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State v. Habib

The defendant's consent to search his car was not valid because it was the product of an illegal detention.

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A Cherokee County deputy sheriff stopped Ali Ibrahim Habib because neither he nor his passenger was wearing a seatbelt, and subsequently discovered a gram of marijuana in the back seat of the car Habib was driving. Habib was charged with violating the seatbelt law and with possession of less than an ounce of marijuana. The trial court granted his motion to suppress, and the State appeals. For the reasons that follow, we affirm. The defendant stipulated at the motion to suppress hearing that he was not challenging the stop itself, but contended that the officer did not have a reasonable articulable suspicion that justified detaining him in custody. The officer testified that he asked Habib for his license and asked him to step out of the car because he wanted to ask him the passenger’s name without the passenger, who had no identification, hearing his answer. He intended to cite both men, who were 19, for seatbelt violations. The passenger spoke as if he had a “thick tongue,” or as if he had something in his mouth, which indicated to the officer that he had been smoking marijuana.

The officer then asked Habib to stick out his tongue, which was stained brown and had a foamy, “cotton-mouth” kind of substance around his tongue, which to the officer was indicative of someone who might have smoked marijuana. He then asked the passenger for permission to search his person, which he testified revealed the smell of marijuana, and the passenger admitted he had smoked marijuana the day before. The officer “felt like” both men had been smoking, and the passenger’s admission to smoking the day before coupled with their “cotton mouth” led him to suspect they had marijuana on them.

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