Appeal
from Shelby Circuit Court (CV-16-900459)
Page 322
Jeffrey Bryan Pino of Jim Pino & Associates, P.C.,
Pelham, for appellant.
Steve
Marshall, atty. gen., and Yvonne A.H. Saxon, asst. atty.
gen., for appellee.
EDWARDS,
Judge.
Mary
Alice Wilson, a Colorado resident, appeals from a judgment
entered by the Shelby Circuit Court ("the trial
court") ordering the forfeiture of $19,410 ("the
$19,410") to the State of Alabama pursuant to Ala. Code
1975, § 20-2-93.
Christopher
Bruton, a resident of Shelby County, originally met Wilson on
a cruise in 2013. They smoked marijuana together on the
cruise, and, thereafter, Bruton began purchasing marijuana
from Wilson in quantities of one-half pound or one pound per
purchase; occasionally, Bruton also purchased alprazolam,
i.e., Xanax, from Wilson.[1] To obtain the drugs, Bruton would
contact Wilson by text message and request marijuana
("sometimes specify[ing] the amount and `flavor'
(`Gorilla Glue,' `Bruce Banner,' `Luke
Skywalker,' etc.)") or Xanax. Wilson would respond
by text message, and, within a few days, she would ship the
drugs to Bruton and would provide him with a tracking number
for the shipment. Wilson would also indicate the cost for the
drugs, if she and Bruton had not already agreed to the
specific cost. After Bruton received the shipment, he would
make a deposit into a bank account Wilson had at Wells Fargo,
as directed by Wilson. Bruton made the deposits at a Wells
Fargo branch in Pelham.
Wilson's
first shipment of marijuana to Bruton was in late August
2013. Thereafter, Bruton placed orders and received shipments
of marijuana or Xanax from Wilson every two or three months,
on average,
Page 323
until May 2016. On May 17, 2016, a Birmingham police officer
obtained a search warrant for a package from Wilson that was
intended for Bruton. The warrant was issued based on a
positive indication from a narcotics-detection dog that had
occurred while the package was being processed at a local
Federal Express facility; the ensuing search revealed that
the package contained 1.14 pounds of marijuana in a
vacuum-sealed bag. The package was thereafter delivered to
Bruton at his Shelby County address. Officers from the Shelby
County Drug Enforcement Task Force ("the task
force") were present when the package was delivered and
confronted Bruton after he accepted delivery. Bruton
thereafter agreed to cooperate with the task force's
investigation of Wilson, including consenting to a review of
information contained on Bruton's cellular telephone. We
note that Bruton made no payment to Wilson for the May 2016
shipment of marijuana, although a text message from Wilson to
Bruton on October 28, 2013, stated that she had "a
policy" of charging only half the agreed upon price if
she sent a package that "gets lost or taken."
Based
on information obtained during the task force's
investigation into Wilson and Bruton's relationship, on
May 18, 2016, the task force seized $35,746.70 ("the
$35,746.70") from four accounts at Wells Fargo that
belonged to Wilson; the $35,746.70 was seized through a
Shelby County branch of Wells Fargo. The four accounts are
hereinafter identified by the last four digits of the
respective Wells Fargo account numbers, namely 3990, 6995,
5935, and 6603. We note that all of Bruton's deposits
were made into Wilson's Wells Fargo account number 6603
("the 6603 account"), which, on May 18, 2016, had a
balance of $27,709.23 ("the $27,709.23") and was
part of the $35,746.70.
On June
10, 2016, the State filed a complaint in the trial court
seeking forfeiture of the $35,746.70 pursuant to §
20-2-93. In addition to the $35,746.70, Wilson was named as a
defendant. Wilson filed an answer to the State's
complaint. Thereafter, she filed a motion for a summary
judgment arguing that the State's claims to the portions
of the $35,746.70 seized from her Wells Fargo account numbers
3990, 6995, and 5935 were due to be denied because the State
had no evidence indicating that the currency from those
accounts was associated with any illegal drug transaction.
Accordingly, Wilson contended, the currency seized from those
three accounts was due to be returned to her.
