Roy Colter Clayton III v. State of Alaska

Opinion

2026 WL 2427913

Only the Westlaw citation is currently available.

NOTICE: UNPUBLISHED OPINION

NOTICE Memorandum decisions of this Court do not create legal precedent. See Alaska Appellate Rule 214(d) and Paragraph 7 of the Guidelines for Publication of Court of Appeals Decisions (Court of Appeals Order No. 3). Accordingly, this memorandum decision may not be cited as binding authority for any proposition of law, although it may be cited for whatever persuasive value it may have. See McCoy v. State, 80 P.3d 757, 764 (Alaska App. 2002).

Court of Appeals of Alaska.

ROY COLTER CLAYTON III, Appellant,

v.

STATE OF ALASKA, Appellee.

Court of Appeals No. A-14284

August 19, 2026

Trial Court No. 3HO-22-00011 CR

Appeal from the Superior Court, Third Judicial District, Homer, Bride Seifert, Judge.

Attorneys and Law Firms

Appearances: Justin N. Gillette, Assistant Public Defender, and Terrence Haas, Public Defender, Anchorage, for the Appellant. Kayla H. Doyle, Assistant Attorney General, Office of Criminal Appeals, Anchorage, and Stephen J. Cox, Acting Attorney General, Juneau, for the Appellee.

Before: Allard, Chief Judge, and Wollenberg and Terrell, Judges.

MEMORANDUM OPINION

Judge ALLARD.

Star page 1*1 Following a bench trial, Roy Colter Clayton III was convicted of third-degree misconduct involving weapons — being a felon in possession of a concealable firearm.¹

Before trial, Clayton filed a motion to suppress evidence of the firearm, which was discovered by the police during a warrantless search of a hotel room that Clayton was sharing with his then-girlfriend, Sophia Kvasnikoff. The police had responded to a call seeking a welfare check for Kvasnikoff, who had sent the caller an image of Clayton holding a firearm with no additional context. In the course of responding to this request for a welfare check, the officers found Clayton's firearm while searching the hotel room. The court ultimately denied the motion to suppress, relying on the emergency aid exception to the warrant requirement.

On appeal, Clayton challenges the superior court's denial of his motion to suppress. Clayton further argues that the third-degree misconduct involving weapons statute, AS 11.61.200(a)(1), is unconstitutional as applied to non-violent felons like him.

For the reasons that follow, we affirm the superior court's denial of the motion to suppress and reject Clayton's as-applied challenge to the weapons misconduct statute.

Background facts and proceedings

On January 7, 2022, Officers Charles Lee, Morgan Tracy, and Kellen Stock of the Homer Police Department responded to the Best Western Bidarka Inn after a caller requested a welfare check. The caller reported concern for Sophia Kvasnikoff's safety because she was in a hotel room with Clayton and had sent the caller an image of him holding a firearm with no additional context.

Upon obtaining Kvasnikoff's room number, the officers activated their audio recorders and knocked on Kvasnikoff's door. After Kvasnikoff answered the door and confirmed that Clayton was in the room, the officers could smell alcohol coming from the room and observed that both Kvasnikoff and Clayton were intoxicated. When the officers asked about the gun, Clayton denied there was a gun, but Kvasnikoff quietly confirmed that Clayton had a gun.

Although Kvasnikoff denied being afraid of Clayton, the officers observed that she kept looking back in the room in the direction of Clayton and appeared nervous. The officers noticed Clayton was standing behind Kvasnikoff, looking over her shoulder while she was speaking with them.

The officers asked Kvasnikoff why she would send an image of Clayton “brandishing a firearm,” but Kvasnikoff did not directly answer the question. Kvasnikoff told the officers that she and Clayton were just going to bed. When the officers asked Kvasnikoff why Clayton would play with a gun in a hotel room before going to bed, Kvasnikoff again did not directly answer. Clayton stated that they were going to sleep and told the officers to go away. Kvasnikoff confirmed that she did send an image to someone.²

Star page 2*2 When the officers asked to secure the gun, explaining they did not want an unsecured gun in the area while they were talking, Kvasnikoff stated that she had not called the police and they were going to bed. Clayton invited the officers into the room to pat him down to prove that he did not have a gun on his person.

