Johnson v. State

The trial court did not err in denying the defendant's motion to suppress drugs found on his person during a second Terry pat-down since the evidence established that the initial detention and pat-down were reasonable, and the defendant validly consented to the second pat-down.

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Arron Lavell Johnson was found guilty at a bench trial of possession of a schedule II controlled substance 3, 4 —methylenedioxymethamphetamine in violation of the Georgia Controlled Substances Act. Johnson and the State stipulated to evidence that he was in possession of the controlled substance and agreed to try the case based on the transcript produced at the pre-trial hearing on his motion to suppress evidence of the controlled substance, the Georgia Bureau of Investigation Crime Lab report, and the City of Snellville Police incident report. Johnson’s sole enumeration of error is that the trial court erred by denying his motion to suppress evidence found in a search of his person showing that he was in possession of the controlled substance. For the following reasons, we affirm. 1. The trial court correctly denied Johnson’s motion to suppress and admitted the evidence found in the search.

The State produced evidence that, while police officers detained Johnson to investigate their suspicion of criminal activity, they patted down Johnson for weapons and searched his person pursuant to his consent and found the controlled substance in his possession. Johnson contended in support of his suppression motion that the consent to search was tainted and invalid because it was obtained while he was illegally detained by police for questioning and for the pat-down in violation of the Fourth Amendment protection against unreasonable search and seizure. To the contrary, the evidence shows that the detention and the pat-down were proper and that the search conducted during the detention was pursuant to valid consent.

Johnson v. State

The trial court did not err in denying the defendant's motion to suppress drugs found on his person during a second Terry pat-down since the evidence established that the initial detention and pat-down were reasonable, and the defendant validly consented to the second pat-down.

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