State v. Williams

665 So. 2d 112, 1995 WL 684793
Louisiana Court of Appeal·Decided November 16, 1995·No. 95-K-1971·Published·Cited by 16 cases

Opinion

665 So.2d 112 (1995)

STATE of Louisiana
v.
Joann WILLIAMS, Monique Breely and Stephanie Brown, a/k/a Stephanie Harris.

No. 95-K-1971.

Court of Appeal of Louisiana, Fourth Circuit.

November 16, 1995.

*113 Harry F. Connick, District Attorney, Kevin Marks, Assistant District Attorney, Gina H. Warner, Law Clerk, New Orleans, for State.

Before LOBRANO, ARMSTRONG and WALTZER, JJ.

WALTZER, Judge.

STATEMENT OF THE CASE

The defendants have been charged in this case with possession of cocaine. The motion to suppress the evidence was heard on August 25, 1995, at the conclusion of which the court granted the motion as to defendant Brown. The State now comes before this court seeking relief from this ruling. The transcript of the August 25th hearing has been received, and it indicates that this writ was filed timely.

FACTS

On the afternoon of February 10, 1995, police officers executed a search warrant at 2315 Joliet Street. As the officers arrived at the residence, they discovered the defendant Stephanie Brown, who had just exited the house. They detained her, entered and secured the house, and then escorted her inside. Also inside the house were the defendants Joann Williams and Monique Breely and a child. The officers advised the women that they were under investigation for narcotics violations, advised them of their Miranda rights, and advised them that the officers had a warrant to search the house. The officers asked the women if they had any contraband or weapons to declare, and when the women did not answer, the officers began searching the house. At one point, Ms. Williams told the officers that she would tell them where the drugs were if they stopped searching. Ms. Williams told them that she personally was holding a small amount of cocaine in her pocket and that she had given the rest of it to Ms. Breely to keep for her. The officers searched Ms. Williams and retrieved both powdered and crack cocaine. The officers then asked Ms. Breely to pull her bra away from her chest, and when she did so, powdered and crack cocaine and marijuana fell from her bra. A search of Ms. Brown's purse revealed .7 grams of cocaine.

DISCUSSION

The only evidence suppressed by the trial court was the .7 grams of cocaine seized from Ms. Brown, who had exited the house just as the officers arrived to execute the search warrant. Neither party argues that the search warrant was deficient; indeed there appears to be ample probable cause for its issuance. Nor does this writ concern the evidence seized from Ms. Williams and Ms. Breely. The sole issue before this court is whether the small amount of cocaine found in Ms. Brown's purse was lawfully seized.

*114 The State argues that the issuance of the warrant empowered the officers to search Ms. Brown and her purse. In support, it cites Michigan v. Summers, 452 U.S. 692, 101 S.Ct. 2587, 69 L.Ed.2d 340 (1981), where the Court held that officers executing a search warrant could detain the resident of the place to be searched during the pendency of the search. In Summers, the officers encountered the defendant, who lived in the house to be searched, on the steps of the house just as they arrived to search the house. The officers detained the defendant, requested his assistance in entering the house, and then arrested him when they discovered drugs in the house. Pursuant to a search incident to this arrest, they found additional drugs in his pocket. Upholding the detention of the defendant, the Court noted that the defendant's privacy rights had already been intruded upon by the execution of the search warrant for his house, for which a magistrate had already found probable cause. The Court further noted that the additional violation of his privacy right in being detained during the search of his house was minimal. The Court stated:

If the evidence that a citizen's residence is harboring contraband is sufficient to persuade a judicial officer that an invasion of the citizen's privacy is justified, it is constitutionally reasonable to require that citizen to remain while officers of the law execute a valid warrant to search his home. Thus, for Fourth Amendment purposes, we hold that a warrant to search for contraband founded on probable cause implicitly carries with it the limited authority to detain the occupants of the premises while a proper search is conducted. [footnotes omitted]

Id., 452 U.S. at 704-705, 101 S.Ct. at 2595.

In a footnote, the Court continued: "Although special circumstances, or possibly a prolonged detention, might lead to a different conclusion in an unusual case, we are persuaded that this routine detention of residents of a house while it was being searched for contraband pursuant to a valid warrant is not such a case." Id. at 705, fn. 21, 101 S.Ct. at 2595-2596, fn. 21.

Summers was interpreted by the Louisiana Supreme Court in State v. Beals, 410 So.2d 745 (La.1982), the case upon which the trial court based its ruling in this case. In Beals, drugs were seized from the defendant's pocket during the execution of a search warrant for her house. Unlike in Summers, where the search of the defendant was made incident to his arrest for contraband found in his house, in Beals the defendant was searched as a part of the execution of the warrant. Thus, the issue before the Court was whether the issuance of the search warrant for the defendant's house authorized the officers executing the warrant to search the outer clothing of the defendant. The Court cited Summers and Ybarra v. Illinois, 444 U.S. 85, 100 S.Ct. 338, 62 L.Ed.2d 238 (1979), where the U.S. Supreme Court had held that the issuance of a search warrant for a bar and the bartender working there did not extend to the search of a patron of the bar in the absence of any indication that the bar was frequented by drug users or that patrons were seen using drugs in the bar. The Louisiana Supreme Court in Beals noted that the affidavit for the search warrant indicated that occupant of the residence had been selling drugs from the residence, that drugs were seen in plain view on a table in the residence, and that an earlier search of the apartment had revealed drugs. Thus, the Court noted, the officers had reason to believe that the defendant had "a special connection with the premises and that she was in possession of contraband." State v. Beals, 410 So.2d at 748. The Court held:

Our specific but narrow holding under the facts and circumstances of this case is that where a warrant to search a residence for contraband is issued on probable cause based on information that the occupant of the residence participated in the sale of drugs at the residence three days prior to the issuance of the warrant, the reasonable scope of the warrant extends to a search of the pockets of the outer clothing of the resident of the premises who is on the premises at the time it is searched.
Ybarra notes that the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments protect the "legitimate expectations of privacy of persons, not places." It is equally true that crimes *115 are committed by persons, not places. A warrant to search a place based on probable cause information that the resident of that place has committed or is committing a crime in that plac

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State v. Williams, 665 So. 2d 112, 1995 WL 684793 (La. Ct. App. 1995).

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