Once the officers entered the room, things became more chaotic. The officers attempted to separate Kvasnikoff and Clayton so they could speak freely with Kvasnikoff, but Clayton frequently interjected, prompting both Kvasnikoff and the officers to request that he stop. The officers observed ammunition in several places in the room and that Clayton's behavior was unpredictable, agitated, and aggressive. Clayton repeatedly told the officers they could not search the room.

To determine whether Kvasnikoff would be safe if they left, the officers again tried to ask Kvasnikoff about why she would send an image of Clayton holding a gun. Clayton asserted that it was from a long time ago. Kvasnikoff ultimately showed Officer Lee a picture she had taken of Clayton holding a handgun in bed, with Clayton's hand over the grip and his index finger positioned over the trigger guard. When Clayton again insisted it was an old image, Kvasnikoff stated that she did not know where the gun was.

Throughout this encounter, the officers made multiple requests to search the room to secure the gun. Kvasnikoff initially denied several requests, but eventually said, “Just get it out of the way.”

When the officers began to search for the gun, Clayton started moving in the room, creating safety concerns. The officers put Clayton in handcuffs. While the search was underway, the officers learned that Clayton was a felon. Officer Lee then located a handgun when searching the bed. Shortly thereafter, Clayton was arrested and subsequently indicted on one count of third-degree misconduct involving weapons.³

Clayton filed a motion to suppress evidence of the firearm obtained in the search of the hotel room. Clayton argued that the search violated his Fourth Amendment rights because he had objected to the officers’ search of the hotel room and the facts of this case did not meet the emergency aid exception to the warrant requirement. At the evidentiary hearing on Clayton's motion to suppress, the State called the three responding officers to testify, played the audio recordings from all three officers, and introduced the photo that Kvasnikoff had shown to Officer Lee.⁴ All three officers testified that they had safety concerns for Kvasnikoff based on the initial call requesting the welfare check and that these concerns increased based on what they observed once they arrived at the hotel room.

The officers testified that they do not commonly get calls reporting that a picture of someone holding a gun has been sent out to friends or family, and that such calls typically relate to a domestic violence situation. The officers therefore believed that Kvasnikoff might be in danger. The officers testified that one of the first things Kvasnikoff said to them was to quietly confirm that Clayton had a gun, while Clayton himself denied having a gun. The officers also testified that Kvasnikoff's verbal assertions that she was not afraid of Clayton did not match her body language. According to the officers, Clayton was closely watching Kvasnikoff's interactions with the officers the entire time and they did not believe Kvasnikoff was free to speak with them openly under the circumstances. The officers testified that they had the impression that Kvasnikoff had sent the image of Clayton with a gun hoping for help and they believed it was a high-risk situation given that Clayton was intoxicated and agitated, and that if they had left the room before securing the gun, Clayton might have harmed Kvasnikoff.

Star page 3*3 Following this evidentiary hearing, the superior court made detailed factual findings. The court found that the officers had testified credibly that they were concerned about Kvasnikoff's safety based on her non-verbal actions. The court found it significant that the officers received inconsistent statements from Clayton and Kvasnikoff about whether there was a gun, and the court found that Kvasnikoff's quiet response that Clayton had a gun, but louder statements that she did not need help, suggested that she did not want Clayton to hear her tell the police he had a gun. The court found that the officers credibly testified that Kvasnikoff's body language and non-verbal cues suggested she was afraid of Clayton, despite her verbal statements to the contrary.

The court also found that the officers reasonably believed that Clayton posed a threat to Kvasnikoff's safety based on his actions and behavior. The court noted that the officers observed that Clayton was intoxicated, that Clayton became agitated when they asked Kvasnikoff about sending an image of him with a gun, and that Clayton interrupted Kvasnikoff whenever she would start responding to officers’ questions. The court found that the officers credibly testified that Clayton was “behaving erratically” and was “obsessively” watching the officer talking to Kvasnikoff.

The court found that the entire interaction — from when the officers arrived at the hotel room to when the officers located the gun while searching the bed — lasted approximately sixteen minutes and that the officers were trying to eliminate any threat to Kvasnikoff's safety the entire time. The court further found that the officers did not learn that Clayton had a felony conviction until after they started searching for the gun.

The superior court ultimately denied Clayton's motion to suppress, relying on both the consent doctrine and the emergency aid exception as independent bases justifying the search.

