State v. Neely

156 N.W.2d 840, 261 Iowa 1107, 1968 Iowa Sup. LEXIS 810
CourtSupreme Court of Iowa
DecidedMarch 5, 1968
Docket52645
StatusPublished
Cited by9 cases

This text of 156 N.W.2d 840 (State v. Neely) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Iowa primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
State v. Neely, 156 N.W.2d 840, 261 Iowa 1107, 1968 Iowa Sup. LEXIS 810 (iowa 1968).

Opinion

MOORE, Justice.

Defendant James Neely was charged, tried and convicted of breaking and entering in violation of section 708.8, Codes 1962, 1966, and has appealed. We affirm.

Defendant’s two assigned errors are that his motion to suppress and objections to testimony based on an alleged unreasonable search and seizure should have been sustained and the evidence was insufficient to corroborate the testimony of an accomplice as required hy Code section 782.5.

About 10 p. m., January 21, 1966, Mr. and Mrs. Homer Shaw discovered the front door of Barton Abarr’s Phillips 66 service station in the town of Redding, Ringgold County, was standing open. They so notified Abarr at his nearby residence and returned to the station with him.

They discovered the lower pane of glass was broken out of the door, the pop machine pried open, the cigarette display disarranged and the cash register open. The frame which had enclosed the safe in the wall had been pried away and the safe taken. Abarr had closed and locked the station at 8:20 p. m.

About 8:30 p. m., Alta Jeanes, a local resident, drove by the station and observed an automobile parked in the station driveway with three persons sitting in it. She described it as a blue Ford with a white top, .in the 50’s.

A 1955 Ford, white over green, license 21-859, occupied by Tom Pinegar, Ronald Johnston, Barbara Nelson and defendant James Neely had been stopped by the highway patrol in Adair or Adel the day before. The local law enforcement officers had seen the vehicle in Leon and Lamoni the night before the break-in. They had also seen it in that area the day of the break-in.

Abarr upon discovering the break-in notified Sheriff Strange who came to the scene. The sheriff immediately put out a radio call to all police officers to be on the lookout for a white over green 1955 or 1956 Ford, license number 21-859. A Missouri trooper reported the car had been observed in Hatfield, Missouri earlier that evening.

In response to the radio dispatch Patrolman Wignall and Sergeant Grotewold of the Iowa Highway Patrol drove to Lamoni where they observed the described Ford parked in the driveway next to the apartment occupied by Mr. and Mrs. Alfred Pinegar. They later learned it was registered to Alfred’s brother, Tom Pinegar of Des Moines. They then notified other officers by radio the car had been located.

Other officers, including Deputy Sheriff Houck and Officer Peel soon arrived. *842 They remained in the road and while discussing what should be done observed a young man, later identified as Ronald Johnston, come up the road and enter the Pinegar residence. Johnston then came out with a girl and started toward the Ford. Officers Wignall and Houck approached them, inquired where they were going and were told they were going for a ride. Wignall told them not to leave because the officers wanted to look inside the house. Johnston stated they better get a search warrant. The two young people went back into the Pinegar apartment. Houck left for the purpose of getting a search warrant. Wignall returned to the patrol car and reported to Sergeant Grotewold.

The officers became suspicious of what had or could happen and decided to go around and observe the opposite side of the apartment building. As officers Wignall and Peel went around the building they saw a window screen from the Alfred Pinegar apartment on the ground. They also observed many footprints in the snow leading south from the window.

The officers followed these footprints three to four hundred feet south and while searching around a large woodpile near another house they heard a noise which caused them to throw the light from their flashlights toward an outhouse. They there saw defendant Neely who, in response to their inquiry of what he was doing there, stated he was urinating. The fly of his trousers was unzipped. Wignall then took defendant to his patrol car where he was retained. He refused to answer any question other than give his name.

Soon after Neely was placed in the patrol car Mr. and Mrs. George Black drove up, parked and started toward the Alfred Pinegar residence. They were known by some of the officers as parents of Mrs. Pinegar. The Blacks were told if they entered the apartment they would not be permitted to leave until after a search under a warrant was made. Mrs. Black stated it would be all right for the officers to enter but they did not do so until Mrs. Pinegar came to the door and specifically consented to the officers’ entry. Mrs. Pinegar then turned on the lights in her home and the officers entered.

On entering the Pinegar home the officers observed the stolen safe near the door sitting on its top. A hole had been broken through the bottom and cement fragments were on top of the safe and on the floor around it. There was an open tool chest on the floor and a hammer on the safe. A fruit can full of pennies was found on the davenport.

The two Pinegar brothers were later found hiding in another house in Lamoni and a large amount of paper money recovered.

I. Defendant’s motion to suppress made before trial alleged the search of the Pine-gar premises both in and outside of the apartment was an illegal search and seizure and sought to suppress all evidence related thereto. After an evidentiary hearing the trial court overruled the motion to suppress. Defendant’s contentions were reasserted during the trial and in his motion for new trial.

On this appeal defendant makes no attack on the evidence discovered by the officers following Mrs. Pinegar’s consent that they enter her apartment home. This is understandable as the rule is now well established that not all searches and seizures undertaken without a warrant are unreasonable. The search and seizure of the apartment predicated on the undisputed voluntary consent of Mrs. Pinegar brings it under an exception to the rule a search must rest upon a search warrant. Our review of these principles and supporting authority are set out in our recent case of State v. Halverson, Iowa, 155 N.W.2d 177, 179, 180, filed December 12, 1967, and need not be repeated here.

II. Defendant asserts the evidence discovered when the officers went around to the opposite side of the apartment building *843 was obtained by illegal search and seizure and therefore inadmissible under Mapp v. Ohio, 367 U.S. 643, 81 S.Ct. 1684, 6 L.Ed.2d 1081, 84 A.L.R.2d 933. We do not agree.

Cross-examination of Wignall by defendant’s counsel (not his present counsel) includes: “Q. Now, this would be a house with a lot, would it be ? Is there a lot and some outbuildings that belong with the premises? This home of Alfred’s in Lamo-ni, is it a house? Is there a lot that goes with it? A. I don’t know if the lot goes with it or not. Q. You don’t know what part of it would be contiguous with the house or not, would you? A. No, I don’t know how it is laid out as property. There is this building. It is a long, narrow one. I do know the building is divided into two apartments, the one A1 lives in, and one right next to him east is vacant and I believe there is two more. I am not positive .of that, and then there is two or three house trailers' around there. Q.

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

State v. Barker
262 N.W.2d 538 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 1978)
State v. Bakker
262 N.W.2d 538 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 1978)
State v. King
256 N.W.2d 1 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 1977)
State v. Kramer
231 N.W.2d 874 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 1975)
State v. Davis
228 N.W.2d 67 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 1975)
State v. True
190 N.W.2d 405 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 1971)
State v. Cornwell
189 N.W.2d 611 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 1971)
State v. Schlater
170 N.W.2d 601 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 1969)
State v. Upton
167 N.W.2d 625 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 1969)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
156 N.W.2d 840, 261 Iowa 1107, 1968 Iowa Sup. LEXIS 810, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-v-neely-iowa-1968.