Sarah Monique Eanes v. Commonwealth of Virginia

• Court: Court of Appeals of Virginia
• Decided: February 18, 2025
• Docket: 0233243
• Status: Unpublished

Opinion

COURT OF APPEALS OF VIRGINIA UNPUBLISHED

Present: Judges AtLee, Chaney and Lorish Argued at Lexington, Virginia

SARAH MONIQUE EANES MEMORANDUM OPINION* BY v. Record No. 0233-24-3 JUDGE LISA M. LORISH FEBRUARY 18, 2025 COMMONWEALTH OF VIRGINIA

FROM THE CIRCUIT COURT OF THE CITY OF MARTINSVILLE G. Carter Greer, Judge

Elena Kagan, Assistant Public Defender (Catherine French Zagurskie, Chief Appellate Counsel; Virginia Indigent Defense Commission, on briefs), for appellant.

Susan Hallie Hovey-Murray, Assistant Attorney General (Jason S. Miyares, Attorney General, on brief), for appellee.

Sarah Monique Eanes argues that the trial court erred by not suppressing evidence found

after a drug dog alerted on her car. The question on appeal is whether officers had reasonable

suspicion to extend the stop and conduct the canine sniff. Because we find that there was

reasonable suspicion, we affirm her convictions for two counts of possessing a Schedule II

controlled substance under Code § 18.2-250.

BACKGROUND

When a trial court denies a motion to suppress, we review the ruling “consider[ing] the

facts in the light most favorable to the Commonwealth, the prevailing party at trial.” Aponte v.

Commonwealth, 68 Va. App. 146, 156 (2017) (quoting Hairston v. Commonwealth, 67 Va. App.

552, 560 (2017)). “It is the appellant’s burden to show that when viewing the evidence in such a

* This opinion is not designated for publication. See Code § 17.1-413(A). manner, the trial court committed reversible error.” Id. (quoting Hairston, 67 Va. App. at 560).

“While we are bound to review de novo the ultimate questions of reasonable suspicion and

probable cause, we ‘review findings of historical fact only for clear error and . . . give due weight

to inferences drawn from those facts by resident judges and local law enforcement officers.’”

Long v. Commonwealth, 72 Va. App. 700, 712 (2021) (alteration in original) (footnote omitted)

(quoting Ornelas v. United States, 517 U.S. 690, 699 (1996)).

Before trial, Eanes moved to suppress evidence obtained during a traffic stop of her car.

At the hearing on Eanes’s motion, Officer Logan Bowman testified that police officers had been

surveilling a Martinsville home for drug activity for at least three days. During their

surveillance, police saw known drug users coming and going from the house and had also seized

methamphetamine from a vehicle leaving the residence.

While on surveillance duty, Officer Bowman saw a man, later identified as Jonathan

Hunt, leave the home around midnight. Hunt appeared to be intoxicated as he walked slowly to

a blue Volvo. He initially got into the driver’s seat, but later moved to the front passenger seat.

Moments later, a woman, later identified as Eanes, left the same house and got into the driver’s

seat of the car. The car pulled away a few seconds later. Officer Bowman told Officer Charles

Griffith, a canine handler, that the car had just left.

Officer Griffith followed the Volvo and pulled it over after seeing it cross the center line

twice while traveling 43 miles per hour in a 35-mile-per-hour zone. He requested Eanes’s

driver’s license, proof of insurance, and registration, and told her he had stopped her for speeding

and crossing the center line twice.1 Eanes produced her license but said that she did not have

insurance and that the title was at her house. Eanes first said that the vehicle was registered in

her name. But then she explained that it was not registered to her because, while her mother had

1 Officer Griffith’s body camera footage was played for the trial court. -2- signed the title of the vehicle over to her, she had not yet gone to the DMV to register the

vehicle, as she was “going through a lot” following a death in her family. After obtaining

Eanes’s driver’s license, Officer Griffith returned to the front of his patrol vehicle and asked

dispatch to run the names of Eanes and Hunt. Officer Griffith testified that he personally

recognized them and already knew that both had a history of drug use and drug-related

convictions.

Officer Bowman arrived about a minute later, and Officer Griffith asked him to remove

Eanes and Hunt from the car. Officer Bowman asked, “What have you got on them?” Officer

Griffith responded, “That’s Jonathan Hunt coming from a known drug house with a lot of

activity. History of distribution. Lot of activity. Cars coming out of there with drugs in ’em. I

have enough for a search warrant. I think I have enough reasonable suspicion to extend the

stop.” At the suppression hearing, Officer Griffith admitted that he never began writing a

speeding ticket.

