United States v. James Hardesty

• Court: Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit
• Decided: March 30, 2023
• Docket: 21-4496
• Status: Unpublished

Opinion

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UNPUBLISHED

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

No. 21-4496

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

Plaintiff - Appellee,

v.

JAMES JOSHUA HARDESTY, a/k/a James Hardesty,

Defendant - Appellant.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of West Virginia, at Clarksburg. Irene M. Keeley, Senior District Judge. (1:20-cr-00066-IMK-MJA-1)

Submitted: March 20, 2023 Decided: March 30, 2023

Before NIEMEYER and DIAZ, Circuit Judges, and MOTZ, Senior Circuit Judge.

Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion.

ON BRIEF: L. Richard Walker, First Assistant Federal Public Defender, OFFICE OF THE FEDERAL PUBLIC DEFENDER, Clarksburg, West Virginia; Zoey Vilasuso, Law Student, WEST VIRGINIA UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF LAW, Morgantown, West Virginia, for Appellant. William Ihlenfeld, United States Attorney, Wheeling, West Virginia, Sarah E. Wagner, Assistant United States Attorney, OFFICE OF THE UNITED STATES ATTORNEY, Clarksburg, West Virginia, for Appellee.

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PER CURIAM:

James Joshua Hardesty pled guilty to possession of a firearm by a felon, in violation

of 18 U.S.C. §§ 922(g)(1), 924(a)(2). The charge arose after a Fairmont, West Virginia,

police officer conducted a Terry * stop and recovered a firearm from Hardesty’s jacket

pocket. Hardesty moved to suppress the firearm as evidence, arguing that it was the fruit

of an unlawful seizure. The district court denied the motion, and Hardesty subsequently

entered his guilty plea, preserving the right to challenge the court’s denial of his motion to

suppress. The district court sentenced Hardesty to 63 months’ imprisonment. On appeal,

Hardesty contends that the officer lacked reasonable suspicion for the stop. We affirm.

“When reviewing a district court’s ruling on a motion to suppress, [we] review[]

conclusions of law de novo and underlying factual findings for clear error.” United States

v. Fall, 955 F.3d 363, 369-70 (4th Cir. 2020) (cleaned up). “If, as here, the district court

denied the motion to suppress, [we] construe[] the evidence in the light most favorable to

the government.” Id. at 370 (cleaned up).

The Fourth Amendment protects “[t]he right of the people to be secure in their

persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures.” U.S.

Const. amend. IV. “Under well-established doctrine, a police officer may, consistent with

the Fourth Amendment, conduct a brief investigatory stop—known as a ‘Terry stop’—

predicated on reasonable, articulable suspicion that ‘criminal activity may be afoot.’”

United States v. Mitchell, 963 F.3d 385, 390 (4th Cir. 2020) (quoting Terry, 392 U.S. at

* Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1 (1968).

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30). The officer must have “at least a minimal level of objective justification,” meaning

that he “must be able to articulate more than an inchoate and unparticularized suspicion or

hunch of criminal activity.” Illinois v. Wardlow, 528 U.S. 119, 123-24 (2000) (internal

quotation marks omitted). “The degree to which the police may rely on a tip to establish

reasonable suspicion depends on the tipster’s veracity, reliability, and basis of knowledge.”

United States v. Kehoe, 893 F.3d 232, 238 (4th Cir. 2018). While “[a] tip from an

anonymous caller seldom . . . contains sufficient indicia of reliability necessary to provide

the reasonable suspicion necessary to justify a Terry stop and frisk,” “courts generally

presume that a citizen-informant or a victim who discloses his or her identity and basis of

knowledge to the police is both reliable and credible.” Id. Courts assess whether an officer

has articulated reasonable suspicion for a stop under “the totality of the circumstances,”

giving “due weight to common sense judgments reached by officers in light of their

experience and training.” United States v. Perkins, 363 F.3d 317, 321 (4th Cir. 2004); see

Mitchell, 963 F.3d at 390.

Here, the responding officer testified at the hearing on Hardesty’s motion to

suppress. He recounted that dispatch told him a caller was concerned about a man who

was potentially overdosing or having a seizure. The caller identified herself, implied that

she resided nearby, and relayed what she was observing in real time. She provided detailed

information about the man’s appearance, behavior, and location. When the officer arrived

on the scene shortly thereafter, he found Hardesty in the described location and matching

the physical description provided by the caller. The officer also observed behavior that he

believed was consistent with intoxication. The district court found that the caller was

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reliable and credible and that the officer was entitled to rely on the caller’s information and

his own observations to establish reasonable suspicion to seize Hardesty. Considering the

totality of the circumstances, we conclude that the district court did not err in denying

Hardesty’s motion to suppress. See Perkins, 363 F.3d at 321.

Accordingly, we affirm the district court’s judgment. We dispense with oral

argument because the facts and legal contentions are adequately presented in the materials

before this court and argument would not aid the decisional process.

AFFIRMED