APPEAL
FROM THE SEBASTIAN COUNTY CIRCUIT COURT, FORT SMITH DISTRICT
[NO. 66FCR-16-1094] HONORABLE STEPHEN TABOR, JUDGE
Fuqua
Campbell, P.A., by: J. Blake Hendrix and Annie Depper, for
appellant.
Leslie
Rutledge, Att'y Gen., by: Kathryn Henry, Ass't
Att'y Gen., for appellee.
PHILLIP T. WHITEAKER, JUDGE
Appellant
Donald Cagle entered a conditional plea of guilty to one
count each of possession of methamphetamine with purpose to
deliver and possession of drug paraphernalia. His conditional
plea reserved his right to appeal from the circuit
court's denial of his motion to suppress evidence. On
appeal, Cagle contends that the initial traffic stop of his
vehicle was invalid and that the subsequent search of his
vehicle was unlawful. We find no error and
affirm.[1]
I.
Background
Cagle
was pulled over for alleged traffic violations by Officer
Keith Shelby of the Fort Smith Police Department. During the
traffic-violation investigation, Officer Shelby conducted a
canine search and found contraband in Cagle's car. Cagle
was arrested on charges of possession of methamphetamine with
purpose to deliver and possession of drug paraphernalia.
Cagle subsequently filed a motion to suppress the evidence
seized during that traffic stop. The circuit court held a
hearing on Cagle's suppression motion and subsequently
entered an order denying Cagle's motion to suppress.
Cagle then entered a conditional plea of guilty pursuant to
Arkansas Rule of Criminal Procedure 24.3(b), reserving his
right to appeal the denial of his suppression motion. The
circuit court sentenced him to ten years in the Arkansas
Department of Correction with an additional ten years'
suspended imposition of sentence. Cagle filed a timely notice
of appeal and now urges that the circuit court's denial
of his suppression motion was erroneous.
II.
Standard of Review
When
reviewing a circuit court's denial of a motion to
suppress evidence, we conduct a de novo review based on the
totality of the circumstances, reviewing findings of
historical facts for clear error and determining whether
those facts give rise to reasonable suspicion or probable
cause, giving due weight to the inferences drawn by the
circuit court. Bathrick v. State, 2016 Ark.App. 444,
504 S.W.3d 639. A finding is clearly erroneous when, even if
there is evidence to support it, the appellate court, after
reviewing the entire evidence, is left with the definite and
firm conviction that a mistake has been made. Prickett v.
State, 2016 Ark.App. 551, 506 S.W.3d 870. We defer to
the circuit court's superior position in determining the
credibility of the witnesses and resolving any conflicts in
the testimony. Pickering v. State, 2012 Ark. 280,
412 S.W.3d 143. We now turn our attention to the evidence
before the court at the suppression hearing.
III.
The Suppression Hearing
Cagle
filed a motion to suppress, alleging that the initial traffic
stop was invalid pursuant to Arkansas Rule of Criminal
Procedure 3.1 and that the subsequent search of his vehicle
by a canine officer followed an "unlawfully
prolonged" delay. At the motion hearing, the circuit
court heard evidence that Shelby effectuated a traffic stop
of a Chevy Tahoe driven by Cagle. Shelby observed the Tahoe
traveling northbound. Cagle initially had his turn signal on;
however, when he saw Shelby and his marked patrol unit, he
"acted nervous, turned his blinker off, and kept going
straight." Based on this, Shelby pulled in behind the
Tahoe and ran its tags.[2] Shelby discovered that there was no
insurance on file for that vehicle and began to follow the
Tahoe. Cagle turned into a Mini Mart parking lot without
activating his turn signal one hundred feet before the turn,
according to Shelby. Shelby believed that Cagle was trying to
evade him, so he pulled in behind the vehicle at the gas pump
and activated his blue lights.
Cagle
got out of his car and appeared nervous and acted as though
he did not want Shelby looking in the vehicle. Shelby asked
multiple times for consent to search the vehicle, which Cagle
eventually denied. Shelby then got his canine out of his car
and had the dog perform a sniff of Cagle's vehicle. The
dog alerted twice on the Tahoe, and Shelby's subsequent
search uncovered a "rather large bag" of
methamphetamine and a meth pipe. The court reviewed a video
of the incident. According to the video, no more than eight
minutes elapsed between Shelby's initial contact with
Cagle and the discovery of the drugs.
IV.
Validity of the Traffic Stop
In its
order denying Cagle's motion to suppress, the circuit
court found that four separate issues justified Shelby's
decision to stop Cagle's vehicle: (1) Cagle's
"last-second decision" to abandon his turn when he
saw the officer's vehicle; (2) the lack of valid
insurance on Cagle's vehicle; (3) Cagle's failure to
activate his right-hand-turn signal more than one hundred
feet before his turn into the gas-station parking lot; and
(4) the totality of the previous circumstances leading Shelby
to believe that Cagle was attempting to evade or avoid him.
The court found that the "possible insurance violation
and the obvious turn signal violation in and of themselves
individually justified ...