NOT RECOMMENDED FOR FULL-TEXT PUBLICATION
File Name: 11a0733n.06
No. 10-6473
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT FILED
Oct 26, 2011
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
LEONARD GREEN, Clerk
Plaintiff-Appellee,
ON APPEAL FROM THE
v. UNITED STATES DISTRICT
COURT FOR THE MIDDLE
DAVID LAMONT MARSH, DISTRICT OF TENNESSEE
Defendant-Appellant.
/
Before: BATCHELDER, Chief Judge; MARTIN and KETHLEDGE, Circuit Judges.
BOYCE F. MARTIN, JR., Circuit Judge. David LaMont Marsh appeals his conviction on
the grounds that police obtained evidence through a traffic stop that was impermissible in length and
scope. For the following reasons, we AFFIRM.
On the night of March 28, 2009, Marsh was a passenger in the car of Julius Johnson when
Officer Frederick Nelson of the Nashville Police pulled them over for running a stop sign. Once
stopped, Officer Nelson approached Marsh and Johnson and asked for their identification and
Johnson’s vehicle registration. Officer Nelson observed Marsh holding a “blunt” cigar, asked if
there was anything illegal in the car, and inquired further if he could search the car. Johnson did not
consent to a search. Officer Nelson radioed for a K-9 team and returned to his cruiser to check
Johnson’s vehicle records as well as write a citation.
No. 10-6473
USA v. Marsh
Page 2
After five to ten minutes, Officer Alex Moore, who was not part of a K-9 team, arrived on
the scene while Officer Nelson was still writing the citation in his cruiser. Officer Nelson told
Officer Moore that he had seen Marsh chewing something up and spitting it into a plastic bottle.
According to Officer Moore, Officer Nelson also indicated that he thought there might be marijuana
in the car. Officer Moore walked to the car to speak to Johnson and Marsh, shined a flashlight inside
the car, and saw a green material on Marsh’s shirt that Officer Moore believed to be marijuana.
Officer Moore made this observation no more than fifteen minutes after the beginning of the traffic
stop and while Officer Nelson was still writing the citation in his cruiser. Officer Moore asked
Marsh to step out of the car and placed him under arrest. He then searched the passenger-seat area
where he found a loaded handgun.
A grand jury indicted Marsh for one count of being a felon in possession of a firearm. He
filed a suppression motion arguing that the traffic stop had lasted too long and that the search
exceeded the scope of the traffic stop. The district court rejected his motion. Marsh later entered
into a plea agreement whereby he pleaded guilty but preserved his right to appeal the ruling on the
suppression motion.
On appeal, Marsh chiefly asserts that the police found the marijuana and handgun only
because the traffic stop was impermissible in length and scope. He argues that police do not need
fifteen minutes to conduct a traffic stop and write a citation, and that they cannot investigate the
presence of drugs without a reasonable suspicion that they are present. “When reviewing decisions
on motions to suppress, this Court will uphold the factual findings of the district court unless clearly
erroneous, while legal conclusions are reviewed de novo.” United States v. Johnson, 627 F.3d 578,
No. 10-6473
USA v. Marsh
Page 3
583 (6th Cir. 2010) (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). “Evidence should be viewed
in the light most favorable to the district court’s conclusion.” Id. (internal quotation marks and
citation omitted).
“An officer may stop and detain a motorist so long as the officer has probable cause to
believe that the motorist has violated a traffic law.” United States v. Bell, 555 F.3d 535, 539 (6th
Cir. 2009) (citation omitted). “To detain the motorist any longer than is reasonably necessary to
issue the traffic citation, however, the officer must have reasonable suspicion that the individual has
engaged in more extensive criminal conduct.” Id. (citation omitted).
Even though fifteen minutes might have been atypically long for a traffic stop, the record
does not show that it was longer than necessary to complete the tasks related to the stop. Cf. id. at
541 (“The proper inquiry is not whether [the defendant] was detained longer than the average
speeder, but whether he was detained longer than reasonably necessary for the Officers to complete
the purpose of the stop in this case.”). During those fifteen minutes, Officer Nelson spoke to
Johnson and Marsh, checked Johnson’s record, and wrote a citation, which are permissible actions
during a traffic stop. See id. (“In a traffic stop, an officer can lawfully detain the driver of a vehicle
until after the officer has finished making record radio checks and issuing a citation.” (internal
quotation marks and citation omitted)). Marsh presents no evidence that Officer Nelson was stalling.
He relies only on a subjective belief that this stop was just too long. However, the stop was not
impermissibly long because the police did not “detain [Marsh] any longer than [wa]s reasonably
necessary to issue the traffic citation.” See id at 539.
No. 10-6473
USA v. Marsh
Page 4
Furthermore, it was not impermissible for Officer Moore to approach Johnson and Marsh
even if he was looking for evidence of marijuana because doing so did not extend the stop. See
Arizona v. Johnson, 129 S. Ct. 781, 788 (2009) (“An officer’s inquiries into matters unrelated to the
justification for the traffic stop . . . do not convert the encounter into something other than a lawful
seizure, so long as those inquiries do not measurably extend the duration of the stop.”) (citation
omitted). Rather, Officer Moore approached the car and noticed marijuana on Marsh’s shirt while
Officer Nelson was still writing Johnson’s traffic citation. From that point, Officer Moore had at
least a reasonable suspicion that Marsh possessed marijuana and, thus, could search the passenger
area where Marsh had been sitting and the handgun was found.
Additionally, Marsh claims that the district court’s ruling was “insufficient,” “erroneous,”
and premised upon erroneous factual findings. These claims are baseless and without merit.
We AFFIRM.