Summary
In Cobb, this Court determined, upon reviewing circumstances virtually identical to those in the instant case, that police officers who suspected a defendant was selling credit cards and conducted "a search of defendant's pocket without any inquiry" had essentially effected what "amounted to an arrest requiring probable cause."
Summary of this case from People v. HerreraOpinion
October 25, 1994
Appeal from the Supreme Court, New York County (Emily Jane Goodman, J.).
While the anonymous tip of a man selling credit cards, coupled with the observation of a man exactly fitting the informant's description and holding what could have been a credit card, gave the police reasonable suspicion to believe that defendant had possession of and was trying to sell stolen credit cards (see, People v. Benjamin, 51 N.Y.2d 267, 270-271), justifying temporary detention for questioning (see, People v. De Bour, 40 N.Y.2d 210, 223), such circumstances did not justify a search of defendant's pocket without any inquiry, which amounted to an arrest requiring probable cause (see, People v. Diaz, 81 N.Y.2d 106, 109; People v Soto, 194 A.D.2d 371). Defendant's action in putting the card in his pocket when one of the officers tapped his shoulder was not "furtive", as the People argue, and defendant did not flee or otherwise attempt to avoid the officer when asked what he had just put in his pocket. The officer who reached into defendant's pocket was not the officer who had overheard defendant's conversation with the second man about buying credit cards, and he did so without awaiting a response from defendant to his question about what he had just put in his pocket. The police did not know whether defendant was the owner of the credit card they saw him holding as they approached, and had no reason to believe that defendant had a weapon in his pocket. Since the credit cards and other physical evidence recovered from defendant's pocket, and the subsequent statements he made at the scene attempting to explain his possession of the cards, were the direct product of an unlawful search, they were properly suppressed (see, People v. Soto, supra, at 374).
Concur — Murphy, P.J., Sullivan, Rosenberger, Nardelli and Tom, JJ.