As Officer Bowman removed Eanes and Hunt from the vehicle, Officer Griffith retrieved

his police dog from his patrol vehicle. Officer Griffith testified that the canine was trained to

detect cocaine, methamphetamine, and heroin. When Officer Griffith led the canine around the

car, about four and a half minutes after the car was first pulled over, it alerted to the passenger

side window area of the Volvo. The officers then placed Eanes and Hunt in patrol vehicles and

searched the Volvo. That search ultimately uncovered a firearm under the front passenger seat

and methamphetamine with cocaine residue in Eanes’s purse.

The trial court denied Eanes’s motion to suppress. The trial court noted that the officers

had been conducting surveillance on a suspected drug house for three days, observed known

drug users entering and leaving, and recovered methamphetamine from a vehicle departing the

house. The court also noted that Hunt appeared unsteady and intoxicated when he exited the

-3- house after midnight, that Eanes was going eight miles per hour over the speed limit and crossed

the center line twice, and that Officer Griffith recognized Eanes and Hunt and knew that they had

previous drug convictions. Finally, after watching the body camera footage, the court found that

Eanes appeared “agitated” while talking with Officer Griffith and that her explanation for why

the vehicle was not registered in her name “made no sense.” Based on these circumstances, the

court concluded that the officers had reasonable suspicion to prolong that stop and investigate

whether Eanes had used drugs and was driving under the influence. The court found that after

the trained police dog alerted on the Volvo, the officers had probable cause to search it and

lawfully seized the drugs found in the purse.

Eanes appeals this decision.

ANALYSIS

The Fourth Amendment protects “[t]he right of the people to be secure in their persons,

houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures.” U.S. Const. amend. IV.

“The Fourth Amendment prohibits only unreasonable searches and seizures.” Thompson v.

Commonwealth, 54 Va. App. 1, 7 (2009). “Reasonableness is judged from the perspective of a

reasonable officer on the scene allowing for the need of split-second decisions and without

regard to the officer’s intent or motivation.” Id. (quoting Scott v. Commonwealth, 20 Va. App.

725, 727 (1995)).

“A seizure for a traffic violation justifies a police investigation of that violation.” Rodriguez

v. United States, 575 U.S. 348, 354 (2015). The “tolerable duration of police inquiries in the

traffic-stop context is determined by the seizure’s ‘mission’—to address the traffic violation that

warranted the stop and attend to related safety concerns.” Id. (citation omitted) (quoting Illinois v.

Caballes, 543 U.S. 405, 407 (2005)). “[A] police stop exceeding the time needed to handle the

matter for which the stop was made violates the Constitution’s shield against unreasonable

-4- seizures.” Id. at 350. “A seizure justified only by a police-observed traffic violation, therefore,

‘become[s] unlawful if it is prolonged beyond the time reasonably required to complete th[e]

mission’ of issuing a ticket for the violation.” Id. at 350-51 (alterations in original) (quoting

Caballes, 543 U.S. at 407).

Following Rodriguez, a police officer may not extend a stop to conduct a canine sniff

“absent the reasonable suspicion ordinarily demanded to justify detaining an individual.” Id. at 355.

But “[i]f an officer develops independent reasonable suspicion or probable cause that an occupant

has committed an additional traffic offense or crime, the officer may extend the stop for a

reasonable amount of time in order to confirm or dispel that new suspicion.” Williams v.

Commonwealth, 71 Va. App. 462, 482 (2020); see also Matthews v. Commonwealth, 65 Va. App.

334, 345 (2015) (explaining that the seizure of the appellant and search of his vehicle was

“improper, unless [the officer]’s unrelated questions and conduct can be supported by independent

reasonable suspicion or probable cause”).

Eanes does not challenge that Officer Griffith lawfully stopped her for traffic violations.

Instead, she claims that the officers unconstitutionally prolonged the traffic stop beyond its proper

scope when they removed her and Hunt from the vehicle and conducted an open-air dog sniff of her

vehicle. While the dog sniff took place only minutes after the traffic stop started, and officers still

had Eanes’s driver’s license, the Commonwealth has not argued that the canine alert occurred

before the original mission of the traffic stop had concluded. We will assume, then, that Eanes’s

detention for speeding and crossing the center line would have ended before the canine sniff took

place, and thus that some new reasonable suspicion was required to justify the additional detention.

Reasonable suspicion must be “more than an unparticularized suspicion or ‘hunch.’” Sidney

v. Commonwealth, 280 Va. 517, 523 (2010) (quoting Illinois v. Wardlow, 528 U.S. 119, 124

(2000)). “Nevertheless, it ‘requires only “some minimal level of objective justification.”’”

