State v. Merritt

805 S.W.2d 337, 1991 Mo. App. LEXIS 351, 1991 WL 31276
CourtMissouri Court of Appeals
DecidedMarch 12, 1991
Docket57367, 58896
StatusPublished
Cited by15 cases

This text of 805 S.W.2d 337 (State v. Merritt) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Missouri Court of Appeals primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
State v. Merritt, 805 S.W.2d 337, 1991 Mo. App. LEXIS 351, 1991 WL 31276 (Mo. Ct. App. 1991).

Opinion

GARY M. GAERTNER, Presiding Judge.

Paul Stanley Merritt, appellant, appeals from his jury conviction of felony resisting arrest. RSMo § 575.150 (1986). Since the appellant was found to be a prior and persistent offender, the court assessed his punishment at ten years imprisonment. Appellant also appeals from the denial of his Rule 29.15 motion, without an evidentia-ry hearing. We affirm in all respects.

On December 6, 1988, a deputy sheriff of Madison County was conducting an undercover surveillance of a suspected drug house. The deputy, who was wearing street clothes and was driving his personal car, began his surveillance around 3:00 p.m. At approximately 4:00 p.m., the deputy observed appellant drive up and pull into the driveway of the home. Appellant went into the home and, five minutes later, exited and drove his 1972 pickup truck to Bud’s Booze to Go, a local liquor store. The deputy sheriff followed appellant to the liquor store and parked across the street from appellant, with a clear view of appellant who was seated in his truck.

The deputy sheriff then called the sheriff to inform him that he was in the process of trying to make a drug arrest of the appellant. The deputy sheriff testified that this particular liquor store was known to him to be the site of previous drug trafficking.

Approximately two hours after appellant arrived at the liquor store, appellant flashed his headlights towards a friend of his, Keith Stacy, 1 who pulled his car near appellant’s truck. Stacy walked up to appellant’s driver’s side window and began conversing with appellant.

The deputy sheriff, assuming that a drug transaction was transpiring, called the sheriff’s office to inform them that “the deal was going down.” The deputy sheriff then quickly approached both men, identified himself as a deputy sheriff by voice and by displaying his badge in his left hand (he carried a walkie talkie in his right hand) and asked both men for identification. 2 Stacy began to comply with this request but the appellant refused, stating that he did not know who the officer was. The *339 deputy sheriff observed a bag of what appeared to be marijuana sitting in appellant’s lap and the deputy watched as appellant began throwing things onto the floorboard of his truck.

Appellant then started up his truck and the deputy sheriff again requested that appellant identify himself. Appellant, instead, drove away. As appellant began to leave, the deputy sheriff told appellant that he was under arrest. This announcement did not slow the appellant. Instead, appellant’s truck proceeded to strike the deputy sheriff with its outside mirror, hitting him in his right rib cage. The deputy then held on to the door of the truck and was dragged some sixty feet until appellant began to enter a highway. The deputy sheriff’s right ear was also cut. Appellant was arrested some fifteen to twenty minutes later at a friend’s trailer but no marijuana was found.

Appellant was charged by information with one count of felony resisting arrest and was convicted of the same by a jury on August 9, 1989. On appeal, appellant claims that there was insufficient evidence to sustain his conviction since it was not established that the deputy sheriff was arresting appellant for a felony or that the appellant resisted arrest by means other than flight. Appellant also argues that there was no evidence with which to conclude that appellant knew that the deputy was an officer of the law.

The statute pertaining to resisting or interfering with arrest, RSMo § 575.150, provides:

1. A person commits the crime of resisting or interfering with arrest if, knowing that a law enforcement officer is making an arrest, for the purpose of preventing the officer from effecting the arrest, he:
(1) Resists the arrest of himself by using or threatening the use of violence or physical force or by fleeing from such officer; ...
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(3) It is no defense to a prosecution under subsection 1 of this section that the law enforcement officer was acting unlawfully in making the arrest. However, nothing in this section shall be construed to bar civil suits for unlawful arrest.
(4) Resisting, by means other than flight, or interfering with an arrest for a felony is a class D felony; otherwise, resisting or interfering with arrest is a class A misdemeanor.

Our Supreme Court has held that this statute makes resisting arrest a felony offense only if the underlying offense is a felony and the resistance is accomplished by a means other than flight. State v. Furne, 642 S.W.2d 614, 616 (Mo. banc 1982). Appellant seizes upon Fume and argues that, because the deputy sheriff did not observe an actual transaction taking place but only observed appellant with marijuana in his truck, the underlying offense for which the deputy sought to arrest appellant was merely a misdemeanor. However, while the evidence does suggest that a drug transaction may not have taken place, the relevant inquiry to determine whether appellant’s resistance constituted a felony is not whether the appellant is guilty of the underlying charge.

A person does not enjoy the right to resist any arrest, even an unlawful one, by a known police officer. State v. Thomas, 625 S.W.2d 115, 121 (Mo.1981); State v. Winkelmann, 776 S.W.2d 44, 45 (Mo.App., E.D.1989); RSMo § 575.150(3). Hence, it is no defense to the charge of resisting arrest that the officer was without probable cause to make the arrest, was acting in furtherance of a law found to be unconstitutional or that there existed no valid basis with which to arrest the purported violator. Thomas, 625 S.W.2d at 121; Winkelmann, 776 S.W.2d at 45. What is required is that the arresting officer, at the least, contemplate making an arrest and, in our case, that the deputy contemplate making a felony arrest. State v. Wanner, 751 S.W.2d 789, 791 (Mo.App., E.D.1988).

In Wanner, a police officer heard a motorcycle accelerate and, when he was able to trace the source of the noise to defendant’s motorcycle, he attempted to pull de *340 fendant over. The defendant stopped his bike on the side of the road but headed off again after the officer exited his police car. Id. at 790. Eventually, defendant led a high speed chase which culminated in defendant’s being shot once by an officer who was attempting to stop him. Id.

This court reversed the defendant’s conviction of resisting arrest, however, since it was not established that the officer intended to arrest defendant when he pulled him over. Id. at 791. Indeed, the officer testified that he only intended to “warn” the defendant about his driving, he did not intend to arrest him.

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Bluebook (online)
805 S.W.2d 337, 1991 Mo. App. LEXIS 351, 1991 WL 31276, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-v-merritt-moctapp-1991.