Opinions of the United
2006 Decisions States Court of Appeals
for the Third Circuit
3-23-2006
USA v. Bond
Precedential or Non-Precedential: Non-Precedential
Docket No. 05-1664
Follow this and additional works at: http://digitalcommons.law.villanova.edu/thirdcircuit_2006
Recommended Citation
"USA v. Bond" (2006). 2006 Decisions. Paper 1394.
http://digitalcommons.law.villanova.edu/thirdcircuit_2006/1394
This decision is brought to you for free and open access by the Opinions of the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit at Villanova
University School of Law Digital Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in 2006 Decisions by an authorized administrator of Villanova
University School of Law Digital Repository. For more information, please contact Benjamin.Carlson@law.villanova.edu.
NOT PRECEDENTIAL
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT
No. 05-1664
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
v.
AQUIL BOND,
Appellant.
On Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania
(D.C. No. 03-cr-00434)
District Judge: Hon. Eduardo C. Robreno
Submitted under Third Circuit LAR 34.1(a)
on January 12, 2006
BEFORE: ROTH, FUENTES and ROSENN*, Circuit Judges
(Opinion Filed: March 23, 2006)
OPINION
ROTH, Circuit Judge:
Aquil Bond appeals his judgment of conviction for violating 18 U.S.C. §
922(g)(1), which prohibits the possession of a firearm by a convicted felon. We will affirm
*This case was submitted to the panel of Judges Roth, Fuentes and Rosenn. Judge
Rosenn died after submission, but before the filing of the opinion. The decision is filed by a
quorum of the panel. 28 U.S.C.§46(d).
I. Facts
Because the parties are familiar with the facts, we will provide only a brief
synopsis. On October 5, 2002, two undercover Philadelphia Police Officers, Arthur
Herder and Lawrence Tilghman, observed Bond on the north side of the 3800 block of
Reno Street. As the officers drove past Bond, he looked toward the car, lifted up his shirt,
and put his hand on what the officers recognized as the handle of a gun protruding from
his waistband. Bond walked past the car and the officers lost sight of him. They circled
the block, did not see him, and concluded that Bond must have entered one of the houses
in the immediate area. The officers radioed uniformed back-up officers that they had
seen a man with a gun at 38 th and Reno, provided a description of Bond, and waited for
him to reappear. Approximately two minutes later, the officers saw Bond leave a house
and get into the passenger seat of a light grey two-door vehicle. The plainclothes officers
radioed their back-up to inform them that Bond was in a light grey two-door vehicle
heading west.
Within a minute, two back-up uniformed officers, John Joyce and Sean
McLaughlin, spotted a light grey vehicle, occupied by two men, traveling west. The
officers followed the grey car, lost sight of it briefly, and eventually signaled the car to
stop. As the officers approached the car on foot from the rear, Officer Joyce saw Bond
look over his left shoulder toward Officer McLaughlin and reach into his waistband area.
2
Officer Joyce pulled his gun and ordered Bond to put his hands on the dashboard. The
officer recovered a loaded automatic pistol from Bond’s waistband, put it on the roof of
the car, and removed Bond from the car to arrest him. Bond subsequently broke away
from the officer and fled into an abandoned house at 934 Belmont Avenue. Officer Joyce
took possession of the gun, and the officers followed in pursuit and found Bond on the
third floor of the building. On the second floor landing of the house, the officers found a
loaded magazine that fit the handgun the officers had recovered from Bond. Officer
Herder identified Bond as the male he had observed earlier in possession of a gun on
Reno Street. Bond was arrested.
Bond was taken to the police station, where a detective informed him of his
Miranda rights. Bond signed a written waiver of his rights and told the detective that he
had bought the gun a couple of weeks before.
Bond moved to suppress the firearm and other fruits of his arrest. The District
Court denied the motion. On February 27, 2004, a jury found Bond guilty of possession
of a firearm by a convicted felon. Bond appealed.
