United States v. Arriba Lewis

CourtCourt of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit
DecidedApril 3, 2019
Docket17-3592
StatusPublished

This text of United States v. Arriba Lewis (United States v. Arriba Lewis) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
United States v. Arriba Lewis, (7th Cir. 2019).

Opinion

In the

United States Court of Appeals For the Seventh Circuit ____________________ No. 17‐3592 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff‐Appellee, v.

ARRIBA W. LEWIS, Defendant‐Appellant. ____________________

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Central District of Illinois. No. 1:17‐cr‐10004‐JES‐JEH‐1 — James E. Shadid, Judge. ____________________

ARGUED NOVEMBER 29, 2018 — DECIDED APRIL 3, 2019 ____________________

Before FLAUM, RIPPLE, and MANION, Circuit Judges. MANION, Circuit Judge. Officer Sweeney pulled Arriba Lewis over for following too closely. Sweeney processed a warning while Lewis, who seemed unusually nervous, sat in the squad car. After learning Lewis was on federal supervised release for a cocaine conviction, Sweeney requested a drug‐ sniffing dog roughly 5 minutes into the stop. 2 No. 17‐3592

About 10 minutes and 50 seconds after Lewis pulled over, Sweeney handed him a warning. About 10 seconds later, a drug‐sniffing dog and its handler approached Lewis’s car. The dog alerted. Sweeney searched Lewis’s car and found heroin. Lewis was charged with possession with intent to dis‐ tribute heroin. The district court denied his motion to sup‐ press. He appeals, arguing the officer lacked lawful grounds to initiate the traffic stop and arguing the officer prolonged the stop without independent reasonable suspicion for the dog to sniff. But we disagree on both fronts, and affirm. I. Facts Officer Sweeney sat in an unmarked Ford SUV with an ex‐ terior spotlight in the median of Interstate 55 in McLean County, Illinois, watching traffic. He saw a man later identi‐ fied as Arriba Lewis driving a Dodge Charger southbound in “a pack of vehicles traveling in close proximity to each other.” He “was traveling right behind another vehicle in very close proximity,” gripping the wheel at 10:00 and 2:00, and appear‐ ing to push himself behind the side pillar in a rigid posture. Sweeney pursued Lewis. Sweeney testified he wanted “to see if I can observe a traffic violation and confirm [Lewis’s] following distance which I initially saw.” But first he passed Lewis to assist another officer. Sweeney’s dashboard camera began recording after he passed Lewis because Sweeney trig‐ gered his emergency lights as he approached the other officer. Triggering these lights activated the dashcam, which was pro‐ gramed to capture footage beginning 1 minute earlier. After passing Lewis, Sweeney pulled over to the right shoulder be‐ hind the other officer. Video recorded by Sweeney’s dashcam shows a truck followed by Lewis pass to the left of Sweeney. The other officer declined assistance, so Sweeney pulled out No. 17‐3592 3

and accelerated. Several vehicles moved to the right lane to let him pass. He saw Lewis ahead in the left lane “at the prelim‐ inary stages of passing” a truck in the right lane. Then Lewis changed to the right lane behind the truck. As Lewis followed the truck, Sweeney calculated the time‐distance. He activated a stopwatch function to record the time between the truck’s rear passing a milepost and the Charger’s front passing the same object. He clocked this at 1.2 seconds, meaning Lewis followed 1.2 seconds behind the truck according to this calcu‐ lation. Lewis stayed close behind the truck for about 45 sec‐ onds despite the lack of traffic immediately behind him. Sweeney pulled into the right lane. He testified he acti‐ vated his emergency lights.1 He pulled Lewis over. Lewis stopped on the right shoulder, and Sweeney pulled behind him, at about 3 minutes, 41 seconds into the video. The video shows Lewis made a movement to his right inside his car sec‐ onds later. Sweeney walked to the Charger’s passenger side and saw Lewis’s hands trembling. At about 4 minutes into the video, Sweeney reached the front window.2 He made contact with Lewis and asked for his license. Sweeney said:

1 The parties dispute the timing of Sweeney’s activation of his emergency

lights. Sweeney testified he activated his lights sometime after clocking the following‐distance at 1.2 seconds. But Lewis argues Sweeney activated his lights when he pulled over to offer assistance to the other officer, well before clocking the following‐distance, and nothing in the record shows he turned the lights off. This issue’s potential relevance concerns the rea‐ son Lewis pulled into the right lane behind the truck. 2 The dashcam video (presented at the suppression hearing and submitted

to us) begins at 0 minutes, 0 seconds. The video runs for about 3 minutes, 41 seconds before showing Lewis stop on the shoulder. It then shows Sweeney reach the front passenger‐side window of the Charger at about 4 minutes into the video. Sweeney said “Here you go. Here’s your warning, 4 No. 17‐3592

The reason I stopped you was your following‐ distance. You need to leave at least 3 seconds here in Illinois. You were less than 2 behind that semi. Ok. And that’s why I originally pulled out on you back, way back there, too. You had an‐ other car you were following.3 Sweeney testified Lewis’s hands trembled and his breath‐ ing seemed heavy and labored. Sweeney told Lewis he would just get a warning, not a ticket, and told him to sit in the squad car during preparation of the warning. After “hem‐haw[ing]” and failing to exit his car expeditiously, when he finally began to exit he reached back in his car. Then he put his hands up as he walked. Sweeney said, “You’re fine man. Relax.” In the squad car, Sweeney typed information into a com‐ puter and talked with Lewis. The first step of completing the warning was ensuring, via computer, he had a valid license. Upon this check, the computer automatically showed he was on federal probation4 for a cocaine conviction. Sweeney

ok,” and handed it to Lewis at about 14 minutes, 31 seconds into the video. Thus, the total time from Lewis pulling over to Sweeney handing him the warning is about 10 minutes, 50 seconds. The dog sniff began about 10 seconds later and took about 1 minute, 8 seconds. References to the video’s time during the stop include about 4 minutes before Sweeney reached Lewis’s window. The video’s length does not equal the duration of the stop. As we show below, Lewis sometimes conflates the video’s length with the duration of the stop. But they are not the same. 3 We base our quotations of Sweeney and Lewis during the stop on the

video. Any deviations are immaterial. 4 Sweeney used the word “probation,” apparently because his computer

did not distinguish between this and supervised release. Actually, Lewis was on the latter. But the distinction is immaterial here. No. 17‐3592 5

testified the computer returned information based on the li‐ cense within 1 minute of sitting in the squad car. About 2 minutes after Lewis pulled over, Sweeney asked where he was headed. Lewis said he was going to pick his son up. Sweeney asked where. Lewis said, “School … St. Louis.” Sweeney asked how old the son was. Lewis said, “26.” He ex‐ plained his son wanted to return to Chicago. Sweeney asked where the son went to school. Lewis replied his son worked in a warehouse. Lewis added his son “got into it” with his girlfriend. This exchange lasted slightly less than a minute. Sweeney thought the story seemed suspiciously inconsistent. About 3.5 minutes after Lewis pulled over, he asked about the 3‐second guideline Sweeney mentioned: Lewis: So you got to be how many feet back? Sweeney: It’s not feet. It’s seconds. You need to be at least 3 seconds. Lewis: Oh. Ok. Sweeney: Ok. You were 1.2. Lewis: How you measure that? Sweeney: It’s just a stopwatch function on here. So when the, with the semi, when it goes by a stationary object which was the milepost back there is what I used. When the back of that goes past that stationary object I start it. When the front of your vehicle goes past that same object I stop it.

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United States v. Arriba Lewis, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-arriba-lewis-ca7-2019.