FILED
United States Court of Appeals
Tenth Circuit
March 4, 2008
PUBLISH Elisabeth A. Shumaker
Clerk of Court
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
TENTH CIRCUIT
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff - Appellant,
v.
No. 07-3159
CARLOS LOPEZ,
Defendant - Appellee.
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the District of Kansas
(D.C. No. 06-CR-20183-JWL)
Richard A. Friedman, Appellate Section, Criminal Division, Department of
Justice, Washington, D.C. (Eric F. Melgren, United States Attorney; James A.
Brown, Assistant United States Attorney; and David P. Zabel, Special Assistant
United States Attorney, District of Kansas, with him on the briefs) for Plaintiff -
Appellant.
Michael L. Harris, Assistant Federal Public Defender (David J. Phillips, Federal
Public Defender, with him on the brief), District of Kansas, for Defendant -
Appellee.
Before TACHA, ANDERSON, and GORSUCH, Circuit Judges.
GORSUCH, Circuit Judge.
The government seeks to appeal the district court’s ruling suppressing
drugs found in the back of Carlos Lopez’s truck, but failed to file in a timely
manner the certification required by 18 U.S.C. § 3731 – that is, a document
representing that its appeal is not taken for delay and the suppressed evidence is
substantial proof of a fact material to the prosecution. Our precedent indicates,
however, that this failure is not jurisdictional and should not preclude an appeal
so long as the government has materially, if not formally, complied with Section
3731. Because the record demonstrates that the government did, in substance,
undertake the evaluation called for by Section 3731 before noticing this appeal,
we must proceed to its merits. Doing so, we hold that the events witnessed by
government surveillance agents, taken as a whole, provided the officers
reasonable suspicion to effect an investigative detention, and we therefore
reverse.
I
A
On a December morning in 2006, Dana Suchma, a federal Drug
Enforcement Agency special agent, conducted drug-interdiction surveillance at a
Best Western hotel in Kansas City, Kansas, near an I-35 interchange. Agent
Suchma has ten years’ experience in this line of work, and has described his job
as including surveillance in hotel/motel parking lots, with an eye toward locating
cars that are from “source cities” and then gathering information about the car and
driver from hotel employees or others before deciding whether the car’s journey
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sounds sufficiently suspicious to merit further monitoring for drug-related activity.
In the Best Western parking lot, Agent Suchma noticed a red pickup truck
with its engine running and a person inside smoking a cigarette. Running a check
on the truck’s Texas license plate, he discovered it was registered to a Carlos
Lopez from Pharr, Texas. Agent Suchma consulted a map and found that Pharr is
a suburb of McAllen, a border town in south Texas that he believed to be a source
city where drugs are brought over the border. The agent then entered the hotel
and learned from the clerk that Mr. Lopez checked in the night before at 10:38,
checked out that morning at 9:01, and paid cash for his room.
Returning to his own car, Agent Suchma decided to continue monitoring
the truck and requested assistance by radio from three other nearby members of
his surveillance team. After nearly an hour idling in the hotel parking lot, Mr.
Lopez moved his truck from the hotel parking space and drove to one of the
parking spaces of a Sonic drive-in restaurant immediately adjacent to the hotel.
The agents then saw a green pickup truck, parked near Mr. Lopez’s truck in the
Best Western parking lot, follow Mr. Lopez’s truck into the restaurant parking lot
and pull into a space directly next to Mr. Lopez’s vehicle on the passenger side.
As soon as both pickup trucks arrived at the Sonic, the agents observed Mr.
Lopez get out of his truck and walk to the front of it. At the same time, a
passenger in the green truck, Alfonso Urena-Bonilla, exited that vehicle carrying
a white styrofoam cooler, and, without speaking with Mr. Lopez, placed it in the
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bed of Mr. Lopez’s truck. While this transfer was occurring, the driver of the
green truck, Ricardo Cardenas-Corona, got out and stood surveying the general
area. Agent Suchma, concerned that the driver was engaged in counter-
surveillance, relocated his vehicle to remain unnoticed.