Clayton waived his right to a jury trial, and the case proceeded to a bench trial. At trial, Kvasnikoff and Officer Lee testified. Following this bench trial, Clayton was convicted of third-degree misconduct involving a weapon.⁵

Clayton now appeals. On appeal, the State does not rely on the consent rationale for the search — conceding that the superior court erred in its consent doctrine analysis — but instead argues that the search fell within the emergency aid exception to the warrant requirement.

The superior court's finding that the officers’ testimony was credible that Kvasnikoff's behavior indicated that she was afraid of Clayton was not clearly erroneous

On appeal, Clayton first argues that the superior court clearly erred in finding that the officers credibly testified that Kvasnikoff's body language and mannerisms indicated that she was afraid of Clayton. In support of this argument, Clayton asserts that the court's finding was contradicted by portions of the record, and he argues that the officers’ testimony on Kvasnikoff's non-verbal cues was insufficient to support this finding. Clayton also asserts that the court's finding “does not comport with common sense” because, in his view, other explanations for Kvasnikoff's body language are more plausible.

The State responds that Clayton's argument relies on interpreting limited portions of the record in the light most favorable to him, rather than considering the entirety of the officers’ testimony in the context of the circumstances they encountered at the hotel room.

We generally review the denial of a motion to suppress in the light most favorable to upholding the superior court's ruling.⁶ The superior court's findings of fact will not be disturbed unless they are clearly erroneous.⁷ In other words, we accept the facts as found by the superior court unless, based on the entire record, “we are left ‘with a definite and firm conviction ... that a mistake has been made.’ ”⁸ It is further the function of the superior court, not the appellate court, to judge witness credibility and weigh conflicting evidence.⁹ We therefore “generally accept the determination of witnesses’ credibility that are made by the court as a trier of fact, since the court heard and observed the witnesses first hand.”¹⁰

Star page 4*4 Under this deferential standard of review, Clayton's arguments fail.¹¹ Upon reviewing the entire record from the evidentiary hearing, we are not left with a definite and firm conviction that a mistake has been made. Accordingly, we conclude that the superior court did not clearly err in finding the officers’ testimony credible that Kvasnikoff's mannerisms, demeanor, and non-verbal cues during the encounter at the hotel indicated that she was afraid of Clayton.

Why we affirm the superior court's denial of the motion to suppress based on the emergency aid exception to the warrant requirement

Clayton next argues that the superior court erred in denying his motion to suppress evidence of the firearm in reliance on the emergency aid exception to the warrant requirement.¹²

Under both the Alaska and United States Constitutions, a search without a warrant is unreasonable unless it falls within one of the defined exceptions to the warrant requirement.¹³ The emergency aid exception is recognized under both Alaska and federal law, with the Alaska Constitution generally affording greater protection against warrantless searches and seizures than the United States Constitution.¹⁴

To be justified under the emergency aid exception, a warrantless search must satisfy three prongs:

(1) the police must have reasonable grounds to believe there is an emergency at hand and an immediate need for their assistance in the protection of life or property; (2) the search must not be primarily motivated by the intent to arrest a person or to seize evidence; and (3) there must be some reasonable basis, approximating probable cause, to associate the emergency with the area or place to be searched.^[15]

The Alaska Supreme Court has reiterated that “[t]he right of the police to enter and investigate in an emergency without the accompanying intent to either search or arrest is inherent in the very nature of their duties as police officers, and derives from the common law.”¹⁶ The relevant criterion is “the reasonableness of the [police's] belief ... as to the existence of an emergency, not the existence of an emergency in fact.”¹⁷ Our supreme court has approvingly quoted Professor LaFave's description that the question of whether the police have a reasonable belief that an emergency existed is “whether ‘the officers would have been derelict in their duty had they acted otherwise.’ ”¹⁸

In sum, the emergency aid exception to the warrant requirement “is a flexible doctrine” that “must be evaluated on a case-by-case basis, balancing the competing interests in light of the actual facts, perceived dangers, and circumstances encountered by police.”¹⁹

Star page 5*5 As noted above, we generally review the denial of a motion to suppress in the light most favorable to upholding the superior court's ruling.²⁰ Although the superior court's findings of fact will not be disturbed unless they are clearly erroneous, we independently determine whether the superior court's factual findings support its legal conclusions.²¹ Whether a search falls within the emergency aid exception to the warrant requirement is a question of law that we review de novo.²²

