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THE POLICE DID NOT HAVE A REASONABLE SUSPICION DEFENDANT WAS ARMED AND THEREFORE SHOULD NOT HAVE ATTEMPTED TO FRISK HIM; THE POLICE DID NOT HAVE PROBABLE CAUSE TO ARREST DEFENDANT WHEN HE THREW HIS COAT AT AN OFFICER AND RAN BECAUSE THE POLICE WERE NOT AUTHORIZED TO ATTEMPT THE FRISK; INDICTMENT DISMISSED; AN APPELLATE COURT CANNOT CONSIDER A THEORY WHICH WOULD SUPPORT DENIAL OF SUPPRESSION BUT WHICH WAS NOT RAISED BY THE PEOPLE BELOW (FOURTH DEPT).

The Fourth Department, dismissing the indictment, over a two-justice dissent, determined the police did not have a reasonable suspicion defendant was armed and therefore should not have attempted to frisk him when he got out of the vehicle. The fact that defendant threw his coat at the officer and ran did not justify defendant’s arrest for obstructing governmental administration because the police conduct (the attempted frisk) was not authorized:

… [T]he police proceeded to an attempted frisk by approaching the passenger side of the truck, opening the door, and directing defendant to exit the truck so that, as they informed defendant, they could perform a frisk of his person … . The attempted frisk was unlawful, however, because the record establishes that the police did not have ” ‘knowledge of some fact or circumstance that support[ed] a reasonable suspicion that . . . [defendant was] armed or pose[d] a threat to [their] safety’ ” … . Furthermore, even though defendant, despite being instructed to leave his coat in the truck, grabbed the coat, threw it onto one of the officers, and fled in the grassy area by the side of the interstate highway, instead of submitting to the frisk of his person, the police lacked probable cause to arrest defendant for obstructing governmental administration in the second degree based on his alleged obstruction of the officers’ attempted frisk, because that police conduct was not authorized … . Moreover, while the officers had also indicated to defendant that they were going to perform a search of the truck, the People did not rely below on the theory that defendant was properly arrested for obstructing a lawful search of the truck, nor, as the dissent states, did the court “explicitly base[] its decision on that theory.” We thus conclude that, as “an appellate court[, we] may not uphold a police action on a theory not argued before the suppression court” … . People v Hodge, 2022 NY Slip Op 03821, Fourth Dept 6-9-22

Practice Point: Here the police did not have a reasonable suspicion that the defendant was armed and therefore should not have attempted to frisk him. The fact that the defendant threw his coat at an officer and ran did not provide probable cause for arrest because the police conduct (attempting to frisk him) was not authorized. An appellate court cannot consider a theory which would support the denial of suppression but which was not raised below.

 

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