(CN) — The Fourth Circuit found Monday that a Black minister who was arrested and held on a $5 million bond after helping community members file complaints against the local police department was arrested without probable cause.
Police officers in the town of Southern Pines, North Carolina, arrested Lee Marvin Harris Sr. in February 2018 after they observed his son, Lee Marvin Harris Jr., hiding cocaine in an inoperable Cadillac on his property. The elder Harris, a disabled veteran, had spent almost two decades helping community members file complaints against law enforcement and had filed multiple formal complaints against Officer Jason Perry, one of the officers who arrested him.
In its opinion, the panel majority said the officers lacked probable cause to arrest Lee Marvin Harris Sr. and intentionally withheld evidence. Barring the chief of police, the officers involved misled prosecutors to indict him and could be held liable for that, the panel found, reversing the lower court’s decision.
“It defies common sense to say that an officer is entitled to qualified immunity when the allegedly unconstitutional conduct is deliberately withholding exculpatory evidence from prosecutors until after a suspect is indicted. No 'reasonable officer' would have believed that he could constitutionally mislead and deceive prosecutors in this manner,” U.S. Circuit Judge Roger Gregory wrote in the opinion.
Officers never saw Lee Marvin Harris Sr. go near the car and had no evidence that he knew about the drugs, but still charged him with possessing cocaine. They also did not tell the U.S. attorney they were investigating his son for trafficking, information Lee Marvin Harris Sr. claimed was intentionally omitted to secure charges against him.
Lee Marvin Harris Jr., who pleaded guilty for drug trafficking, admitted in his plea agreement to placing cocaine in, and retrieving it from, his father’s Cadillac. Lee Marvin Harris Sr. spent six months in state custody and four months on house arrest before the U.S. attorney dismissed all charges against him and issued a memorandum confirming his son was responsible for the drugs.
“A car in a yard with an unlocked door that anyone walking by can open is very different from someone’s kitchen. Anyone could have accessed the car without Harris, Sr. knowing and placed the drugs inside,” wrote Gregory, a George Bush nominee. "And Harris, Sr. was never observed near the Cadillac.”
Gregory and U.S. Circuit Judge Robert King, who was nominated by Bill Clinton, also said Lee Marvin Harris Sr. can proceed with a fabrication of evidence claim because he was arrested and detained for several months. This Fourteenth Amendment claim initially was dismissed by a lower court because Lee Marvin Harris Sr. was not convicted.
Officers had also claimed they had probable cause because they saw Lee Marvin Harris Sr. give a local mobile car washer/drug dealer money after he arrived with car washing supplies. On video, his car leaves afterward, appearing to be freshly washed. The lower court found that the video provided ample evidence for officers to believe he was involved with the drugs.
The Fourth Circuit wrote that a jury could reasonably conclude that the money was payment for car washing, and that the officers must have also believed that, as they did not mention the instance in proceedings before the appeal was filed.
“The officers’ silence about this interaction throughout the criminal proceedings strongly suggests that, at the time, they understood the payment for what it was: payment for car washing services rendered,” Gregory wrote. “ In concluding otherwise, the district court improperly encroached on the jury’s role as fact finder.”
One judge dissented: Donald Trump nominee U.S. Circuit Judge Allison Jones Rushing.
In her opinion, Rushing said the officers had probable cause to arrest Lee Marvin Harris Sr. and are entitled to qualified immunity.
“Possession can be joint, and his son’s potential involvement with the drugs did not prove Harris’s innocence,” she wrote.
Rushing also said because the officers had probable cause, Harris Sr. has no grounds to pursue a malicious prosecution claim.
The circuit remanded the case to the Middle District of North Carolina.
Lee Marvin Harris Sr.’s attorney, Abraham Rubert-Schewel, who argued on his behalf before the panel when the Fourth Circuit heard the case in May, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
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