Sаmmie JACKSON, Jr., Appellant, v. UNITED STATES of America, Appellee.
No. 16631.
United States Court of Appeals District of Columbia Circuit.
Decided Feb. 8, 1962.
Argued Nov. 27, 1961.
We think National Broadcasting Co. v. United States, 319 U.S. 190, 63 S.Ct. 997, 87 L.Ed. 1344 (1943), settles the narrow question before us in the affirmative. There, the Commission promulgated regulations which provided, inter alia, that no license would be granted to stations whose network contracts would prevent them from developing programs “to serve the needs of the local community.” 319 U.S. at 203, 63 S.Ct. at 1003. National Broadcasting Compаny challenged the regulations on precisely the grounds appellants advance here: that since the regulations were calculated to affect program content, they exceeded statutory and constitutional limitations. In sustaining the regulations, the Supreme Court held that the Commission may impose reasonable restrictions upon the grant of licenses to assure programming designed to meet the needs of the local community. We think it clear that the Commission‘s action in the instant case reflects no greater interference with a broadcaster‘s alleged right to choose its programs free from Commission control than the interference involved in National Broadcasting Co.5
Affirmed.
Mr. William H. Collins, Jr., Asst. U. S. Atty., with whom Messrs. David C. Acheson, U. S. Atty., Nathan J. Paulson, and Thomas M. O‘Malley, Asst. U. S. Attys., were on the brief, for appellee. Mr. Arnold T. Aikens, Asst. U. S. Atty., also entered an appearance for appellee.
Before WILBUR K. MILLER, Chief Judge, and WASHINGTON and BURGER, Circuit Judges.
BURGER, Circuit Judge.
This appeal is taken from convictions on two counts of an eight count indictment charging housebreaking and grand larceny under
The circumstances leading up to appellant‘s arrest are as follows: Police recovered from a local pawnshop a Smith & Wesson pistol which was one of а number of items, including a rhinestone bracelet, reported as stolen in a housebreaking two weeks earlier. The pawnshop records showed that one John Keyes had pawned the pistol. Police went to Keyes’ aрartment to question him. His friend Ethel Curtis, who was at the apartment with Keyes, told the police out of the presence of Keyes that the appellant, Sammie Jackson, had given Keyes the pistol. Keyes, when confronted with what Ethel Curtis had said, confirmed the statement that Jackson had given it to him. The woman also told police that Jackson was a “bad one” who had been “locked up” in Baltimore a few weeks before for carrying a gun. At police rеquest she then telephoned Jackson and ascertained that he was at his home in Washington. Keyes, but not Ethel Curtis, then accompanied the police in a patrol car to Jackson‘s apartment. The police in the meantime had called for another squad car to proceed directly to meet them at the Jackson home. Enroute from Keyes’ home to Jackson‘s home the police read to Keyes a list of the stolen itеms and upon reciting and describing the rhinestone bracelet they were told by Keyes that he
This, in sum, was the information in the possession of the police when thеy reached Jackson‘s home. Standing alone no one factor of information constituted probable cause. The question is whether considered together all the information was enough.
The police, still accompanied by Keyes, met Jackson at his door1 and arrested him. Keyes pointed out the closet where he had seen the rhinestone bracelet. In two suitcases found in that closet the police recovered large quantities of stolen property which had previously been reported to them by the victims. Shortly thereafter and before they had Jackson under actual physical restraint, he plunged through a closed window, escaped and was not apprehended for some time. On this appeal appellant contends that the police had no probable cause to arrest him at the time they confronted him in his apartment.
We have indicated on mаny occasions that there are few absolutes in the area of the law dealing with what constitutes probable cause for arrest. We have also emphasized from time to time that probable cause is not to be evaluated from a remote vantage point of a library, but rather from the viewpoint of a prudent and cautious police officer on the scene at the time of arrest. The question to be answered is whether such an officer in the particular circumstances, conditioned by his observations and information, and guided by the whole of his police experience, reasonably could have believed that a crime had been committed by thе person to be arrested. See Bell v. United States, 102 U.S.App.D.C. 383, 254 F.2d 82, cert. denied, 358 U.S. 885, 79 S.Ct. 126, 3 L.Ed.2d 113 (1958). The law recognizes that mistakes in judgment will occur.
“Because many situations which confront officers in the course of executing their duties are more or less ambiguous, room must be allowed for some mistakes on their part. But the mistakes must be thоse of reasonable men, acting on facts leading sensibly to their conclusions of probability. The rule of probable cause is a practical, nontechnical conception affording the best compromise that has been found for accommodating these often opposing interests. Requiring more would unduly hamper law enforcement. To allow less would be to leave law-abiding citizens at the mercy of the officers’ whim or caрrice.” Brinegar v. United States, 338 U.S. 160, 176, 69 S.Ct. 1302, 1311, 93 L.Ed. 1879 (1949).
Recently Judge Prettyman speaking for this court, in Dixon v. United States, No. 16263, Oct. 19, 1961, 111 U.S.App.D.C. 305, 296 F.2d 427, said:
“The decisive factors are that all the circumstances are to be considered together, in a sum total; that the circumstances to be considered are those of the moment; that the impression to be evaluated is the impression upon the mind of a reasonably prudent police officer; and that the impression made upon him by the circumstances is a reasonable belief that a crime has been, is being, оr is about to be committed.”
While the process of reaching a conclusion that probable cause for an arrest exists calls for exercise of judgment and is in that sense a judging process, it is, of course, not a judicial process. It is,
In the circumstances disclosed by this casе we think the police decided and acted properly. With the possibility that Keyes’ girl friend would warn Jackson by phone before the police arrived at his home, obtaining a warrant was not practical. Had there beеn a legitimate and feasible way to prevent the woman from so communicating with the appellant and thus offset the risk of such a communication, that factor would introduce an additional element to consider as to thе necessity for securing a warrant. Police, of course, had no basis for putting the woman under any restraint.
The total information available to the police officers, including the separate accusations of appellant by two persons, Keyes’ recollection of a rhinestone bracelet in the appellant‘s closet which matched the description of a similar object on the list of stolen property, and the reasоnable inferences to be drawn from all this, must be considered as a whole. Thus considered, the evidence reasonably warranted a belief on the part of the police officers that Jackson had probably committed the felonious acts in which the pawned gun and the rhinestone bracelet were originally stolen. The practical necessities of pursuit of appellant before he might be warned and disappear justified a belief that the circumstances compelled prompt action without an arrest warrant. See Campbell v. United States, 110 U.S.App.D.C. 109, 289 F.2d 775 (1961); Jones v. United States, 106 U.S.App.D.C. 228, 271 F.2d 494 (1959), cert. denied, 362 U.S. 944, 80 S.Ct. 809, 4 L.Ed.2d 771 (1960).
Affirmed.
WASHINGTON, Circuit Judge (concurring in the result).
I agree that probable cause for the arrest of Jackson existed in this case, and that the search which followed was incidental to the arrest and was proper, under the standards laid down in Bell v. United States, 102 U.S.App.D.C. 383, 254 F.2d 82, cert. denied, 358 U.S. 885, 79 S.Ct. 126, 3 L.Ed.2d 113 (1958), and Dixon v. United States, 1961, 111 U.S. App.D.C. 305, 296 F.2d 427, and the cases therein cited. Those standards should be strictly observed by the police, and the courts should view adversely any departure from them.