State of Maine v. Gamache

Maine Superior

State of Maine v. Gamache

DecidedJuly 18, 2011

DocketKENcr-11-240

StatusUnpublished

This text of State of Maine v. Gamache (State of Maine v. Gamache) 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. Gamache, (Me. Super. Ct. 2011).

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Opinion

STATE OF MAINE SUPERIOR COURT KENNEBEC, ss. CRIMINAL ACTION DOCKET NO: CR-1 !-1:40.: /._ ReM- J<£tl -7;t'3;2o;; STATE OF MAINE

V. ORDER DENYING MOTION TO SUPPRESS JENNIFER GAMACHE, Defendant

Defendant filed a motion to suppress contending that the officer involved lacked

articulable suspicion to stop the defendant's vehicle, and further that the officer's

observations of defendant were made after the officer had illegally trespassed on the

private property of the defendant without any warrant or exigent circumstances. A

hearing on the defendant's motion to suppress was held before the court on June 8, 2011.

At the hearing, the officer involved, Dana Wesling, of the Monmouth Police Department,

provided testimony for the court's consideration.

Based upon the testimony and evidence presented at the hearing, the court finds

the following:

On January 25, 2011, at approximately 10:20 p.m., Officer Wesling received a

message through the Winthrop dispatch conveying a request from the Lewiston Police

Department asking officers to be on the look out for a Jennifer Gamache who was leaving

the Lewiston area operating a red Saturn and further providing the license plate number.

Officer Wesling was not aware of the original source of the information provided to the

Lewiston Police Department. Officer Wesling testified that he was familiar with Jennifer

Gamache and that he knew where she lived on 144 Annabessacook Road, having been

there himself on more than one occasion. After receiving the report from dispatch,

Officer Wesling proceeded to the 144 Annabessacook Road location. Upon approaching 144 Annabessacook Road, Officer Wesling observed a vehicle

approaching toward him from the other direction with one missing headlight. The

vehicle turned into the driveway at 144 Annabessacook Road. Officer Wesling followed

that vehicle to make a stop. At the time, Officer Wesling did not know if the vehicle was

the red Saturn described in the dispatch report.

The roadway leading from the public road at 144 Annabessacook Road was a

long private way, approximately 500 yards, leading to two separate driveways-one to

the home of the defendant, Jennifer Gamache, and the other to the home ofthe

defendant's father. Although the private roadway has a gate approximately 150 feet from

the public roadway, the gate was not secured on the evening of January 25,2011. Officer

Wesling followed the vehicle with the non-functioning headlight into the private

roadway. 1

After Officer Wesling approached the vehicle in front of him on the private way,

he determined that it was not the red Saturn vehicle, which was the subject of the earlier

dispatch. Officer Wesling testified that at about the same time he determined the vehicle

in front of him was not the red Saturn vehicle, he observed another vehicle approaching

him, while still on the private way. Officer We sling signaled, with a hand signal, for the

approaching vehicle to stop. When the approaching vehicle was approximately fifteen

feet from Officer Westing's vehicle, he determined that the operator was the defendant

and the vehicle was the red Saturn, which was the subject of the earlier dispatch report.

1 At various points along the private roadway there were no trespassing signs posted which Officer Wesling testified he had not observed on the night in question, or on earlier occasions when he had been at the same location. At the point Officer Wesling stopped the defendant's vehicle, the vehicle was on

the curved portion of the private way, but not in the specific driveway that led to the

defendant's trailer home. 2

ANALYSIS

The court concludes that the defendant's motion to suppress raises two issues for

the court's determination. First, whether there was an articulable suspicion to stop the

defendant's vehicle and two, whether the stop of the vehicle on the specific location on

the private way owned by defendant violated the Fourth Amendment.

An investigatory stop is justified if the officer at the time of the stop has "an

articulable suspicion that criminal conduct has taken place, is occurring, or imminently

will occur, and the officer's assessment of the existence of specific and articulable facts

sufficient to warrant the stop is objectively reasonable in the totality of the

circumstances." State v. Sampson, 669 A.2d. 1326, 1328 (ME 1996). In the Sampson

case, similar to the case before the court, an anonymous tip was forwarded to the police

officer involved, through dispatch, providing specific information regarding the

description of the defendant's vehicle and the license plate number. In addition, in the

pending case, the name of the individual driver, and information regarding a birthday

celebration, was also forwarded. Again, as in Sampson, the officer in the pending matter

corroborated the details of the information conveyed in the dispatch when the officer

2 The court does not recall whether there was specific testimony as to the distance from the point of the defendant's vehicle stop to the point of her trailer, but the officer's testimony was that the distance of the trailer from the public road was 400 or 500 yards, and the distance where he observed the defendant's vehicle on the private way was 300 to 400 yards from the public roadway. stopped the defendant's vehicle within a relatively short period of time after receiving the

dispatch.

This court concludes that the stop of the defendant's vehicle under the

circumstances was supported by more than speculation or an unsubstantiated hunch given

the information conveyed to him through the specific dispatch.

Defendant further contends that the location of the stop on the defendant's private

way constituted a stop within the curtilage of her home, and thus violated the Fourth

Amendment of the Constitution. The court in State v. Boyington, 714 A.2d. 141 (ME

1998) noted that the Fourth Amendment protection does not depend upon a property right

in the place at issue, but whether the person has a legitimate expectation of privacy in the

invaded place. In determining the reach of the curtilage of ones home, the court

identified four factors for consideration:

1) Proximity of area claimed to be curtilage to the home;

2) Whether area claimed to be curtilage is included within an enclosure surrounding the home;

3) The nature of the use as to which the area is put; and

4) Steps taken by the resident to protect the area from observation by people passing by. !d. at 143.

The Boyington court further noted that none of the individual factors is

dispositive, but rather should assist in the analysis of determining "whether the area in

question is so intimately tied to the home itself that it should be placed under the home's

umbrella of Fourth Amendment protection." !d. at 143

The State bears the burden of proving that the area of the stop at issue was outside

the curtilage of the defendant's home. Although it is not disputed that the stop did occur within the private way owned by the defendant, the court is not persuaded, by applying

the four factors identified in Boyington, that the specific location of the stop was within

the curtilage of the defendant's home. The evidence suggests that the point of the stop

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