Speeding driver busted with drugs and $1M in cash after Kansas trooper uses ‘twostep’

An Ohio man has forfeited more than $1 million and his pickup truck to the government after a Kansas Highway Patrol trooper used the “twostep” method to make a drug bust along the interstate.

Joseph Michael Martin, 41, of Euclid, pleaded guilty Thursday in U.S. District Court in Topeka to one count of interstate travel in furtherance of drug trafficking, U.S. Attorney Stephen McAllister said in a news release. Martin’s sentencing is scheduled for Jan. 12. He faces up to five years in federal prison and a fine of up to $250,000.

Court records show that Martin will forfeit a 2016 GMC Sierra and $1,124,840 to the government.

Martin admitted as part of a plea agreement that he was involved in smuggling cocaine.

The case started at around 8:20 a.m. on Sept. 20, 2018, when Trooper Justin Rohr pulled over a truck for speeding on I-70 in Ellsworth County. Martin was the driver of the pickup, which had old hoses, electrical wire and several metal tubes in the truck bed.

“Martin appeared to have been traveling all night, as his eyes were bloodshot, and he had coffee and Red Bull in the cupholders,” the narrative in the plea agreement states. “There were two air fresheners in the truck giving a strong odor.”

The driver told the trooper that he was traveling from Ohio to California, where he planned to buy a Suzuki Hayabusa motorcycle and bring it back in the truck. The trooper did not think it would be feasible to fit a motorcycle among the pipes and hoses.

Rohr checked Martin’s criminal history — which was clean — and gave Martin a warning and told him to have a safe trip.

That’s when the trooper did what the defense attorney characterized as “the old highway patrol twostep.”

Rohr started to walk back to his patrol car, but he abruptly returned to Martin’s pickup and started to ask him more questions. Eventually, the trooper said that law enforcement “was seeing a large amount of criminal activity on I-70 and he wanted to make sure Martin did not have anything illegal in the truck,” the plea agreement states.

The trooper asked to search the vehicle, and the driver said “sure.”

Rohr had a narcotics detection dog with him, but he never used it to sniff the truck during the traffic stop. Instead, he and Trooper Dylan Frantz searched through the truck and its bed. When they checked the metal tubes that had been welded shut, they felt something slide inside as they shook it. So the troopers drilled holes into the caps and saw pink fiberglass insulation inside.

“The trooper knew there had to be something heavier in the tube and guessed bundles of money,” the plea agreement states. “But they could not access it without grinding off the cap.”

The troopers then arrested Martin and took him and the truck to the Russell patrol station, where they removed the caps and found the cash in red plastic bundles. Rohr then brought in the dog, and it alerted to the bundles of money. They then found cocaine in a contact lens case that was in one of the plastic bundles.

The defense attorney filed a motion to suppress, claiming that the troopers violated the law by damaging Martin’s property as part of their search. Judge Holly L. Teeter rejected that argument. The lawyer also mentioned the “highway patrol twostep.”

The Kansas Court of Appeals has described it as a method that is taught to all state troopers where they break off an initial traffic detention and attempt to re-engage the driver in a consensual encounter. The American Civil Liberties Union of Kansas has sued the Kansas Highway Patrol, alleging that the technique is unconstitutional.

“The KHP has maintained a practice of unlawfully detaining drivers after the initial purpose of the stop had been resolved to question drivers about their travel plans without consent or reasonable suspicion of criminal activity,” the ACLU has said. “KHP officers often use a maneuver nicknamed in law enforcement circles as the ‘Kansas Two-Step’ to accomplish these illegal detentions.”

The federal lawsuit has a settlement conference scheduled for Oct. 19.

In Martin’s case, his plea agreement states that he waives any right to appeal.