State v. McCarthy

452 S.W.2d 211, 1970 Mo. LEXIS 1033
CourtSupreme Court of Missouri
DecidedApril 13, 1970
Docket54409
StatusPublished
Cited by13 cases

This text of 452 S.W.2d 211 (State v. McCarthy) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Missouri primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
State v. McCarthy, 452 S.W.2d 211, 1970 Mo. LEXIS 1033 (Mo. 1970).

Opinion

FINCH, Judge.

Defendant, charged and convicted under the Second Offender Act of burglary second degree and stealing, was sentenced to imprisonment for terms of ten and five years to run concurrently. We affirm.

The single issue presented on appeal is whether the trial court erred in overruling a motion to suppress as evidence various articles seized from the automobile when defendant was arrested and which the court thereafter admitted in evidence. Accordingly, we recite the evidence only insofar as necessary to determine the search and seizure issue presented.

At about 7:35 p. m. on October 9, 1967, Officers Boedy and Hodges of the St. Louis County Police Department, dressed in plain clothes and driving an unmarked police car, were patrolling on Parker Road when they observed two men walking parallel to the street in an adjacent field. The men, who were within 25 to 40 feet of the officers, were carrying bundles of some kind, but when first observed the light was not sufficient to enable the officers to tell what the men were carrying. The police car slowed until it was barely moving in order to watch the men. They were approaching a parking lot which was well lighted and as they entered that lot the officers could see that defendant, wearing a plaid shirt and dark trousers, was carrying a large white sack which appeared to be a pillowcase. Defendant was recognized by Officer Hodges. Defendant’s companion, wearing dark shirt and trousers, had red hair but was not recognized by either officer. He was carrying a dark cloth bag with what appeared to be two gun barrels (either rifle or shotgun) protruding about one and one-half feet.

The officers observed the men open the trunk of a car and place therein the bundles they were carrying, after which the men got into the car. The police car circled a block and came to the parking lot exit just as the car occupied by defendant and his companion backed out and drove off. The police car followed. The car driven by defendant accelerated rapidly, made a wide turn at the corner, getting onto the wrong side of the road in the process. Thereafter, it traveled at a speed considerably in excess of the speed limit, weaving back and forth across the center line markings, and at times being entirely on the wrong side of the street. *213 The car entered a shopping center parking lot and stopped, whereupon the passenger riding in the right-hand front seat opened the door and ran. Officer Hodges jumped from the police car and tried to catch the fleeing man. Officer Boedy went up to the driver’s side of the automobile, identified himself as a police officer, and informed defendant that he was under arrest for careless and reckless driving. Boedy asked to see defendant’s operator’s license, and when he had none, also arrested him for driving without an operator’s license.

As Officer Boedy stood by the car talking to the defendant and advising him of his constitutional rights, he could see in plain view on the floor in front of the passenger front seat a pair of pliers, a screwdriver, a flashlight, and a pair of gloves. In addition, he observed on the dashboard a St. Louis County map.

About that time, Officer Hodges returned from an unsuccessful chase after the passenger who had fled. Officer Boedy had opened the driver’s door and told defendant to get out, but before defendant had actually alighted from the car, Boedy also told him that he was under arrest on suspicion of possession of burglary tools.

When defendant alighted from the car, he was searched by Officer Boedy, who, upon finding in his pocket a knife which, when opened, measured ten and one-fourth inches in overall length, then advised defendant that he also was under arrest for carrying a concealed weapon.

Officer Hodges then took the defendant and handcuffed him to the door of the police car, after which he and Officer Boedy then proceeded to enter the car and removed the articles which Boedy had observed as he stood outside the car talking to the defendant. They also found on the back seat of the car an Army fatigue jacket, another flashlight and a heavy wooden club with a carved handle. Officer Boedy examined the map of St. Louis County and found that the area in which 1841 Parker Road was located had been circled.

The officers searched defendant for a key to the trunk but found none. They then removed the back cushion of the rear seat and when they looked into the trunk of the car could see the pillowcase containing articles of some kind and also the two guns which they earlier had observed defendant’s companion carrying and which they had seen him place in the trunk. The officers were unable to reach these things from inside the car, but when a wrecker arrived they employed a pry bar and wrench from the truck to open the car trunk. There they found a double-barreled Stevens shotgun, a 6.5 caliber Japanese rifle, a P38 German pistol, and a pillowcase containing a camera, binoculars, a jewelry box containing a man’s Elgin wrist watch, identification bracelet, cuff links and other items of jewelry, and a box of trading stamps.

These items were removed from the car and placed in the trunk of the police car, At that time the officers did not- know of the burglary of the Schottenhaml residence at 1841 Parker Road, but as they were starting to headquarters with the defendant in the police car they learned of that burglary, and they then drove by the Schottenhaml home where the various articles which had been removed from the car driven by defendant were identified by Mr. Schottenhaml as having been taken from his home that evening.

Defendant’s position is that the search of the automobile cannot be justified as incidental to his arrest for careless and reckless driving because that arrest was unlawful. According to him, the arrest was made merely as a pretext for conducting a search of the automobile. This position is not sustained by the evidence because there was undisputed testimony that defendant did drive in a very careless and reckless manner, which would justify the arrest which was made. Defendant is not insulated from arrest there *214 for because of his prior suspicious activity which prompted the officers to follow him. In any event, the search of which defendant complains was not incident to the arrest for careless and reckless driving but, instead, followed and was incident to the arrest on suspicion of possession of burglary tools.

Defendant’s second contention is that search of the automobile cannot be justified as being incident to the arrest on suspicion of possession of burglary tools, that arrest also being unlawful “because the mere presence of an ordinary screwdriver, an ordinary flashlight and a pair of cotton gloves observed on the floor of the passenger side of the vehicle did not constitute the commission of a felony in the presence of the arresting officer.” This contention necessitates a consideration of whether probable cause for this arrest existed.

In State v. Novak, Mo., 428 S.W.2d 585, this court reviewed the subject of probable cause for arrest and in so doing stated, 1. c. 591: “Dealing with probable cause for arrest requires dealing with probabilities which are not technical but ‘are the factual and practical considerations of everyday life on which reasonable and prudent men, not legal technicians, act.

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Bluebook (online)
452 S.W.2d 211, 1970 Mo. LEXIS 1033, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-v-mccarthy-mo-1970.