Although Mr. Lopez and Mr. Cardenas-Corona stood outside their vehicles
in parking spaces directly next to each other, the agents did not observe any
communication between them. As soon as Mr. Urena-Bonilla deposited the
cooler in Mr. Lopez’s truck, Mr. Lopez reentered the vehicle and backed out of
the parking space, at which point Mr. Urena-Bonilla came over and spoke with
him briefly. After this brief exchange, Mr. Lopez drove out of the Sonic parking
lot and proceeded southbound on I-35. None of the men apparently sought
breakfast at the Sonic.
After following Mr. Lopez and observing him drive onto I-35, Agent
Suchma contacted a member of the Kansas Highway Patrol to request assistance
in stopping Mr. Lopez’s truck. Highway Patrol Lieutenant Tom Catania and
Trooper Charles Lovewell, in a car nearby, responded to the request by calling the
agent on his cell phone. Agent Suchma told Lieutenant Catania what he and the
other surveillance agents saw at the hotel and restaurant, gave a description of the
truck and its plate number, and asked that the Lieutenant and his partner stop Mr.
Lopez – for a traffic infraction if possible, although Agent Suchma believed he
already had reasonable suspicion to justify an investigative stop.
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Trooper Lovewell located Mr. Lopez’s truck and, after following him for a
distance, observed the truck weave slightly and the right-side tires momentarily
stray over the fog line. Believing this violated state law, Trooper Lovewell pulled
Mr. Lopez over. After explaining why he stopped Mr. Lopez and examining his
license, registration, and proof of insurance, Trooper Lovewell asked Mr. Lopez
about his destination and the significant mileage on his relatively new truck. Mr.
Lopez responded that he had driven from Florida to Dallas to Kansas City, and
was now returning to Dallas, and that, although he had driven approximately
14,000 miles in the 4 months he had owned the truck, he did not use it for
business. The troopers believed this amount of mileage likely excessive for
leisure travel and consistent with the operations of a drug courier.
Trooper Lovewell issued Mr. Lopez a written warning for failing to
maintain his lane of travel and returned his documents. After he told Mr. Lopez
to “have a safe trip” and walked away from the vehicle, and after Mr. Lopez
prepared to drive away, Trooper Lovewell turned back toward the truck and
knocked on the window. Mr. Lopez motioned for him to open the passenger door,
which he did. Trooper Lovewell then asked whether he could ask Mr. Lopez
some additional questions. When Mr. Lopez did not object, Trooper Lovewell
asked whether he had anything illegal in the vehicle, such as drugs. Lieutenant
Catania also came alongside the truck and asked whether Mr. Lopez had any
weapons or large amounts of currency. Mr. Lopez responded “no” to these
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questions. Trooper Lovewell then asked if he could search the truck and Mr.
Lopez answered affirmatively. Trooper Lovewell confirmed that Mr. Lopez
understood his request to search and Mr. Lopez against consented. Opening the
cooler in the truck bed revealed 3.3 kilograms of methamphetamine.
B
The government filed an indictment charging Mr. Lopez, along with Mr.
Urena-Bonilla, with possession with intent to distribute 500 grams or more of
methamphetamine, in violation of 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1) and (b)(1)(A). Mr.
Lopez moved to suppress the contents of the cooler, alleging that his stop and
search violated the Fourth Amendment. The district court agreed that the stop
wasn’t based on reasonable suspicion of a legitimate traffic infraction. A single
instance of straying across the fog line without some evidence that it was unsafe
to do so is not a traffic infraction under Kansas law, the court held, and Trooper
Lowell conceded in his testimony that the circumstances at the time did not make
Mr. Lopez’s conduct unsafe (viz, there were no other cars nearby, the driving
conditions weren’t hazardous, etc.).
Although the district court recognized that the stop nonetheless could be
considered lawful as an investigative detention if Agent Suchma acquired
reasonable suspicion Mr. Lopez was involved in criminal drug activity before he
asked highway patrol officers to stop Mr. Lopez, the court ruled that the
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observations of the surveillance agents did not provide reasonable suspicion of
such conduct, though the court considered this a “close call.”
