A Teen With A “Ghost Gun” Was Taken Into Custody After a Policeman Smelled Marijuana!
A detective testified that he patted down an 18-year-old from Evanston because he smelled marijuana and saw what he thought were bits of marijuana. Last month, in downtown Evanston, a high school senior is said to have been carrying a loaded “ghost gun.”
Authorities said that a detective found the untraceable gun while patting down a passenger in a car stopped on Feb. 25 in the 1800 block of Lake Street for not having front trays and driving in a bike lane. Dallas Reid, 18, of the 2300 block of Dempster Street in Evanston, was accused of aggravated unlawful use of a weapon.
which is a felony, and two misdemeanor counts of being in possession of a weapon and of ammunition without a firearm owner’s identity document. At the teen’s first court appearance, Clark County Associate Judge Anthony Calabrese said, “[Reid] is allegedly caught with a ‘ghost gun’ in his waistband with two magazines.
He was with other people in the car.” “An extremely dangerous situation.” Prosecutors say that Reid was one of four people in the car who were asked to get out by a special operations team from the Evanston Police Department. The team had seen signs of recreational cannabis use in the car.
At a preliminary hearing on Tuesday, the arresting officer, Det. Daniel Rosenbaum, said, “I could smell both burned and fresh cannabis, and there was leafy greens plant matter all over the floorboard.” “What reason did you have to do a Terry mark?” asked John Curnyn, an attorney for the defense.
Rosenbaum said, “I was looking into a drug complaint because there might have been cannabis in the car where he was a passenger.” When it comes to the question of whether the smell of marijuana is enough to search a car, the Illinois appellate courts in different districts have different ideas.
Last year, a clear majority wants to appeal panel in the 3rd District, which includes DuPage, Will, Kankakee, and five other northern Illinois counties south and west of Chicago, ruled in the case of People v. Stribling that “the smell of burned cannabis, without any other evidence, is not enough to establish probable cause to search” someone’s car.
But in January, judges on the state’s 4th District, which includes the west and northwest parts of Illinois, came to the opposite conclusion. In People v. Hall, the panel said that state law requires legally owned marijuana to be transported in a car in an odor-proof container.
Since the smell alone can’t show if the amount of marijuana is over the legal limit, a reasonable officer who smells weed in a car “would believe that someone in the vehicle was at least transporting cannabis in a way that violates the Vehicle Code.” But in Reid’s case, the gun wasn’t found in the car when it was searched.
Instead, it was tucked into his waistband. And a judge won’t be able to decide if the stop was legal under the Constitution’s protections against unlawful searches and seizures until Reid files a motion for that to happen. Rosenbaum said that Reid was seated in the front commuter seat of the car before the investigator and his companion asked him to get out.
Rosenbaum said, “As I was strip-searching his waistband, I felt the clear shape of a handgun sticking out of his waistband, and I found a handgun.” Officers said they found a packed Polymer80 unserialized pistol, also called a “ghost gun,” with six rounds in its magazine in Reid’s waistband.
Prosecutors say that Reid possessed an additional magazine with 10 live rounds. Gun control groups did research that showed the amount of “ghost guns” used in offenses threefold between 2020 and 2021. The driver of the car was given two traffic tickets and a civil law violation for having cannabis, according to the police.
One passenger was also given a city ordinance ticket, and another passenger was let go without being charged or cited. After a bond hearing in front of Calabrese, Reid paid the $500 cash portion of his bond to get out of jail before his trial. After the preliminary hearing this week, he is due to return to court on March 27. At that time, he will be able to enter a plea.
