State v. Marquez

CourtNew Mexico Court of Appeals
DecidedJuly 28, 2025
DocketA-1-CA-41488
StatusPublished

This text of State v. Marquez (State v. Marquez) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering New Mexico Court of Appeals primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
State v. Marquez, (N.M. Ct. App. 2025).

Opinion

The slip opinion is the first version of an opinion released by the Clerk of the Court of Appeals. Once an opinion is selected for publication by the Court, it is assigned a vendor-neutral citation by the Clerk of the Court for compliance with Rule 23-112 NMRA, authenticated and formally published. The slip opinion may contain deviations from the formal authenticated opinion. 1 IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF THE STATE OF NEW MEXICO

2 Opinion Number: __________

3 Filing Date: July 28, 2025

4 No. A-1-CA-41488

5 STATE OF NEW MEXICO,

6 Plaintiff-Appellee,

7 v.

8 VON MARQUEZ a/k/a VON P. MARQUEZ 9 a/k/a VON PAUL MARQUEZ,

10 Defendant-Appellant.

11 APPEAL FROM THE DISTRICT COURT OF SAN JUAN COUNTY 12 Curtis R. Gurley, District Court Judge

13 Raúl Torrez, Attorney General 14 Santa Fe, NM 15 Charles J. Gutierrez, Senior Solicitor General 16 Michael J. Thomas, Assistant Solicitor General 17 Albuquerque, NM

18 for Appellee

19 Bennett J. Baur, Chief Public Defender 20 Melanie C. McNett, Assistant Appellate Defender 21 Santa Fe, NM

22 for Appellant 1 OPINION

2 IVES, Judge.

3 {1} Defendant Von Marquez appeals the district court’s denial of his motion to

4 suppress evidence obtained from a warrantless search of his backpack. The district

5 court concluded that the arresting officers conducted a valid inventory search. On

6 appeal, Defendant argues that the district court erred because the State’s justification

7 for inventorying the contents of the backpack does not suffice under the Fourth

8 Amendment of the United States Constitution and Article II, Section 10 of the New

9 Mexico Constitution. In response, the State focuses on its argument—made for the

10 first time on appeal—that Defendant lacks standing to challenge the search because

11 he denied owning the backpack and because he abandoned the backpack before his

12 arrest by leaving it in an apartment in which he did not reside. The State also argues

13 that even if Defendant had standing, the inventory search was reasonable because of

14 the officers’ safety concerns. We conclude that the law does not allow us to rely on

15 a lack of standing to affirm the district court as right for any reason because the

16 State’s standing arguments involve factual questions that are not answered by the

17 evidence presented at the suppression hearing and because Defendant lacked an

18 opportunity to present evidence regarding standing as a consequence of the State’s

19 choice not to raise the issue in the district court. We also conclude that the

20 warrantless inventory search of Defendant’s backpack was invalid under the New 1 Mexico Constitution. We therefore reverse the order denying the motion to suppress

2 and remand for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.

3 BACKGROUND

4 {2} On September 9, 2022, an anonymous caller informed the Bloomfield Police

5 Department that Defendant—who had an outstanding arrest warrant for failing to

6 appear in court—was at the Pinos Blancos Apartment Complex wearing jeans, a

7 vest, no shirt, and a backpack. Officer David Gonzales and Sergeant Christian

8 Waltermire searched the apartment complex and spotted Defendant on the balcony

9 of apartment 69. The officers asked the tenant whether they could enter the

10 apartment to search for a fugitive. The tenant initially declined, but when the officers

11 said that they would obtain a search warrant, the tenant agreed that they could enter.

12 Upon entering the apartment, a small child and an adult male—not Defendant—

13 came out of the bathroom and were told to leave the apartment. Defendant eventually

14 came out of a back room and was arrested.