After the district court issued its order suppressing the cooler’s contents,
the government filed a timely notice of appeal. In its appeal, the government did
not contest the district court’s ruling that there was insufficient evidence of a
traffic infraction for crossing a lane marker to support a traffic stop, but argued
that the circumstances surrounding the transfer of the cooler did give rise to
reasonable suspicion of criminal activity sufficient to justify a brief investigative
detention. At the same time, however, the government failed to certify to the
district court, as required by 18 U.S.C. § 3731, 1 that its interlocutory appeal was
not taken for purpose of delay and the suppressed evidence was a substantial
1
The pertinent portions of 18 U.S.C. § 3731 state:
An appeal by the United States shall lie to a court of appeals from a
decision or order of a district court suppressing or excluding
evidence . . . not made after the defendant has been put in jeopardy
and before the verdict or finding on an indictment or information, if
the United States attorney certifies to the district court that the
appeal is not taken for purpose of delay and that the evidence is a
substantial proof of a fact material in the proceeding.
...
The appeal in all such cases shall be taken within thirty days after the
decision, judgment or order has been rendered and shall be diligently
prosecuted.
The provisions of this section shall be liberally construed to
effectuate its purposes.
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proof of a fact material in the proceeding. In light of this deficiency, we entered
an order to show cause why the case should not be dismissed. In response, the
government filed the required certification and represented that its failure to file
the document earlier was an oversight. During the briefing of this appeal, the
government filed an unopposed motion (which we now grant) to supplement its
response to our order to show cause, appending three sworn affidavits from the
government attorneys involved in this case.
In its filings, the government explained that a Section 3731 certification
was not filed because the Assistant United States Attorney (“AUSA”) who
prepared the notice of appeal was relatively new to federal practice, this was his
first appeal of a suppression order, and he was unaware of the certification
requirement. The government also detailed the analysis the involved attorneys
undertook before deciding to appeal. In their affidavits, the three attorneys
represented that, over an extended number of days, they each considered the
merits of an appeal, discussed with each other and other attorneys whether the
case should be appealed, and prepared an internal memorandum analyzing the
merits and demerits of a potential appeal. They each also represented that, at the
time they filed the notice of appeal (or requested that the notice be filed), it was
clear to them that a Section 3731 certification could have been filed in good faith.
Finally, the government represented that it has “assured that all [AUSAs] in the
District [of Kansas] have been directed to familiarize themselves with” the
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necessity of complying with Section 3731’s certification requirement, Appellant’s
Br. at 17, and that the prosecution of Mr. Lopez will be “substantially impaired,
and probably defeated” if the drug evidence remains suppressed, id. at 20.
II
Failure to file a Section 3731 certificate within 30 days after an adverse
district court decision does not deprive this court of jurisdiction but instead poses
us with a discretionary question. United States v. Welsch, 446 F.2d 220, 224
(10th Cir. 1971). As Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 3(a)(2) explains, “[a]n
appellant’s failure to take any step other than the timely filing of a notice of
appeal does not affect the validity of the appeal, but is ground only for the court
of appeals to act as it considers appropriate, including dismissing the appeal.”
In deciding whether to exercise our discretion to hear an appeal, we are
guided by Congress’s express purpose in enacting the certification requirement –
namely, to ensure that government attorneys make “‘a thorough and conscientious
analysis of the case before deciding to appeal.’” United States v. Carrillo-Bernal,
58 F.3d 1490, 1493 (10th Cir. 1995) (studying congressional purpose and quoting
United States v. Hanks, 24 F.3d 1235, 1239 (10th Cir. 1994)). In this light, we
have acknowledged that the statute itself “admonishes us to construe the statute
liberally to effectuate its purposes” and so precludes us from enforcing “a per se
rule that all government appeals in which there has been an untimely filing of the
certification must be dismissed. To the contrary, we will look ‘liberally’ at any
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explanation offered by the government for its failure to comply with this
requirement.” Hanks, 24 F.3d at 1239. The bottom line, then, in Section 3731
cases is this: we look to see whether the government complied in substance, if
not form, with the statutory requirement that it perform a reasoned analysis before
filing its notice of appeal.
For example, in Carrillo-Bernal, we dismissed the government’s belatedly-
certified appeal because the government admitted that it appealed “in haste”
almost immediately after learning of the district court’s ruling and made no
demonstration that its decision to appeal was preceded by “a reasoned
determination as to the considerations that Congress has expressly incorporated
into Section 3731.” Carrillo-Bernal, 58 F.3d at 1492, 1494. The certification
was eventually sworn and filed by an attorney who was uninvolved in the matter
until that point and thus was unable to represent the motivation and basis for the
appeal by the actual decisionmakers in the first instance. Id. at 1494. Because
the court had before it no demonstration of a reasoned pre-appeal analysis by the
responsible prosecuting official, it could not be satisfied that such analysis had
taken place and the purpose of the certification requirement had been honored.