II. Jurisdiction and Standard of Review
The District Court had jurisdiction of this case pursuant to 18 U.S.C. § 3231. We
have jurisdiction over this appeal pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1291. We subject the District
Court’s application of the law to the facts and its determinations of reasonable suspicion
and probable cause to plenary review. United States v. Valentine, 232 F.3d 350, 353 (3d
3
Cir. 2000) (citing Ornelas v. United States, 517 U.S. 690, 699 (1996)).
III. Discussion
Bond argues that mere possession of a firearm on Philadelphia Streets is not a
criminal offense and thus does not create probable cause for arrest. However, section
6108 of 18 P A. C ONST. S TAT. A NN., titled “Carrying Firearms on Public Streets or Public
Property in Philadelphia,” makes it a crime to carry a firearm on a public street in
Philadelphia. The statute provides that:
“No person shall carry a firearm, rifle or shotgun at any time upon the
public streets or upon any public property in a city of the first class unless:
(1) such person is licenced to carry a firearm; or
(2) such person is exempt from licensing under section 6106(b) of this title
(relating to firearms not to be carried without a license).” (West 2000).
The Pennsylvania courts have interpreted this statute as not requiring the
prosecution to prove that the defendant did not have a license for the firearm.
Commonwealth v. Bigelow, 399 A.2d 392, 396 (Pa. 1979). The possession of a license is
an affirmative defense that can be raised by the defendant. Id. Thus, under Pennsylvania
law, a police officer has probable cause to arrest an individual for violation of section
6108 based solely on the officer’s observation that the individual is in possession of a
firearm on the streets of Philadelphia. See Commonwealth v. Romero, 673 A.2d 374, 377
4
(Pa. Super. 1996). When Officers Herder and Tilghman observed Bond in possession of
a firearm on a public street in Philadelphia, they observed the commission of a completed
crime and had probable cause to arrest him.
Bond contends, however, that the information transmitted to Officers Joyce and
McLaughlin was insufficient to supply either the requisite reasonable suspicion to justify
an investigatory stop or probable cause to arrest him. Consistent with the Fourth
Amendment, law enforcement officers may detain a person if they have reasonable
suspicion that “criminal activity is afoot.” United States v. Valentine, 232 F.3d 350, 353
(3d Cir. 2000) (citing Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 30 (1968)). If officers are relying on
radioed information, the information must have been sufficient to allow the officers a
reasonable suspicion to believe the individual they stopped engaged in criminal activity.
See id. (citing United States v. Sokolow, 490 U.S. 1, 7 (1989)). Further, in United States
v. Harple, we found that the “temporal and geographic proximity” of a car to the scene of
the crime, the fact that the car substantially matched the description which the officers
received, and the fact that the observation of the passengers was consistent with the
description given, supplied arresting officers with reasonable suspicion to effect an
investigatory stop. 202 F.3d 194, 197 (3d Cir. 1999). Under the facts here, Officers
Joyce and McLaughlin had reasonable suspicion that the car they stopped contained the
individual that Officers Herder and Tilghman had observed in commission of a crime.
After the vehicle was stopped, when Officer Joyce saw Bond glance over his
5
shoulder towards Officer McLaughlin and reach into his waistband, Officer Joyce was
permitted to search Bond and seize his gun. “[A] police officer may conduct a reasonable
search for weapons for his own protection ‘where he has reason to believe that he is
dealing with an armed and dangerous individual.’” United States v. Moorefield, 111 F.3d
10, 13 (3d Cir. 1997) (quoting Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1., 27 (1968)). “[A] pat-down for
weapons can occur only where the officer is ‘able to point to specific and articulable facts
which, taken together with rational inferences from those facts, reasonably warrant that
intrusion.’” Id. (citations omitted). These principles also apply in the context of officers
and motorists. Id.
For the above reasons, Bond’s seizure did not violate the Fourth Amendment and
the motion to suppress evidence was properly denied.
IV. Conclusion
For the foregoing reasons, we will affirm the judgment of conviction.
6