15 {3} As Officer Gonzales escorted Defendant to the patrol vehicle, Sergeant

16 Waltermire returned to the apartment to search for the backpack described by the

17 anonymous caller. Sergeant Waltermire told the tenant that the officers needed to

18 retrieve Defendant’s property, reentered the apartment, and eventually found a

19 backpack in the closet of a child’s room—the same room that Defendant had exited

20 during the initial search. It is undisputed that the backpack was zipped shut, and the

2 1 tenant said the backpack did not belong to her or her children and “[she] guess[ed]”

2 that it was Defendant’s. Police searched the backpack while Defendant was in the

3 back of the patrol vehicle, and they found what they believed to be fentanyl pills and

4 drug paraphernalia. Later, at the police station, Defendant acknowledged that he

5 owned the backpack and its contents, according to the affidavit submitted in support

6 of a search warrant for Defendant’s cell phone. The State charged Defendant with

7 trafficking by possession with intent to distribute, contrary to NMSA 1978, Section

8 30-31-20(A)(3) (2006).

9 {4} In the affidavit for a warrant to search Defendant’s phone, Officer Gonzales

10 described the search of Defendant’s backpack as a “search incident to arrest.”

11 Defendant moved to suppress the evidence, arguing that the search was not a valid

12 search incident to arrest. In its response, the State conceded that the search was not

13 incident to arrest but argued that it was a valid inventory search. Defendant replied

14 that the search was not a valid inventory search.

15 {5} After a hearing, the district court denied Defendant’s motion to suppress,

16 concluding, in pertinent part, that “[t]he police were justified in seizing the backpack

17 because it could not safely be left behind in the apartment where [Defendant] was

18 found and arrested, and where small children were located” and that the inventory

19 search was valid because it “served at least two purposes: 1) to shield the police from

3 1 accusations of theft or damage to [Defendant’s] property, and 2) to protect

2 [Defendant’s] property.”

3 {6} Defendant pleaded guilty to charges brought in multiple cases, including

4 distribution of an imitation controlled substance, contrary to NMSA 1978, Section

5 30-31A-4 (1983); trafficking by possession with intent to distribute, contrary to

6 Section 30-31-20(A)(3); and possession of a controlled substance, contrary to

7 NMSA 1978, Section 30-31-23(A), (E) (2021). Defendant reserved his right to

8 appeal the suppression ruling.

9 DISCUSSION

10 I. Lack of Standing Is Not an Appropriate Basis for Affirmance Under the 11 Right for any Reason Doctrine in this Case

12 {7} The State contends that Defendant lacked standing to challenge the search of

13 the backpack because he did not have a reasonable expectation of privacy in the

14 contents of the backpack. See State v. Sanders, 2024-NMCA-030, ¶ 10, 545 P.3d

15 1176. In support of this contention, the State argues that (1) Defendant denies

16 ownership of the backpack and (2) alternatively, Defendant relinquished any privacy

17 interest in the backpack when he “abandoned” the item in a home that was not his.

18 The State concedes that its standing arguments were not presented to the district

19 court and that the district court did not rule on standing, but the State asks us to rely

20 on its appellate standing arguments to affirm the district court under the right for any

21 reason doctrine. We decline to do so because, as we will explain, the doctrine does

4 1 not apply to the fact-dependent arguments presented by the State for the first time

2 on appeal.

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Related

State v. Arredondo
1997 NMCA 081 (New Mexico Court of Appeals, 1997)
State v. Baca
528 P.2d 656 (New Mexico Court of Appeals, 1974)
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State v. Granville
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State v. Paananen
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State v. Davis
2018 NMSC 1 (New Mexico Supreme Court, 2017)
State v. Guebara
894 P.2d 1018 (New Mexico Court of Appeals, 1995)
State v. Granville
2006 NMCA 098 (New Mexico Court of Appeals, 2006)
State v. Marquez
539 P.3d 303 (New Mexico Supreme Court, 2023)
State v. Ontiveros
543 P.3d 1191 (New Mexico Supreme Court, 2023)
State v. Jim
508 P.3d 937 (New Mexico Court of Appeals, 2022)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
State v. Marquez, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-v-marquez-nmctapp-2025.