To be sure, the government in Carrillo-Bernal argued that, even if it had
failed to conduct a pre-appeal analysis of the case, the matter was of sufficient
importance that equity demanded its consideration, and we have recognized such
an exception to the prior-consideration rule. Id. at 1496-97; see Hanks, 24 F.3d at
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1239 (“[W]hen the underlying appeal raises important legal issues needing
appellate clarification, in the interest of justice, or for any significant other reason
to hear the interlocutory appeal, we may excuse the late filing of a § 3731
certificate.”). But the majority in Carrillo-Bernal indicated, albeit over a dissent,
that the case presented no important legal issue in need of appellate clarification.
Carrillo-Bernal, 58 F.3d at 1497.
In Hanks the government did not address the certification issue at all in
briefing, despite a jurisdictional motion and briefing by the defendant; instead,
this court had to inquire about it at oral argument and order supplemental briefing
post-argument. Hanks, 24 F.3d at 1238. When the government finally did issue
its certification, it failed to make it part of the record on appeal and expended no
effort to explain why the appeal should be heard, or “even to acknowledge that
the certification requirement in § 3731 should be taken seriously.” Id.
In contrast with these cases is United States v. Shareef, 100 F.3d 1491
(10th Cir. 1996), where, after filing its tardy certification, the government
provided the court with an affidavit representing that the AUSA involved in the
case had undertaken the analysis required by the statute before filing a notice of
appeal. Id. at 1499 n.2. In light of this uncontested affidavit, we exercised our
discretion to hear the government’s appeal despite the lack of a timely and
complete Section 3731 certification because we were “satisfied that the
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government’s decision to appeal ‘was preceded by a reasoned determination as to
the [§ 3731 factors].’” Id. (quoting Carrillo-Bernal, 58 F.3d at 1494).
We believe this case falls on the Shareef, rather than Hanks/Carrillo-
Bernal, side of the line. Apparently, the only reason the government failed to file
a timely certification was due to the relative inexperience of the AUSA who filed
the notice of appeal – and the government stresses it has addressed the matter
with the AUSA in question and taken steps calculated to minimize the recurrence
of this problem in the future. The uncontested affidavits before us reveal that the
government did, in fact, undertake a reasoned pre-appeal analysis of the Section
3731 factors, involving a number of attorneys thinking about this case over an
extended number of days who prepared a written memorandum analyzing the
proposed appeal. The affidavits before us each also represents that, at the time
the government filed the notice of appeal, it was clear to the involved attorneys
that a Section 3731 certification could have been filed in good faith – that is to
say, that the appeal was not for purposes of delay and the evidence was a
substantial proof of a fact material in the proceeding. Given the uniformity of the
evidence that the government complied with the substance if not form of Section
3731, we are obliged to entertain this appeal and have no need to reach the
government’s alternative argument that this case presents the sort of important
legal question in need of appellate resolution that Carrillo-Bernal indicated could
merit an exception to the prior-consideration rule.
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Mr. Lopez responds that, even if the government did comply in substance
with Section 3731’s requirements, his right to a speedy trial and need for
protection from the hazards of prolonged litigation should nonetheless dictate
dismissal of this appeal. While the delayed resolution of a case surely can weigh
heavily on a criminal defendant’s mind, see Hanks, 24 F.3d at 1238, Mr. Lopez
identifies no basis to believe that the government’s failure to issue a timely
Section 3731 certificate caused any delay in the prosecution of his case beyond
that inherently associated with the resolution of an interlocutory appeal. Neither
are we pointed to any authority or given any reason why we should dismiss an
appeal under these circumstances. To the contrary, if the delay inherent in an
interlocutory appeal where a certification isn’t timely filed sufficed to warrant
dismissal, that would effectively establish a per se rule requiring dismissal of all
cases where the government fails to supply a timely Section 3731 certification
and thus undo our binding precedent requiring us to entertain appeals where the
government substantively, if not formally, complies with the statute.
Accordingly, even if some egregious delay caused by the government’s failure to
comply with Section 3731 could supply a basis for dismissing an appeal (an issue
we need not address today), we hold that the delay inherent in an interlocutory
suppression appeal and judicial resolution of a Section 3731 issue does not form a
sufficient basis on which to dismiss an appeal.
