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DUPREE v. THE STATE

Court of Appeals of Georgia1998-05-19No. A98A0464
232 Ga. App. 573502 S.E.2d 511

Summary

Holding. The court affirmed the conviction, holding that police had probable cause for the warrantless stop and search of Dupree's vehicle based on a reliable informant's tip corroborated by independent surveillance observations, and that probable cause existed to arrest Dupree given the exigent circumstances and totality of the circumstances.

Ricky Dupree was convicted of cocaine trafficking after police discovered drugs in his vehicle during a warrantless stop and search. Dupree appealed, arguing that officers lacked probable cause for the stop and search, and that even if they had probable cause to arrest his associate Jerry Allen, they lacked probable cause to arrest him.

The court upheld the conviction. It found that police had probable cause based on information from a reliable confidential informant whose detailed account of Allen's drug distribution methods was independently corroborated through months of officer surveillance. The officers observed multiple suspicious meetings between Dupree and Allen that appeared to involve drug transactions. When the informant signaled that a drug deal was happening, officers intercepted Dupree's vehicle based on this collective information and their own observations. The court concluded that the totality of circumstances—the informant's established reliability, the corroborating surveillance, and the officers' personal recognition of Dupree and his vehicle—gave police sufficient grounds to stop and search without a warrant.

Summary generated by law.co from the public-domain opinion. The opinion text itself is public domain.

Key issues

  • Whether police had probable cause for a warrantless stop and search of the defendant's vehicle
  • Whether an informant's tip, corroborated by officer surveillance, establishes probable cause
  • Whether probable cause to arrest one person extends to an associate present at the scene

Procedural posture

Dupree appealed his bench trial conviction for cocaine trafficking, challenging the denial of his motion to suppress evidence and the sufficiency of evidence supporting his arrest.

Authorities cited

No cited authorities resolved to law.co cases yet.

Opinion

majority opinion

Judge Harold R. Banke.

In a bench trial, Ricky Dupree was convicted of cocaine trafficking. On appeal, Dupree contests the denial of his motion to suppress and challenges the sufficiency of the evidence leading to his arrest.

The underlying case arose from a drug investigation targeting Jerry Allen. A confidential informant, whose services had been employed successfully on prior occasions, specifically detailed how Allen would order, obtain, and distribute cocaine. According to the informant, Allen would place phone calls from inside the Nowhere Bar, then order quantities of cocaine from a source, and then exit the bar to meet nearby with his source. A second confidential informant supplied virtually identical information to another drug agent. While conducting undercover surveillance of Allen near this bar for a few months, law enforcement officers observed several meetings between Allen and Dupree during which they appeared to conduct drug transactions. Less than a week before the arrest here, a surveillance officer observed a suspicious rendezvous between Allen and Dupree, but while attempting to follow Dupree, lost his vehicle in traffic. On the day of Dupree’s arrest, the confidential informant beeped Officer Charles Porterfield, who alerted his supervisor, Sergeant T. O. Cochran, about an impending drug deal. Nearly immediately, Cochran and another officer, believing a drug deal was in progress, intercepted Allen and Dupree in Dupree’s vehicle and arrested them. Inside Dupree’s vehicle, investigators discovered a plastic bag containing powder cocaine and crack cocaine. Held:

1. Dupree contends that the trial court erred in denying his motion to suppress because the police lacked probable cause for a warrantless stop and search of his vehicle. We disagree.

The State’s evidence showed that a confidential informant with established reliability provided detailed information which had been independently confirmed as investigators shared information obtained during their surveillance of Allen. See Goodman v. State, 255 Ga. 226, 229 (13) (336 SE2d 757) (1985) (probable cause may rest upon the collective knowledge of the police when there has been com munication among them, rather than solely on the information possessed by the arresting officer).

Decided May 19, 1998.

James W. Smith, for appellant.

Harry N. Gordon, District Attorney, Henry R. Thompson, Assistant District Attorney, for appellee.

Where the details of a tip are corroborated by the personal observation of the investigating officers, a reliable informant’s tip is sufficient to establish probable cause for a warrantless search. Wells v. State, 212 Ga. App. 60, 63 (2) (441 SE2d 460) (1994). In this case, the arresting officer had received information conveyed by a reliable informant that a drug deal was underway, and based on his own personal knowledge, the officer recognized Dupree as well as his vehicle. Under the totality of the circumstances surrounding the arrest, we cannot say that the trial court clearly erred in finding that probable cause existed for officers to execute a warrantless stop and search of Dupree and his vehicle. Williams v. State, 208 Ga. App. 737, 738-739 (431 SE2d 731) (1993); Morgan v. State, 195 Ga. App. 732, 735 (3) (394 SE2d 639) (1990). Since Dupree failed to show that the trial court’s factual or credibility findings were clearly erroneous, those findings must be accepted. Martinez-Rodriguez v. State, 195 Ga. App. 491, 493 (4) (393 SE2d 748) (1990); Durden v. State, 187 Ga. App. 433, 434 (2) (370 SE2d 528) (1988).

2. Dupree contends that investigators lacked probable cause to arrest him, even assuming arguendo that they had probable cause to arrest Allen. We disagree. Given the exigent circumstances justifying the warrantless search and seizure here, and considering the totality of the circumstances, the trial court did not err in determining that police had probable cause for the arrest. Archer v. State, 217 Ga. App. 395, 396-397 (457 SE2d 679) (1995).

Judgment affirmed.

Birdsong, P. J., and Johnson, J., concur.