-5- Hairston, 67 Va. App. at 561 (quoting Branham v. Commonwealth, 283 Va. 273, 280 (2012)). “In

making reasonable-suspicion determinations,” an appellate court considers “the ‘totality of the

circumstances’ . . . to [assess] whether the detaining officer ha[d] a ‘particularized and objective

basis’ for suspecting legal wrongdoing.” Mason v. Commonwealth, 291 Va. 362, 368 (2016)

(quoting United States v. Arvizu, 534 U.S. 266, 273 (2002)). In addition, we review those

circumstances through the lens “of a reasonable police officer with the knowledge, training, and

experience of the investigating officer.” Matthews, 65 Va. App. at 346.

Applying these standards, and in consideration of all the circumstances then present, we

find that the trial court did not err in concluding that the officers had a reasonable articulable

suspicion that Eanes was under the influence of, or in possession of, illegal drugs to justify the

extension of the stop to conduct the dog sniff. Viewed in the light most favorable to the

Commonwealth, the record establishes that police had been surveilling a home for three days on

suspicion of drug activity. During that time, known drug users had been seen coming and going

from the residence, and police had seized methamphetamine from a vehicle departing the

residence.2 Around midnight, Officer Bowman observed Hunt leave the suspected drug house.

Hunt appeared unsteady and intoxicated. Moments later, Eanes left the house and drove away

with Hunt in the passenger seat. After observing Eanes commit traffic violations, Officer

Griffith stopped her. Officer Griffith recognized both Eanes and Hunt and knew that they had

2 The mere fact that Eanes and Hunt were associated with a known drug house, if it stood on its own, would likely be insufficient to establish reasonable suspicion. See McCain v. Commonwealth, 275 Va. 546, 553 (2008) (finding that a suspect’s brief visit to a house where a past controlled drug buy was made did not create reasonable suspicion of criminal activity). But where the house in McCain was associated with a single controlled purchase months earlier, here officers were actively surveilling the house in question for three days and observed current drug activity. The fact that Eanes and Hunt came from this particular house is certainly part of the “totality of the circumstances,” that officers could consider as part of the circumstances giving rise to reasonable suspicion. Mason, 291 Va. at 368 (quoting Arvizu, 534 U.S. at 273). -6- drug-related convictions.3 The trial court, after reviewing Officer Griffith’s body camera

footage, found that Eanes was “agitated” as she spoke with Officer Griffith and that her

explanation about the vehicle’s registration “made no sense.”

At that point, the officers had reasonable suspicion to briefly detain Eanes and Hunt to

dispel their suspicion that Eanes was under the influence of drugs or otherwise engaged in drug

activity. “We have repeatedly affirmed that ‘[i]n conducting a Terry stop, the police must

diligently pursue a means of investigation likely to confirm or dispel their suspicions quickly.’”

Turay v. Commonwealth, 79 Va. App. 286, 302 (2023) (en banc) (quoting Brown v.

Commonwealth, 33 Va. App. 296, 307 (2000)). Here, the officers had enough reasonable

suspicion to justify a short additional detention to allow a drug dog that was already on the scene

to conduct a sniff only four and a half minutes after the stop began. This brief extension of the

detention was an “intrusion of liberty” that was reasonably “calibrated against the grounds for

suspicion.” Id. After the dog alerted, the police then had probable cause to search the vehicle.

See Jones v. Commonwealth, 277 Va. 171, 180 (2009) (holding that “a positive alert from a

narcotics detection dog establishes probable cause to search a vehicle”). For this reason, the

police did not violate Eanes’s Fourth Amendment rights when they seized the drugs, and the trial

court did not err in denying the motion to suppress.

3 Knowledge of a suspect’s criminal convictions or past drug use, standing alone, is insufficient to establish reasonable suspicion of criminal activity. See, e.g., Commonwealth v. Smith, 281 Va. 582, 594 (2011) (“Nowhere in our opinion do we state that a police officer armed with knowledge of a suspect’s criminal record, even a record including firearms and narcotics, is justified in stopping an individual based solely upon that record.”); Matthews, 65 Va. App. at 346 (finding a suspect’s criminal history and appearance “consistent with a narcotics user” insufficient to establish reasonable suspicion); United States v. Foster, 634 F.3d 243, 246 (4th Cir. 2011) (“A prior criminal record ‘is not, standing alone, sufficient to create reasonable suspicion.’” (citation omitted)). However, Officer Griffith’s personal knowledge is a relevant part of the “totality of the circumstances” to be considered. Mason, 291 Va. at 368 (quoting Arvizu, 534 U.S. at 273). -7- CONCLUSION

For these reasons, the trial court’s judgment is affirmed.

Affirmed.

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