State v. Quarles

CourtNew Mexico Court of Appeals
DecidedJune 30, 2022
StatusUnpublished

This text of State v. Quarles (State v. Quarles) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering New Mexico 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. Quarles, (N.M. Ct. App. 2022).

Opinion

This decision of the New Mexico Court of Appeals was not selected for publication in the New Mexico Appellate Reports. Refer to Rule 12-405 NMRA for restrictions on the citation of unpublished decisions. Electronic decisions may contain computer- generated errors or other deviations from the official version filed by the Court of Appeals.

IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF THE STATE OF NEW MEXICO

No. A-1-CA-38270

STATE OF NEW MEXICO,

Plaintiff-Appellee,

v.

MORGAN EUGENE QUARLES,

Defendant-Appellant.

APPEAL FROM THE DISTRICT COURT OF BERNALILLO COUNTY Charles W. Brown, District Judge

Hector H. Balderas, Attorney General Maris Veidemanis, Assistant Attorney General Santa Fe, NM

for Appellee

Bennett J. Baur, Chief Public Defender Caitlin C.M. Smith, Assistant Appellate Defender Santa Fe, NM

for Appellant

MEMORANDUM OPINION

BACA, Judge.

{1} Following a jury trial, Morgan Eugene Quarles (Defendant) was found guilty of armed robbery, contrary to NMSA 1978, Section 30-16-2 (1973), conspiracy to commit armed robbery, contrary to NMSA 1978, Section 30-28-2 (1979), and resisting, evading, or obstructing an officer, contrary to NMSA 1978, Section 30-22-1(B) (1981). Defendant appeals these convictions. On appeal, Defendant argues (1) the district court abused its discretion by dismissing his motion to suppress as untimely filed pursuant to a local rule, (2) the Victim’s identification of Defendant during trial violated his due process rights under the New Mexico Constitution, (3) alternatively, the identification of Defendant should have been excluded under Rule 11-403 NMRA, and (4) the district court should have declared a mistrial. Unpersuaded, we affirm Defendant’s convictions.

BACKGROUND

{2} On February 3, 2016, Victim1 was walking on Colombia Drive near the University of New Mexico (UNM) when someone pulled on his shoulder and robbed him at gunpoint. The robber took Victim’s cell phone and blue Nike backpack. After robbing Victim, the robber got into the passenger seat of a nearby Chevrolet truck, and the truck drove away. After the truck drove away, Victim used a bystander’s cell phone to call the police. During the call, Victim provided the police with the truck’s license plate number. Victim, using the Find My iPhone application, located his phone, and he gave its location to the police. Initially, Victim described the robber as a six-foot-tall African American male with dreadlocks. Twelve days after he was robbed, Victim called police to tell them that, after viewing a news report on a local television station that described Defendant as a person of interest in several robberies, including Victim’s own robbery, he recognized Defendant as the man who robbed him. After viewing this news report, Victim changed his description of the robber’s ethnicity and hairstyle. Victim testified at trial that based on the news report, Victim believed Defendant was the person who robbed him and notified the police of this fact. He believed this because Defendant “looked really familiar” and the way that a different victim was robbed was similar to the way Victim was robbed.

{3} At the time Victim was robbed, Albuquerque Police Department Detective Koury Church was investigating several robberies near the UNM and Central New Mexico Community College (CNM) campuses that were similar to the robbery of Victim. Based on the investigation, Detective Church and other police officers arrested an accomplice of Defendant at Defendant’s apartment complex. At that time, police also attempted to arrest Defendant at this apartment, but Defendant jumped out of a second-story window of the apartment building and fled. Defendant was arrested shortly afterward on the roof of a nearby building.

{4} On the day of Defendant’s arrest, police obtained a search warrant for Defendant’s apartment. During the search of the apartment, police recovered Victim’s blue Nike backpack. On February 15, 2016, Victim called Detective Church to tell him that he had seen Defendant and the other men police arrested in connection with this string of robberies on the news. To avoid tainting the identification of Defendant because of what Victim had viewed during the news report, Detective Church did not ask Victim to view a photo array to identify his assailant.

1In this opinion, Victim is the eyewitness who identified Defendant during trial as the individual who robbed him, based on circumstances Defendant contends on appeal were suggestive. Although we do not refer to Victim as the “witness” or “eyewitness,” we want to be clear that Victim is the eyewitness whose identification of Defendant as the perpetrator is at issue here, given that Defendant was tried on charges related to two other alleged victims during the same proceedings. {5} As a result of its investigation, the State charged Defendant with three counts of armed robbery, conspiracy to commit armed robbery, and several other offenses. Before trial, Defendant moved to suppress Victim’s identification. However, the district court dismissed the motion without reaching its merits because the district court found that the motion was untimely filed contrary to the scheduling order issued pursuant to LR 2-308 NMRA (the local rule). At trial, Defendant was convicted of armed robbery, conspiracy to commit armed robbery, and resisting, evading, or obstructing an officer. This appeal followed.

DISCUSSION

{6} Defendant argues (1) it was an abuse of discretion for the district court to deny his motion to suppress Victim’s out-of-court identification of him after watching the news on grounds that it was not timely filed; (2) the “tainted” in-court identification of Defendant by Victim violated Article II, Section 18 of the New Mexico Constitution; (3) the prejudicial effect of Victim’s identification of Defendant substantially outweighed its probative value, violating Rule 11-403; and (4) that the district court should have granted a mistrial when the prosecution showed the jury a cell phone unrelated to this case. We address each of these arguments in turn.

I. The District Court Appropriately Denied Defendant’s Motion to Suppress on Timeliness Grounds

{7} First, Defendant argues that it was an abuse of discretion for the district court to deny his motion to suppress on timeliness grounds. Defendant filed a motion seeking to suppress Victim’s out-of-court identification of him as the perpetrator of Victim’s robbery after Victim viewed a news story in which Defendant was implicated in the robbery of Victim. We are unpersuaded. Denial of a motion on timeliness grounds is reviewed for abuse of discretion. See State v. Smallwood, 2007-NMSC-005, ¶ 12, 141 N.M. 178, 152 P.3d 821. Here, the district court denied Defendant’s motion to suppress because it was untimely filed pursuant to both the scheduling order and the local rule. Under applicable precedent, the district court’s decision to deny the motion on this ground was appropriate. See State v. Vialpando, 1979-NMCA-083, ¶ 6, 93 N.M. 289, 599 P.2d 1086 (stating that a motion to suppress could have properly been denied on untimeliness grounds); State v. Helker, 1975-NMCA-141, ¶ 7, 88 N.M. 650, 545 P.2d 1028 (“[W]e hold that rules of criminal procedure can put a time limitation on the exercise of a constitutionally protected right.”); see also City of Santa Fe v. Marquez, 2012-NMSC- 031, ¶ 28, 285 P.3d 637 (noting that Rule 5-212(C) NMRA requires that motions to suppress be filed sixty days before trial).

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Bluebook (online)
State v. Quarles, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-v-quarles-nmctapp-2022.