Regarding the first prong, the superior court's factual findings support the conclusion that the officers reasonably believed that Clayton posed a threat to Kvasnikoff's safety and that there was an immediate need to intervene. The court's factual findings thus support the conclusion that police would have been “derelict in their duty” if they had left Kvasnikoff in the hotel room with Clayton, who was agitated and intoxicated, with an unsecured handgun.²³

Among other things, the court found that the officers were conducting a welfare check based on concerns for Kvasnikoff's safety given that she had sent an image of Clayton holding a firearm with no additional context. The court noted the inconsistency between Kvasnikoff's quiet confirmation to the officers that Clayton had a gun and Clayton's repeated denials that there was a gun. And the court found that the officers had credibly testified that Kvasnikoff's non-verbal cues indicated that she was afraid of Clayton, and that Clayton was intoxicated, agitated, and behaving erratically. Given the totality of the superior court's findings, we agree with the superior court that the first prong of the emergency aid exception was met — the officers had reasonable grounds to believe there was an emergency at hand and an immediate need for their assistance in the protection of Kvasnikoff's life.²⁴

Regarding the second prong, the superior court's findings support the conclusion that the officers’ primary motivation was to ensure Kvasnikoff's safety, not to seize evidence or to arrest Clayton. The court found that the officers responded to the hotel room to conduct a welfare check based on concerns for Kvasnikoff's safety and their concerns increased when Kvasnikoff quietly confirmed that Clayton had a gun and Clayton repeatedly denied having a gun. The court also found that the officers’ safety concerns increased when they observed Clayton was intoxicated and behaving erratically.

The superior court found that the officers repeatedly asked if they could search the room to secure the gun while they resolved their safety concerns, and did not learn that Clayton had a felony conviction until after they were already in the process of searching for the gun. The superior court explained that after applying a high level of scrutiny, it found the officers credibly testified that they intended to search the room to secure the gun, not to obtain evidence.²⁵

Star page 6*6 The third prong, that the officers had a reasonable basis to associate the need to respond to the threat to Kvasnikoff's safety with searching the hotel room for the gun, was also met. The court found that the officers had a reasonable basis to believe that Clayton had a gun and that he posed a danger to Kvasnikoff based on the image of the gun that was sent, Kvasnikoff's quiet confirmation that Clayton had a gun, her non-verbal cues that suggested she was afraid of Clayton, Clayton's aggressive and erratic behavior, and the officers’ inability to successfully separate Kvasnikoff from Clayton so that they could speak with her alone. Based on the superior court's factual findings, we agree that the officers would have a reasonable basis to associate responding to the threat to Kvasnikoff's safety with searching the hotel room for the gun. As we have previously explained, “once the existence of an emergency has been determined, and once it has been found that [the officers’] conduct was motivated by the apparent need to render assistance,” the officers “must be allowed a broad scope of judgment in the precise manner of dealing with emergency situations.”²⁶

We therefore affirm the superior court's denial of Clayton's motion to suppress based on the emergency aid exception to the warrant requirement.

Clayton's constitutional challenge to the third-degree misconduct involving weapons statute is foreclosed by controlling Alaska precedent

Clayton's final argument on appeal is that the third-degree misconduct involving weapons statute violates the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms as applied to non-violent felons like him.²⁷ As we recently explained in Ivyories v. State, however, controlling Alaska Supreme Court precedent Farmer v. State, Department of Law forecloses Clayton's challenge.²⁸

In Ivyories, which was decided shortly after briefing in this appeal was completed, we were asked to consider the constitutionality of the third-degree weapons misconduct statute as applied to defendants whose prior felonies were for non-violent conduct.²⁹ We reasoned that in Farmer, the Alaska Supreme Court held that “prohibitions on the purchase and possession of firearms by convicted felons do not violate either the Second Amendment of the United States Constitution or [A]rticle I, [S]ection 19 of the Alaska Constitution.”³⁰ Just as we concluded in Ivyories, as an intermediate appellate court, we are bound by Farmer, and so Clayton's claim fails.³¹

Conclusion

For the foregoing reasons, we AFFIRM Clayton's conviction for third-degree misconduct involving weapons.

Footnotes

1

AS 11.61.200(a)(1).

2

At the evidentiary hearing, Officer Lee testified that his understanding was that the caller initially reported receiving a video, but Kvasnikoff ultimately clarified it was a still image.

