USCA4 Appeal: 22-4154 Doc: 26 Filed: 05/23/2023 Pg: 1 of 4
UNPUBLISHED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT
No. 22-4154
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff - Appellee,
v.
RASHAN FRANKLIN,
Defendant - Appellant.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Western District of Virginia, at
Danville. Michael F. Urbanski, Chief District Judge. (4:20-cr-00019-MFU-1)
Submitted: May 3, 2023 Decided: May 23, 2023
Before HARRIS and HEYTENS, Circuit Judges, and MOTZ, Senior Circuit Judge.
Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion.
ON BRIEF: Juval O. Scott, Federal Public Defender, Charlottesville, Virginia, Monica D.
Cliatt, First Assistant Federal Public Defender, OFFICE OF THE FEDERAL PUBLIC
DEFENDER, Roanoke, Virginia, for Appellant. Christopher R. Kavanaugh, United States
Attorney, Roanoke, Virginia, S. Cagle Juhan, Assistant United States Attorney, OFFICE
OF THE UNITED STATES ATTORNEY, Charlottesville, Virginia, for Appellee.
Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.
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PER CURIAM:
Rashan Franklin entered a conditional guilty plea to possession of a firearm by a
felon, in violation of 18 U.S.C §§ 922(g)(1), reserving, in his plea agreement, the right to
appeal the district court’s denial of his motion to suppress. On appeal, Franklin argues that
the district court erred in denying his motion to suppress the firearm, which was seized
from the kitchen cabinet of an apartment in which Franklin was a guest. We affirm.
We review de novo a district court’s legal conclusions in denying a motion to
suppress and review its factual findings for clear error, viewing the evidence in the light
most favorable to the Government. United States v. Pulley, 987 F.3d 370, 376 (4th Cir.
2021). We will find clear error only when we are “left with the definite and firm conviction
that a mistake has been committed.” Id. (internal quotation marks omitted). “The Fourth
Amendment protects the right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers,
and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures.” United States v. Small, 944 F.3d
490, 501 (4th Cir. 2019) (cleaned up).
Franklin first contends that the officers exceeded the scope of the apartment tenant’s
consent to enter the apartment. “Consent to a search or for entry into one’s home must be
knowing and voluntary.” United States v. Ojedokun, 16 F.4th 1091, 1113 (4th Cir. 2021)
(internal quotation marks omitted), cert. denied, 142 S. Ct. 2780 (2022). “The question of
whether consent to a search is voluntary—as distinct from being the product of duress or
coercion, express or implied—is one of fact to be determined from the totality of all the
circumstances.” Id. at 1113-14 (internal quotation marks omitted). “When there is no
question that consent was voluntary, the scope of that consent is assessed by considering
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what the typical reasonable person would have understood by the exchange between the
officer and the suspect.” Id. (cleaned up). Upon review, we discern no clear error in the
district court’s finding that the tenant validly consented for officers to enter the apartment
and that the officers did not exceed the scope of that consent.
Next, Franklin argues that the officers’ presence in the apartment amounted to a
seizure, and that the officers lacked reasonable suspicion to seize him. Assuming, as the
district court did, that the encounter changed in character from consensual to a seizure at
some point, we conclude that, under the totality of the circumstances, the officers had
reasonable suspicion to seize Franklin both before and after they found the gun. Consistent
with the Fourth Amendment, “[a]n officer may stop and briefly detain a person when the
officer has reasonable, articulable suspicion that the person has been, is, or is about to be
engaged in criminal activity.” United States v. Montieth, 662 F.3d 660, 665 (4th Cir. 2011)
(internal quotation marks omitted). To justify the particular intrusion, “the police officer
must be able to point to specific and articulable facts which, taken together with rational
inferences from those facts, reasonably warrant that intrusion.” Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1,
21 (1968). “Thus, a court must look to the totality of the circumstances in determining
whether the officer had a particularized and objective basis for suspecting criminal
activity.” United States v. Foster, 634 F.3d 243, 246 (4th Cir. 2011). Here, several specific
and articulable facts existed that reasonably warranted a brief seizure of Franklin. A 911
caller reported that the tenant and Franklin had repeatedly attempted to break into a unit
she believed to be vacant in her apartment building. Next, one officer had relayed that the
tenant and Franklin were smoking marijuana—an activity that was illegal at the time.
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Another officer, who was viewing the tenant and Franklin from outside the apartment,
through a first-floor window, observed Franklin quickly place something into the kitchen
cabinet when Franklin realized that police had arrived at the apartment door. These
circumstances provided a particularized and objective basis for the officers to briefly seize
Franklin.
Finally, Franklin asserts that the officers’ search of the kitchen cabinet was
unlawful. Franklin contends that because the officers threatened Franklin that they would
obtain a warrant to search the cabinet, their coercive language rendered involuntary the
tenant’s subsequent consent to search the cabinet. Upon review, we conclude that the
district court did not clearly err in determining that the tenant’s consent was voluntary.
Accordingly, we affirm the criminal judgment. We dispense with oral argument
because the facts and legal contentions are adequately presented in the materials before this
court and argument would not aid the decisional process.
AFFIRMED
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