A U.S. DEA agent should be prosecuted for running a stop sign and killing a cyclist in south Salem last year because his pursuit of a drug trafficker was not urgent, the Marion County District Attorney’s Office argued on Friday in federal court.
Prosecutors asserted that Samuel T. Landis, 39, should not be immune from prosecution because his “actions were objectively unreasonable” and there was no way he could see oncoming traffic. Their filing in Eugene U.S. District Court was in response to a motion from the agent’s attorneys to dismiss the case.
Landis was pursuing a suspected fentanyl trafficker in March 2023 in the Gaiety Hill neighborhood when he ran the stop sign and drove into the path of cyclist Marganne M. Allen, 53, killing her.
At the time of the crash, four DEA agents and three Salem police officers were pursuing the courier, and Landis was among the furthest from the suspect vehicle.
“The defendant believed the subject was not in danger of being lost and all officers involved were in good radio contact. No arrests were going to be made, and ostensibly, the primary goal of this operation (to identify the vehicle the courier was driving) had already been achieved,” Marion County Deputy District Attorney David Wilson said in his eight-page court filing.
Landis’ attorneys have until Nov. 6 to respond. They argued in July that the agent’s job tracking drug dealers sometimes requires breaking traffic laws.
The criminal case has centered around whether Landis should be immune from prosecution because he was exercising his duties as a federal agent when he ran the stop sign.
His attorneys successfully argued last December to have the case moved to federal court. The immunity defense does not exist in state court, where a Marion County grand jury indicted Landis last September on a charge of criminally negligent homicide.
The Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals in May rejected state attorneys’ efforts to move the case back to Marion County Circuit Court.
Landis’ attorneys and prosecutors are scheduled to argue in person in late November over whether the case should be dismissed.
At the time of the crash, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration and the Salem Police Department were investigating fentanyl and heroin trafficking in the Salem area.
Their plan on March 28, 2023 was to identify a drug courier’s vehicle so that they could place a tracker on it at a later date.
“This was not an operation where there was an immediate danger to life or any pursuit,” Wilson wrote in his court filing, citing a Salem police sergeant’s testimony to the grand jury. “No arrests were anticipated, and none were made during the course of this operation.”
DEA policy allows its agents to violate traffic laws in certain circumstances.
Landis’ attorneys argued in their earlier motion that officers frequently speed, turn without signals and run red lights or stop signs to stay in position during surveillance missions.
Prosecutors responded by citing the DEA’s policy, which instructs that “safety of the public and the agent have higher priority than any enforcement activity. Traffic and parking laws will not be violated to the detriment of public and personal safety.”
They argued that Landis violated that policy. “It was in no way reasonable for him to blindly run a stop sign in an unfamiliar area while it was raining heavily,” Wilson said in his filing.
On the day of the crash, an informant who had bought drugs before from couriers arranged to meet another courier in the parking lot of a central Salem restaurant.
Landis’ assignment was to follow the courier after the controlled drug deal. As he did so, the courier made a sudden turn onto Mission Street heading east, and the agent missed the turn. Several officers close to the suspect decided not to follow.
Landis tried to rejoin his team but testified in August 2023 that there was no urgency and that he believed “someone had visual contact” of the vehicle.
“At the time of the crash, no one was in danger of losing sight of the suspect,” according to Wilson.
Landis’ attorneys previously argued that the turn meant officers further behind had a greater urgency to catch up to the team.
Landis at that time was driving east on Leslie Street.
He tapped his brakes before approaching the stop sign at the intersection of Southeast Leslie and High Streets.
At that moment, it would have been impossible for him to see oncoming traffic going south on High Street, according to testimony from a Keizer police officer. Traffic on High Street does not stop at the intersection.
The agent then drove into the intersection at around 18 to 19 miles per hour without stopping, the Keizer officer testified. The cyclist, Allen, who had the right of way, then collided with Landis’ government-owned pickup truck.
“This court must decide whether it was objectively reasonable for a federal agent to run a stop sign at an intersection where he could not have seen oncoming traffic, while driving in an unfamiliar location, during a non-emergent surveillance operation, while in good communication with other officers, at a time when he believed the subject was still being visually tracked by other members of his team and no arrests were planning to be made or actually made that day,” Wilson said in his filing.
He said that Landis’ motion to dismiss the case should be denied. “His actions were neither necessary nor proper,” the prosecutor said.
RELATED COVERAGE:
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Contact reporter Ardeshir Tabrizian: [email protected] or 503-929-3053.
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Ardeshir Tabrizian has covered criminal justice and housing for Salem Reporter since September 2021. As an Oregon native, his award-winning watchdog journalism has traversed the state. He has done reporting for The Oregonian, Eugene Weekly and Malheur Enterprise.
