US v. Mayberry: Davis was the passenger in a car that was pulled over for speeding. He told officers that he was headed to a hotel to meet a man he knew as “Red” to purchase four pounds of methamphetamine. Officers showed Davis a picture of another man, Phillips, who he identified as Red. Using Davis’ cell phone, officers texted with Red, who was on his way to the hotel. Shortly thereafter, a pickup truck entered the parking lot and Davis got a text from Red saying that he had arrived.
The driver of the truck – Mayberry, not Phillips – got out (with a young child) carrying a red, white, and blue bag and entered the side door of the hotel. Officers intercepted Mayberry on the second floor, without the bag. The bag was found behind a door in the stairwell Mayberry had used. It was found to contain about 4.4 pounds of methamphetamine. After a motion to suppress was denied, Mayberry pleaded guilty to drug and firearm charges and was sentenced to 414 months in prison.
The Fourth Circuit affirmed Mayberry’s conviction and sentence. The district court rejected two arguments with regard to the motion to suppress. First, the court concluded that Mayberry’s statements made after his arrest should not have been suppressed because the police had probable cause to make the arrest. It specifically rejected Mayberry’s reliance on the fact that Davis identified someone else as Red, pointing to the accuracy of the other information Davis provided that was “supported independently by the officers’ real-time observations of Mayberry” after they started texting with Red. Second, the court agreed with the district court that Mayberry had abandoned the bag with the methamphetamine in it and therefore could not challenge its search.
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