State ex rel. Macy v. Thirty Thousand Seven Hundred Eighty One Dollars & No/100 ($30,781.00)

1993 OK CIV APP 170, 865 P.2d 1262, 65 O.B.A.J. 160, 1993 Okla. Civ. App. LEXIS 156, 1993 WL 527415
CourtCourt of Civil Appeals of Oklahoma
DecidedNovember 2, 1993
DocketNo. 79975
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 1993 OK CIV APP 170 (State ex rel. Macy v. Thirty Thousand Seven Hundred Eighty One Dollars & No/100 ($30,781.00)) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Civil Appeals of Oklahoma primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
State ex rel. Macy v. Thirty Thousand Seven Hundred Eighty One Dollars & No/100 ($30,781.00), 1993 OK CIV APP 170, 865 P.2d 1262, 65 O.B.A.J. 160, 1993 Okla. Civ. App. LEXIS 156, 1993 WL 527415 (Okla. Ct. App. 1993).

Opinions

memorandum; opinion

ADAMS, Judge:

On September 19, 1989, the State filed a forfeiture action against $30,781.00 seized by a highway patrol trooper on August 24,1989. Appellants Jimmy Bolling and Richard Hughes claimed the money, and now appeal the trial court’s order granting the State’s summary adjudication request and ordering forfeiture. Appellants claim the evidence is insufficient to support the trial court’s order.1

When it filed its Motion for Summary Judgment, the State attached the affidavit of an Oklahoma Highway Patrol Trooper and two agents for the Oklahoma Bureau of Narcotics (OBN). The State also attached an affidavit of an investigator of the Meigs County, Ohio prosecutor’s office and a certified copy of a “Judgment in a Criminal Case” against Appellant Hughes. Although Appellants responded to the State’s motion, they did not attach any affidavits or other supporting documents to establish their claim that a material fact was still at issue.

The State contends that such documentation was required by Rule 13, Rules for District Courts of Oklahoma, 12 O.S.1991, Ch. 2, App. 1, and that Appellants’ failure to do so required the trial court to grant the motion. We disagree. Appellants’ inadequate response results only in an admission for purposes of summary adjudication of “[a]ll material facts set forth in the statement of the movant which are supported by admissible evidence.” Spirgis v. Circle K Stores, Inc., 743 P.2d 682 (Okla.App.1987).

Under such circumstances, the trial court, and this Court on appeal, has the duty [1264]*1264to insure that the motion is meritorious. Therefore, like the trial court, we must examine the evidentiary materials supporting the motion and if the movant has not addressed all of the material facts or if one or more such facts is not supported by admissible evidence, we must determine that judgment for the movant was not proper. Spirgis, 743 P.2d at 685.

In order for summary adjudication to be appropriate, not only must there be no dispute as to material facts, but all reasonable inferences and conclusions to be drawn from those facts must be in the movant’s favor and show that the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. Runyon v. Reid, 510 P.2d 943 (Okla.1973). The eviden-tiary materials must be viewed in the light most favorable to the party opposing summary adjudication. Hargrave v. Canadian Valley Elec. Co-op., 792 P.2d 50 (Okla.1990). Moreover, any ruling on a motion for summary adjudication must be made on the record the parties have actually made and not upon one which is theoretically possible. Daugherty v. Farmers Co-op. Ass’n, 689 P.2d 947 (Okla.1984).

According to the State’s evidentiary materials, on August 24, 1989, a trooper for the Oklahoma Highway Patrol stopped a car with Ohio license plates for making an illegal lane change. He advised the driver of the car, Jeffrey Whittington, that he had committed a traffic violation and later issued him a warning. There were two other passengers in the ear, later identified as Robin Slater and Rick Lunsford. While running a check on the car, the trooper discovered it was owned by Jim E. Bolling of Nitro, West Virginia. When asked why he was driving Bolling’s car, Whittington explained that they were friends and he had Bolling’s permission to use it. Upon searching the car with Whit-tington’s consent, the trooper found $14,-000.00 in a “zip bag” in the front seat and $16,781.00 in a black carry on bag in the car trunk, for a total of $30,781.00. The trooper requested further assistance based on his experience and training that drug dealers carry large amounts of cash.

The trooper transported the three men to OBN headquarters and had the car towed to the same location in order to allow a “drug detector dog” to determine whether narcotics were present or had been present in the car or with the money. The dog, Bogey, made a positive alert “on a black carry on bag and along the edge of the front seat along the floor of the vehicle by biting and scratching.” Thereafter, all three men executed affidavits indicating their consent to answer questions.

All three stated they were returning from California where they had gone to purchase a truck, but each gave different versions of the facts concerning the attempted truck purchase. Slater stated the purpose of the trip was to buy a truck for his uncle, Jimmy Bolling, and that Whittington had inspected a white 1983 Peterbilt truck. Whittington stated he could not remember the year or make of the truck, but that Slater had inspected it. Lunsford stated only that the truck was a blue 1980 Peterbilt. All three men refused to be re-interviewed. No narcotics were found in the car, and the three men were released. However, the money was seized, and the State filed forfeiture proceedings.

The affidavits of the two OBN agents detailed the two positive alerts made by Bogey and his certification and reliability as a drug detector dog. The investigator’s affidavit described a voluntary interview with Lunsford on April 3,1992, during which Lunsford stated that: 1) the purpose of a trip that he made with Slater and Whittington was to buy marijuana for Appellants and that Appellants had entrusted them with approximately $31,-000.00 for that purpose; and 2) they tried to make an arrangement to purchase the marijuana but the deal fell through. According to the certified copy of the “Judgment in a Criminal Case,” Appellant Hughes was found guilty in an Ohio federal court of one count of Conspiracy to Distribute Marijuana, and three counts of Possession with Intent to Distribute Marijuana, all offenses having occurred on June 14, 1990.

The State based its forfeiture claim on 63 O.S.1991 § 2-503(A)(6) and § 2-506(G), and [1265]*1265contended the evidentiary materials established without dispute that the money was intended to be used to purchase marijuana. According to those sections, the material fact that State must prove at the forfeiture hearing is that “the money was used, or was intended to be used, to facilitate any violation of the Uniform Controlled Dangerous Substances Act by a preponderance of the evidence.”

We need look no further than the affidavit of one of the OBN agents to conclude that summary adjudication was not appropriate. The affidavit states, in relevant part, that “Robin Slater stated that the purpose of the trip was to buy a truck for his uncle....” This statement clearly contradicts State’s position that the money was intended to be used to purchase drugs. The State’s eviden-tiary materials did not establish the absence of any controversy as to a material fact, and summary adjudication was inappropriate.

Unlike the dissent, however, we do not conclude the trial court was required to grant summary adjudication in favor of Appellants. The dissent’s position rests on the conclusion that the State was required to show probable cause for the institution of the forfeiture. The federal authority upon which the dissent relies is inapplicable to a proceeding under Oklahoma’s forfeiture laws.

The dissent correctly notes that Oklahoma law authorizes seizure of forfeitable material only upon probable cause. However, as recognized in U.S. v. $191,910.00 in U.S. Currency, 788 F.Supp.

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Bluebook (online)
1993 OK CIV APP 170, 865 P.2d 1262, 65 O.B.A.J. 160, 1993 Okla. Civ. App. LEXIS 156, 1993 WL 527415, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-ex-rel-macy-v-thirty-thousand-seven-hundred-eighty-one-dollars-oklacivapp-1993.