed as of the
time that Larson was arrested. Therefore, we focus first on the
issue of lawful entry.
"[A] warrantless entry into a person's dwelling may be
permitted if exigent circumstances arise." Samboy, 433 F.3d at 158
(1st Cir. 2005) (internal quotation marks omitted). Such exigent
circumstances arise when, inter alia, the police have a reasonable
fear that a person would destroy drug evidence unless the person's
-5-
premises are secured. Illinois v. McArthur, 531 U.S. 326, 331-32
(2001). The district court found that the agents had a reasonable
belief that such exigent circumstances existed in this case,
because Larson's failure to return could signal their presence to
St. Pierre. See Samboy, 433 F.3d at 158-59 (courier's arrest and
resultant failure to return to dealer can cause fear in police that
dealer would be alerted to their investigation and would destroy
evidence). We agree. Therefore, because the police were lawfully
within the apartment and had probable cause to arrest St. Pierre,
the arrest was lawful.
The question that remains is whether the pants were
properly searched during the booking process.2 An "inventory
search" of an arrestee's personal effects at a police station is
permissible under the Fourth Amendment. Illinois v. Lafayette, 462
U.S. 640, 648 (1983). The Supreme Court has upheld inventory
searches of, e.g., an arrestee's shoulder bag, id., an impounded
2
The defendant argues that, even if the warrantless entry were
lawful, the evidence in the pants should nonetheless be suppressed
under the original suppression order. However, he did not object
to the oral amendment to his original suppression motion or to the
subsequent evidentiary hearing. Thus, by not objecting to treating
the $380 as outside of the original suppression motion and order,
he waived the argument that it was included. See United States v.
JG-24, Inc., 478 F.3d 28, 32 (2007). Therefore, we review the
argument for plain error only, which requires that the defendant
demonstrate (1) an error (2) which was clear, (3) affected his
substantial rights, and (4) seriously impaired the fairness or
integrity of the proceeding. Id.; see United States v. Olano, 507
U.S. 725, 731-32 (1993). We find no such error here, in large part
because there was other substantial evidence of guilt.
-6-
car's glove compartment, South Dakota v. Opperman, 428 U.S. 364,
376 (1976), and a backpack found in an impounded car, Colorado v.
Bertine, 479 U.S. 367, 375 (1987). In those cases, the key facts
were that the police "were following standardized procedures" and
were not "act[ing] in bad faith or for the sole purpose of
investigation." Id. at 372. Such searches were considered
"reasonable" under the Fourth Amendment, regardless of whether
there was probable cause or the police had a warrant, because the
procedures were developed for independent reasons, such as the
safety of the officers or the protection of an owner's property
while in the custody of the police. Id. That reasoning would
break down, however, if the procedures were manipulated for
investigatory purposes.
Therefore, the circumstances by which the pants came to
be on St. Pierre are important. If it were the case that the
police, knowing that the evidence found in the apartment search was
likely to be suppressed, conspired to stash the $380 in the pocket
of a pair of pants and then coerce St. Pierre into wearing them,
this would be a very different case. Here, however, St. Pierre has
not alleged any bad faith by the agents, nor is there any evidence
of such. Furthermore, having the consent of the girlfriend to
search the apartment, the agents had no reason to believe that the
evidence they discovered would be suppressed. Finally, given St.
Pierre's condition, it was entirely reasonable for all parties,
-7-
himself included, to want him to be given pants, and there is no
evidence that he protested or asked for a different pair of pants.
Thus, under these somewhat unusual circumstances, a search of St.
Pierre's pants at booking was proper, and we see no error in the
denial of the motion to suppress the $380.3
Affirmed.
3
The government argues implicitly that St. Pierre's tacit
consent to wearing the pants is equivalent to an arrestee's consent
to a warrantless search. We do not decide that issue here,
however, since the question of consent to a search is problematic
when (a) St. Pierre consented only to wearing pants, and (b) the
ability to give consent to a warrantless search is questionable
under these sorts of circumstances. See Schneckloth v. Bustamonte,
412 U.S. 218, 222 (1973); United States v. Twomey, 884 F.2d 46, 51
(1st Cir. 1989). Our decision is based instead on the fact that
St. Pierre consented to wearing pants in a situation where wearing
pants was eminently reasonable and no police bad faith was alleged,
and that such pants were then reasonably searched at booking
pursuant to an inventory search policy.
-8-