Criminal Law : Traffic Stop – Search – Resisting Arrest

(1)Where an officer testified that his sole purpose in conducting a pat-down search of a defendant was to search for drugs, which he performed after he did not find contraband in the vehicle, the smell of marijuana did not justify the warrantless search of the defendant, and there was no evidence to support a finding of exigency prior to the first search, so a second search was a mere continuation of the unconstitutional search, and the defendant’s flight from the officer did not purge the taint of the first search, so the evidence of drugs should have been excluded.

(2)Where an officer testified that he had only intended to detain a defendant rather than arrest him when the defendant began to run from him, the officer had no reason to believe that the defendant had committed a felony, so insufficient evidence supported a finding that the defendant was guilty of felony resisting arrest.

Judgment is reversed and remanded.

State v. Lee (MLW No. 69121/Case No. WD78404 – 26 pages) (Missouri Court of Appeals, Western District, Witt, J.) Appealed from circuit court, Saline County, Rolf, J. (Gregory L. Barnes, Jefferson City, for respondent) (Samuel E. Buffaloe, Columbia, for appellant).

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