Regarding
the $27,709.23 seized from the 6603 account, the text
messages retrieved from Bruton's cellular telephone
reflect that, between August 2013 and March 2016, Bruton made
15 deposits for the purchase of marijuana or Xanax into that
account; those deposits totaled $30,410. However, according
to an affidavit filed by Wilson in support of her motion for
a summary judgment, when the State seized the $27,709.23 from
the 6603 account, most of the $27,709.23 was from deposits
that were not related to any illegal drug transaction. Wilson
argued that the State's evidence could link only $4,260
of the $27,709.23 to any specific illegal drug transaction
— the payments for transactions between her and Bruton
in January 2016, February 2016, and March 2016 — and
she contended that the remaining $23,449.23 from the 6603
account should be returned to her. Wilson argued, in the
alternative, that the two-year statute of limitations in Ala.
Code 1975, § 6-2-38(l) precluded the State from
retaining any currency from the 6603 account that was
attributable to an illegal drug transaction that had occurred
more than two years before the State filed its forfeiture
complaint; the currency deposited by Bruton
Page 324
into the 6603 account for transactions during the two years
before the State filed its complaint totaled $19,410.
The
State filed a response to Wilson's motion for a summary
judgment, and, after a hearing on that motion, the trial
court entered a summary judgment in favor of Wilson and
against the State regarding the portions of the $35,746.70
seized from Wilson's Wells Fargo account numbers 3990,
6995, and 5935. Regarding the $27,709.23 seized from the 6603
account, however, the trial court concluded that a disputed
issue of material fact precluded the entry of a summary
judgment against the State.
In
addition to the forfeiture action, the State filed criminal
charges against Wilson for her attempted sale and delivery of
marijuana to Bruton in May 2016. Apparently, no charges were
filed against Bruton. On November 2, 2016, Wilson pleaded
guilty in the criminal proceeding to conspiring to distribute
a controlled substance in violation of Ala. Code 1975, §
13A-12-204.
On
November 19, 2018, the trial court held an ore tenus
proceeding in the forfeiture action. The only witness who
testified at the trial was Bruton. Wilson did not attend the
trial, although her counsel was present. In addition to
Bruton's testimony, the State and Wilson stipulated to
the admission into evidence of all the exhibits offered as
part of the summary-judgment proceeding (including the
materials attached to a motion to reconsider that Wilson had
filed), which included an affidavit from Wilson, a copy of
her guilty plea from the criminal proceeding, documents from
the task force's investigation, bank-account statements,
and a printout of the text messages between Bruton and
Wilson. At trial, the State argued that Bruton had deposited
more than the $27,709.23 into the 6603 account for illegal
drug purchases from Wilson and that the State was entitled to
all of the $27,709.23.
On
December 6, 2018, the trial court entered a judgment
declaring that the $27,709.23 the State seized from the 6603
account was forfeited to the task force. See Ala.
Code 1975, § 20-2-93(e)(2). In the December 2018
judgment, the trial court determined that the $27,709.23 was
"proceeds knowingly commingled with proceeds used to
facilitate violation of the criminal controlled substance
laws for the State of Alabama and/or [was] proceeds knowingly
commingled with proceeds that were the fruits of the illegal
sale of controlled substances in the State of Alabama."
The trial court further stated that it found no Alabama
precedent specifically addressing the commingling issue, and
it
"adopt[ed] the United States Eleventh Circuit Court of
Appeals' analysis in U.S. v. One Single Family
Residence Located at 15603 85th Ave. North, Lake Park, Palm
Beach County, Florida, 933 F.2d 976, 981-982 (11th
Cir. 1991), in distinguishing individuals who are `innocent
owners' from those who are `wrongdoers' who
knowingly mix illicit proceeds with proceeds attributable
to illegal drug transactions. Thereby, this Court finds
that ... Wilson should not prevail in keeping any amount of
the funds from... [the] 6603 [account] because she is
clearly a `wrongdoer' who knowingly engaged in illegal
drug activity and who knowingly directed ... Bruton to
deposit funds for illegal drugs into ... [the] 6603
[account]."
We note
that in United States v. One Single Family Residence
Located at 15603 85th Avenue North, Lake Park, Palm Beach
County, Florida, 933 F.2d 976, 978 (11th Cir. 1991), the
United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit
("the Court of Appeals") ...