State of Maine v. Abdulrahman

CourtSuperior Court of Maine
DecidedApril 29, 2015
DocketCUMcr-14-5642
StatusUnpublished

This text of State of Maine v. Abdulrahman (State of Maine v. Abdulrahman) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Superior Court of Maine primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
State of Maine v. Abdulrahman, (Me. Super. Ct. 2015).

Opinion

STATE OF MAINE C~;;;i ~:,~~FlED CRIMINAL DOrT R CUMBERLAND, ss. CLE;?:<•s nFF! No. CR-14-5642 · •II, v CE

STATE OF MAINE 2015 FirR 30 AFI B 59

V. ORDER

MOHAMED ABDULRAHMAN,

Defendant

Before the court is defendant Mohamed Abdulrahman's motion to suppress certain

evidence obtained as a result of a pat down search conducted on August 26, 2014. A hearing on

that motion was held on April 17, 2015.

Abdulrahman' s motion to suppress was originally also directed at certain statements

made on August 26. At the April 17 hearing counsel for Abdulrahman withdrew his motion with

respect to the statements he made to police officers on the street and with respect to statements

he made to Officer Beal in the downstairs interview room at the police station.

Abdulrahman is also seeking to suppress statements he made during a subsequent

interview with Detective Dunham at the police station. As to that interview, counsel for

Abdulrahman withdrew his challenge as to voluntariness and counsel for the State agreed that the

Dunham interview would not be used in the State's direct case.

With respect to the evidence obtained after the pat-down search, the court finds as

follows:

Around 12:30am on August 26, four uniformed Portland police officers (Officers Turner,

Beal, Morrison, and Hodgdon) were in an unmarked car when they received a radio transmission

reporting a sexual assault in the area of Deering Oaks Park. The alleged assailant was described as an African American male wearing a sports ball cap, shorts, blue sneakers, and a red and blue

striped shirt.

They responded to the scene and saw a man matching the description of the alleged

assailant at the comer of Park Avenue and High Street at the southeast comer of Deering Oaks

Park. The officers approached the man, who was with a group of people. Officers Beal,

Hodgdon, and Turner spoke to the man, who identified himself as Mohammed Abdulrahman. 1

Officer Morrison spoke to other persons in the group. The officers asked Abdulrahman for his

identification, but he said that he had no identification with him.

Shortly afterward Sergeant Farris arrived on the scene. The unmarked car carrying the

four officers did not have a dashboard camera, but Sergeant Farris's vehicle had a dashboard

camera which captured some of the interaction between the officers and Abdulrahman from the

time that Sergeant Farris arrived. Sergeant Farris also had a body microphone that provided a

simultaneous audio recording of voices in Sergeant's Farris's presence. 2

During the portion of the interaction with Abdulrahman that was captured on Sergeant

Farris's dashcam, from the time that Sergeant Farris arrived until the pat-down search that is the

subject of the instant motion, the officers who spoke to Abdulrahman were Officer Beal and

Sergeant Farris. Officer Turner stayed in the background until he stepped forward to conduct the

pat-down search. If Officer Hodgdon remained present while the other officers spoke with

1 At the hearing counsel for Abdulrahman conceded that the officers had a reasonable articulable suspicion to approach and question Abdulrahman because he appeared to match the description that had been given of the suspect. 2 A dashcam video from the Farris vehicle was admitted into evidence at the April 17 hearing as Defendant's Exhibit 1. Because the video submitted on April 17 turned out to be the wrong video, counsel for defendant agreed that counsel for the State would substitute the correct video. That has been done and the substituted video has been admitted and marked as Court Exhibit IA.

2 Abdulrahman, Hodgdon stood farther back and can neither be seen nor heard on the dashcam

video.

During his interaction with the officers in the street, Abdulrahman was nervous but

cooperative. He was not handcuffed or restrained and moved around while the officers

questioned him as to whether he had had any interaction with the alleged victim. During his

discussion with the officers, Abdulrahman was talkative, discussing among other things the

medications he was on, his medical conditions, and the fact that he was homeless. He denied

having any involvement with the alleged victim of the sexual assault.

The officers did not immediately seek to pat Abdulrahman down. Originally,

Abdulrahman kept his hands in view. As the questioning proceeded, however, Abdulrahman

intermittently placed his hands behind his back where the officers could not see them. Officer

Samuel Turner was aware that one of the persons who had been in the group with Abdulrahman

was known to carry weapons. Turner decided to pat Abdulrahman down for weapons. This

occurred approximately seven minutes after Sergeant Farris arrived on the scene and

approximately 10 minutes after the officers first approached Abdulrahman on the street.

Until shortly before the pat-down search, Sergeant Farris's microphone captured most of

the interaction between Abdulrahman and the officers who spoke to Abdulrahman. Shortly

before Turner undertook to pat Abdulrahman down, however, Sergeant Farris moved away to

make a call on his cell phone. As a result, there is no audio recording of the events that occurred

during the pat down search except for an initial question by Turner asking Abdulrahman whether

he had any weapons. The pat down search appears on the video, and the court's findings are

based on the video and on Officer Turner's testimony.

3 Turner told Abdulrahman that he was not under arrest - which Abdulrahman had

previously also been told by Officer Beal- but that Turner was going to undertake a pat down

search for weapons. Without any hesitation Abdulrahman put his hands behind his head, and

Turner then patted him down. In the pocket of Abdulrahman's shorts Turner felt an object that

felt like an ID card. Suspicious because Abdulrahman had previously stated that he was not

carrying any identification, Turner asked Abdulrahman if it was okay to remove the object, and

Abdulrahman said yes. Turner then removed what turned out to be an EBT card and several

other cards that bore the name of Caitlyn Croston. Caitlyn Croston is the alleged victim of the

sexual assault with which Abdulrahman is charged. Although Turner did not know her name at

that time, he had been informed that the alleged victim's purse had been stolen, so he retained

the cards.

The legitimacy of an investigatory detention requires a two step analysis - first, whether

an investigatory stop was justified at its inception and second, whether the subsequent action

taken was reasonably related in scope to the circumstances which justified the stop. State v.

Storey, 1998 ME 161 ~ 12, 713 A.2d 331, citing Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 20 (1968). Given that

there is no dispute that the officers had a reasonable articulable suspicion sufficient to justify the

initial stop of Abdulrahman, this case involves the second step in the analysis. In this connection

the specific issues before the court are whether the detention lasted longer than necessary before

the pat-down search was conducted, the validity of the pat-down search itself, and whether there

was a valid basis for the removal of the cards from Abdulrahman's pocket. The State has the

burden of proof by a preponderance of the evidence on these issues.

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Related

Terry v. Ohio
392 U.S. 1 (Supreme Court, 1968)
Schneckloth v. Bustamonte
412 U.S. 218 (Supreme Court, 1973)
United States v. Sharpe
470 U.S. 675 (Supreme Court, 1985)
State v. Kirby
2005 ME 92 (Supreme Judicial Court of Maine, 2005)
State v. Storey
1998 ME 161 (Supreme Judicial Court of Maine, 1998)
State v. Donatelli
2010 ME 43 (Supreme Judicial Court of Maine, 2010)
State v. Ullring
1999 ME 183 (Supreme Judicial Court of Maine, 1999)

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State of Maine v. Abdulrahman, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-of-maine-v-abdulrahman-mesuperct-2015.