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III
Turning to the merits, we begin by noting that the facts surrounding the
surveillance of Mr. Lopez are not meaningfully in dispute. Accordingly, the only
question before us is their legal significance, a question we review de novo. In
assessing the constitutionality of an investigatory stop, we ask whether the
circumstances demonstrate that law enforcement officers had reasonable suspicion
that criminal activity may have been afoot. United States v. Arvizu, 534 U.S. 266,
273 (2002); United States v. Cortez-Galaviz, 495 F.3d 1203, 1205-06 (10th Cir.
2007). In making this determination, we look at the totality of the circumstances
to determine whether a particularized and objective basis, viewed from the
standpoint of an objectively reasonable police officer, existed for suspecting legal
wrongdoing. Arvizu, 534 U.S. at 273. Courts may not evaluate and reject each
contributing factor in isolation, for reasonable suspicion can exist even if each
individual observation is susceptible of innocent explanation. United States v.
Guerrero, 472 F.3d 784, 787 (10th Cir. 2007). Rather, even factors that are
entirely innocent when taken separately can support a lawful detention if, taken
together, they reasonably suggest the presence of illegal conduct. United States v.
Ramirez, 479 F.3d 1229, 1244 (10th Cir. 2007); see Guerrero, 472 F.3d at 787.
In analyzing whether a given set of factors gives rise to the requisite reasonable
suspicion, we are reminded that we must “be careful to judge the officer’s
conduct in light of common sense and ordinary human experience but also to
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grant deference to a trained law enforcement officer’s ability to distinguish
between innocent and suspicious circumstances.” Ramirez, 479 F.3d at 1244
(internal quotation omitted).
With these rules of review in mind, we consider the factors that contributed
to the officers’ suspicion in this case. The officers saw a rendezvous in which
Mr. Lopez’s truck, after idling for an hour, moved in concert with the green truck
from the hotel to the drive-in restaurant. They saw the passenger of the green
truck, Mr. Urena-Bonilla, deposit the cooler into the bed of Mr. Lopez’s truck.
They then saw Mr. Lopez promptly leave the restaurant for the interstate. Agent
Suchma and Lieutenant Catania each testified that, based on his training and
experience in hotel drug-interdiction surveillance, an exchange of this sort was
indicative of illegal activity. Agent Suchma testified that “it is not uncommon to
find coolers, . . . things of that nature, exchanged in a public area; and it is not
uncommon to later find that those . . . containers or coolers contain either drugs
or a sum of bulk currency.” Hr’g Tr. at 21. Lieutenant Catania testified that “one
of the things that we would watch for . . . was an exchange of some sort,
somebody bringing a vehicle to somebody . . . or an exchange in the parking lot
or meeting with somebody else at an alternate location and then an exchange
being made. Those are the things we typically saw, and the fact that one was
made in this case made it very suspicious.” Id. at 100.
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The officers observed this hand-off in the context of other suspicious
circumstances as well. First, they saw what appeared to be counter-surveillance
by the driver of the green truck, Mr. Cardenas-Corona. Second, there was a
dearth of communication between the parties to the exchange. Although all three
parties to the transaction were standing outside their adjacent vehicles in the
parking lot, the officers observed no customary greeting or words exchanged
between them, no acknowledgment of each others’ existence. Only when Mr.
Lopez backed his truck out of the parking space to leave the restaurant did he and
the passenger of the green truck briefly appear to speak to each other. Third, the
parties moved their trucks from the hotel parking lot to the adjacent drive-in
restaurant parking lot, where the hand-off took place, even though neither
appeared to order or receive any food at the drive-in or enter the restaurant.
The district court did not include any of these three circumstances in its
reasonable suspicion analysis, perhaps because they represent omissions, or things
that didn’t happen. But the government reminds us of the logical significance of
the dog that didn’t bark, 2 and we believe that omission of an expected or
2
In Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s story, Inspector Gregory posited that a
stranger had stolen a race horse from Colonel Ross’s barn in the night. But
Sherlock Holmes asked how he could explain the “curious incident” of the guard
dog’s silence. Holmes later revealed that the dog was silent because the thief was
the horse’s trainer, a person familiar to the dog. See Sir Arthur Conan Doyle,
Silver Blaze, in The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes (1894).