3

AS 11.61.200(a)(1). A count of fourth-degree misconduct involving weapons, for being in possession of a firearm while intoxicated, was later added by information, but the State dismissed this charge before the bench trial. AS 11.61.210(a)(1).

4

The parties further stipulated to the admission of the 911 call so that the superior court could listen to it after the hearing.

5

AS 11.61.200(a)(1).

6

State v. Gibson, 267 P.3d 645, 650 (Alaska 2012) (citing State v. Joubert, 20 P.3d 1115, 1118 (Alaska 2001)).

7

Id.

8

Meyer v. State, 368 P.3d 613, 615 (Alaska App. 2016) (quoting Geczy v. LaChappelle, 636 P.2d 604, 606 n.6 (Alaska 1981)).

9

Luker v. Sykes, 357 P.3d 1191, 1199 (Alaska 2015) (citing Fyffe v. Wright, 93 P.3d 444, 450 (Alaska 2004)).

10

Demoski v. New, 737 P.2d 780, 784 (Alaska 1987).

11

See, e.g., Meyer, 368 P.3d at 615 (explaining a trial court's findings of fact are reviewed deferentially, under the “clearly erroneous” standard).

12

On appeal, Clayton also argues that the superior court erred in denying his motion to suppress under the alternative theory that Kvasnikoff consented to the search. The State does not rely on the consent theory on appeal.

13

State v. Gibson, 267 P.3d 645, 650-51 (Alaska 2012) (citing Schultz v. State, 593 P.2d 640, 642 (Alaska 1979); Groh v. Ramirez, 540 U.S. 551, 559 (2004)).

14

Gibson, 267 P.3d at 659.

15

Id. (citing Gallmeyer v. State, 267 P.3d 645, 842 (Alaska App. 1982)).

16

Id. at 658 (quoting Stevens v. State, 443 P.2d 600, 602 (Alaska 1968)).

17

Id. (quoting Stevens, 443 P.2d at 605 (Rabinowitz, J., concurring)).

18

Id. (quoting 3 Wayne R. LaFave, Search and Seizure § 6.6(a), at 452-53 (4th ed. 2004) (footnote omitted)).

19

Id. (citing Gallmeyer, 640 P.2d 837).

20

Id. at 650.

21

Id.

22

Id.

23

Id. at 658 (quoting 3 Wayne R. LaFave, Search and Seizure § 6.6(a), at 452-53 (4th ed. 2004)).

24

See id. at 660-61 (explaining that “to allow the police to fulfill their duties to the public,” the balancing of interests involved in applying the emergency aid doctrine must account for different factual settings, and so “where a perceived emergency's circumstances are far more undefined and the potential harm is more serious,” that should be taken into account in balancing against the extent to which police conduct results in a violation of privacy interests (citing Gallmeyer, 640 P.2d at 844)).

25

See Gallmeyer, 640 P.2d at 842 (noting “a high level of judicial scrutiny is focused on the actual intent of officers invoking the exception”).

26

Id. at 845.

27

See AS 11.61.200(a)(1) (providing a person commits third-degree misconduct involving weapons if the person “knowingly possesses a firearm capable of being concealed on one's person after having been convicted of a felony”); U.S. Const. amend. II (“A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”).

28

Ivyories v. State, 2026 WL 222447, at *3 (Alaska App. Jan. 28, 2026) (unpublished) (citing Farmer v. State, Dep't of Law, 235 P.3d 1012 (Alaska 2010)). We further note that we previously rejected a similar claim under the Alaska Constitution. See Wilson v. State, 207 P.3d 565, 566 (Alaska App. 2009) (rejecting Wilson's argument “that the statute prohibiting a felon from possessing a concealable firearm violates article I, section 19 of the Alaska Constitution because it does not differentiate between violent and non-violent felons”).

29

Ivyories, 2026 WL 222447, at *1.

30

Id. at *2 (quoting Farmer, 235 P.3d at 1016-17 (citing District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570, 625-28 (2008))).

31

Id. at *3 (citing Alaska Const. art. IV, § 2 (establishing the supreme court as the highest court of the State)). As we also reasoned in Ivyories, given our resolution of this case, we have no need to determine whether Clayton, who was convicted of felony driving under the influence, is in fact a “non-violent” felon or how such term should be defined. Id. at *3 n.17.

End of Document