United States v. Liddell

Antonio Ray Liddell pleaded guilty to being a felon in possession of a firearm in violation of 18 U.S.C. §§ 922(g)(1) and 924(a)(2). As permitted by a condition in his plea agreement, Liddell now appeals the denial of his motion to suppress a post-arrest statement made without the warnings required by Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966). We agree with the district court1 that the arresting officers’ in-custody questioning fell within the public safety exception to Miranda established in New York v. Quarles, 467 U.S. 649, 104 S.Ct. 2626, 81 L.Ed.2d 550 (1984). Accordingly, we affirm.

The following facts are undisputed. At approximately 12:45 a.m., Police Officer Michael Adney stopped a car driven by Liddell for a loud music violation. Adney arrested Liddell when a check revealed that he was barred from driving in Iowa. After the arrest, a pat-down search uncovered a bag of marijuana, $183 in cash, and two cell phones. Adney handcuffed Lid-dell and placed him in the patrol car. Meanwhile, Police Officer Jon Melvin arrived to assist and began to search Lid-dell’s car incident to the arrest. When Melvin discovered an unloaded .38 caliber revolver under the front seat, he showed the gun to Adney and asked whether Lid-dell’s person had been thoroughly searched after the arrest.

Adney removed Liddell from the patrol car and asked, referring to Liddell’s ear, “Is there anything else in there we need to know about?” Melvin added, “That’s gonna hurt us?” Adney repeated, “That’s gonna hurt us? Since we found the pistol already.” Liddell laughed and said, “I knew it was there but ... it’s not mine,” before telling the officers there were no other weapons in his car. Melvin completed the search of the car, finding .38 caliber ammunition and rolling papers used to make marijuana cigarettes.

Charged with unlawful possession of the firearm and with unrelated drug offenses, Liddell entered a conditional plea of guilty to the felon-in-possession charge after the district court denied a motion to suppress his highly incriminating statement that he knew the .38 revolver was under the front seat of his car. In the district court and on appeal, the government conceded that Liddell was in custody and had not been given Miranda warnings at the time the officers asked the question *1009that elicited this incriminating statement. Thus, the issue is whether the statement is admissible under the public safety exception to Miranda as articulated by the Supreme Court in Quarles and applied by this court in United States v. Williams, 181 F.3d 945 (8th Cir.1999), and United States v. Luker, 395 F.3d 830 (8th Cir.), cert. denied, 546 U.S. 831,126 S.Ct. 52,163 L.Ed.2d 82 (2005). “Whether facts support an exception to the Miranda requirement is a question of law” that we review de novo. United States v. Lackey, 384 F.3d 1224, 1226 (10th Cir.), cert. denied, 540 U.S. 997, 124 S.Ct. 502, 157 L.Ed.2d 399 (2003); accord United States v. Talley, 275 F.3d 560, 561 (6th Cir.2001).

In Quarles, the Supreme Court held that “there is a ‘public safety’ exception to the requirement that Miranda warnings be given before a suspect’s answers may be admitted into evidence.” 467 U.S. at 655, 104 S.Ct. 2626. In this context, protection of the public safety includes protection of the police officers themselves. Id. at 658 n. 7, 659, 104 S.Ct. 2626. The exception does not depend upon the subjective motivation of the questioning officers. Instead, the Court adopted an objective standard: the exception applies when “police officers ask questions reasonably prompted by a concern for the public safety.” Id. at 656, 104 S.Ct. 2626, quoted in Williams, 181 F.3d at 953. It does not apply to “questions designed solely to elicit testimonial evidence from a suspect.” 467 U.S. at 659, 104 S.Ct. 2626.2

Liddell argues that the public safety exception does not apply because, at the time the officers asked the question that prompted his incriminating admission, “there was no longer an objective reasonable need to protect the police or the public from any immediate danger” because the revolver had been found, Liddell was handcuffed and under the control of the two officers, and there were no passengers or nearby members of the public who could have accessed or been harmed by the contents of Liddell’s car. The district court rejected this contention, explaining:

The discovery of a firearm hidden in a vehicle would lead an officer to have an objectively reasonable concern that other, possibly loaded, firearms may also be in the vehicle which could cause harm to an officer if they were to happen upon them unexpectedly or mishandle them in some way. The accidental discovery of additional weapons poses a threat to officer safety and at the time the officers conducted their limited questioning of [Liddell], given the information then known to them, it was reasonable for the officers to believe this threat existed. There was no way for Officer Melvin or Officer Adney to know that the firearm found under the driver’s seat was ultimately the only weapon or dangerous device located inside of the vehicle.

The district court’s analysis is consistent with this court’s controlling precedents. Our prior cases recognized that the risk of police officers being injured by the mishandling of unknown firearms or drug par*1010aphernalia provides a sufficient public safety basis to ask a suspect who has been arrested and secured whether there are weapons or contraband in a car or apartment that the police are about to search. See Luker, 395 F.3d at 832 (public safety exception applied to post-arrest question whether there was anything in intoxicated driver’s car the police should know about); Williams, 181 F.3d at 953-54 (public safety exception applied to post-arrest question, “is there anything we need to be aware of’ in the suspect’s apartment, because the police “could not have known whether other hazardous weapons were present ... that could cause them harm if they happened upon them unexpectedly or mishandled them in some way”). Accord Lackey, 334 F.3d at 1227-28; contra United States v. Williams, 483 F.3d 425, 428 (6th Cir.2007). Here, when the officers found Liddell’s concealed .38 caliber revolver, they had good reason to be concerned that additional weapons might pose a threat to their safety when they searched Liddell’s car incident to a late-night arrest.

The judgment of the district court is affirmed.