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customary action, equal to actions themselves, can be of use in assessing whether
something is amiss and criminal activity may be afoot.
Mr. Lopez responds that Agent Suchma’s testimony does not indicate that
he or his team inferred that Mr. Cardenas-Corona was engaged in counter-
surveillance, so we should not consider that factor as contributing to reasonable
suspicion. But Agent Suchma testified that an agent on his surveillance team saw
the driver of the green truck exit his truck at the drive-in restaurant and stand
around, looking about while the passenger put the cooler in the bed of Mr.
Lopez’s truck. Hr’g Tr. at 18, 38-39. He then testified that, based on this
observation, he thought, “in the event this guy is trying to conduct some type of
countersurveillance, I was not comfortable with where I was,” so he moved his
vehicle, because he “didn’t want to compromise the surveillance.” Id. at 39.
Agent Suchma’s testimony is easily understood as saying that he took action to
preserve his cover based on his inference that the driver was engaged in counter-
surveillance. Mr. Lopez does not contest that a reasonable officer could make
this inference, and Agent Suchma’s testimony indicated that he did so, which
contributed to his reasonable suspicion.
To be sure, as the district court correctly noted, some of the other factors
identified as contributing to the officers’ suspicion are relatively weak. For
example, the government’s reliance on the fact that Mr. Lopez traveled from a
known drug source area is a factor that we have previously held so consistent with
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innocent activity as to “do[] little” when standing alone to add to the reasonable
suspicion calculus. Guerrero, 472 F.3d at 788. Likewise, the fact that Mr. Lopez
paid a modest sum of cash for a single night’s stay in a hotel can be “afforded
little weight,” given how common the conduct is and how consistent it is with
ordinary and lawful travel. United States v. Bloom, 975 F.2d 1447, 1458 (10th
Cir. 1992), overruled on other grounds, United States v. Little, 18 F.3d 1499
(10th Cir. 1994) (en banc).
But neither of these factors stands alone in this case or is even necessarily
essential to our conclusion. Rather, the exchange of the cooler and the
circumstances surrounding the exchange, considered as a whole and with the due
deference commanded by our precedent to the officers’ experience and training,
suggest that reasonable suspicion of criminal activity existed sufficient to justify
a brief investigative detention. In reaching this conclusion we are mindful that
the level of suspicion required for reasonable suspicion is “considerably less”
than proof by a preponderance of the evidence or that required for probable cause.
United States v. Sokolow, 490 U.S. 1, 7 (1989). Officers merely need an
articulable reasonable suspicion that criminal activity may be afoot – they need
not even assert a “fair probability” that their investigation will actually turn up
evidence of criminal activity. Id.
In fact, this court has found even probable cause to arrest, above and
beyond reasonable suspicion, based on a defendant’s suspected counter-
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surveillance incident to a drug deal. In United States v. Soto, 375 F.3d 1219 (10th
Cir. 2004), an undercover officer had arranged to purchase drugs from men in a
white truck at a gas station. Surveillance officers observed a blue truck enter the
gas station parking lot, circle the lot, and then leave, shortly before the white
truck arrived and parked in an adjacent hotel parking lot. Id. at 1221. The blue
truck later returned and parked in the gas station lot, with an unobstructed view of
the white truck, although its occupants did not leave the vehicle to conduct any
business at the gas station. Id. The undercover officer discussed the drug deal
with the men in the white truck, who suggested they go to a different location to
complete the sale. Id. Officers later stopped the blue truck and arrested its
occupants five miles down the road from where they stopped the white truck but
before they searched the white truck for contraband. Id. Although one could well
think of innocent explanations for the movements of the blue truck, we held that
the apparent counter-surveillance and connection with the white truck, based on
the officers’ experience with situations of this sort, were enough to establish
probable cause for arrest. See id. at 1220, 1223. Even though the officers in Soto
knew that the men in the white truck were involved in criminal activity, the
suspected connection between the men in the blue truck and this criminal activity
was based entirely on circumstantial factors capable of innocent explanation.
Likewise, in the present case, activities, circumstances, and omissions of a similar
nature to those in Soto are enough, based on the officers’ experience with drug
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trafficking exchange scenarios, to indicate a connection to criminal activity and
pass the lower threshold of reasonable suspicion.
***
The district court’s suppression order is
Reversed.
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