United States v. Jack Palmer Vaneaton

49 F.3d 1423, 95 Daily Journal DAR 3223, 95 Cal. Daily Op. Serv. 1884, 1995 U.S. App. LEXIS 4793, 1995 WL 101835

• Court: Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit
• Decided: March 13, 1995
• Docket: 93-30387
• Status: Published

Opinions

Opinion by Judge TROTT. Dissent by Judge TASHIMA.

TROTT, Circuit Judge:

John Vaneaton¹ was arrested on September 9, 1992, while standing just inside the open door of his motel room in Bend, Oregon. He was arrested without a warrant by officers of the Bend Police Department. He concedes that the police who arrested him for receiving stolen property had probable cause to do so, but he contends that the warrant-less arrest violated the rule of Payton v. New York, 445 U.S. 573, 100 S.Ct. 1371, 63 L.Ed.2d 639 (1980), a rule ordinarily requiring police to obtain a warrant before arresting a suspect inside his home, or in this case, inside his motel room.

We have jurisdiction over this timely appeal pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1291 and Fed. R.Crim.P. 11(e)(2). We affirm the district court’s denial of Vaneaton’s motion to suppress a revolver found in his motel room in connection with his arrest. This revolver was used to secure his conditional plea of guilty to a charge of felon in possession of a firearm.

I

On August 25, 1992, officers of the Portland Police Bureau arrested Vaneaton in Portland, Oregon on outstanding no-bail warrants charging him with a parole violation and contempt of court. He had failed to report as required to his parole officer. Va-neaton, a notorious, thrice-convicted burglar known by the police to operate primarily in the Willamette Valley and along the coast of Oregon, lived in Independence, Oregon, some 60 miles from Portland. He was known to have committed crimes in at least four counties: Polk, Lincoln, Jackson, and Multnomah.

Around the time Vaneaton was arrested, he had been repeatedly selling goods to various pawn shops in the Portland area, an activity that attracted the attention of the police. Among the items he sold were pieces of jewelry that turned out to have been stolen during recent unsolved residential burglaries in the Bend, Oregon area. Bend is located in the middle of the state, approximately 150 miles from Portland, and 100 miles from Independence. When arrested, he had documents on his person indicating he had previously been in Bend. Vaneaton was released shortly after his arrest. The police were unaware of his release.

As part of an investigation instigated as a result of Vaneaton’s possession of stolen property, and in order to determine if proof could be developed that Vaneaton had been in Bend precisely at the time of the crimes during which the jewelry was stolen, uniformed officers of the Bend Police Department were detailed on September 9, 1992, to tour motels in that area to look for such evidence. They found it at their first stop, the Rainbow Motel. Not only did they discover that Vaneaton had been in Bend at the time of the burglaries, but they also discovered to their surprise that he was back, and staying again in the Rainbow Motel for at least another night. This discovery was unexpected for two reasons. First, the Bend police believed he was still in custody for a parole violation. Second, it was counter intuitive to find him back at the scene of the crime.-

Armed with this unexpected information, and now with ample probable cause to arrest him for receiving stolen property with respect to the recovered loot he possessed in Portland, the officers called for backup. When it arrived, they went directly to his motel room to see if he was there and to arrest him if he was. .

Wearing their uniforms and with their guns in their holsters, the officers knocked on the door to Vaneaton’s room. They made no demands; in fact, they said nothing. According to the stipulated facts, Vaneaton opened the curtains of a window, saw the officers, and opened the door. Detective Carpenter asked him if he was Jack Vanea-ton, and when he said he was, he was arrested. At the moment of his arrest, Vaneaton was standing at the doorway but just inside the threshold.- The arresting officer was immediately outside the threshold of the' room and did not enter before advising Vaneaton he was under arrest. Vaneaton was then handcuffed, advised of his Miranda rights, and asked for permission to search the room. He gave verbal permission for such a search and signed a written consent form. Officer Reeves also asked him if he had a gun. Vaneaton said he did and directed them to a closet. The police then found a revolver where Vaneaton had told them it was located.

II

The issue Vaneaton raises is whether the police, acting with probable cause but without a warrant and while standing outside his motel room, could lawfully arrest him while he was standing immediately inside the open doorway. Relying on Payton v. New York, 445 U.S. 573, 100 S.Ct. 1371, 63 L.Ed.2d 639 (1980), and denying the existence of exigent circumstances, Vaneaton claims, the answer is clear: The arresting officers were required to have had a warrant.

In Payton, the Court drew a bright fine at the identifiable threshold of a protected dwelling and said such a line cannot be crossed !to arrest a suspect inside, absent consent or exigent circumstances:

The Fourth Amendment protects the individual’s privacy in a variety of settings. In none is the zone of privacy more clearly defined than when bounded by the unambiguous physical dimensions of an individual’s home — a zone that finds its roots in clear and specific constitutional terms: “The right of the people to be secure in their ... houses ... shall not be violated.” ... In terms that apply equally to seizures of property and to seizures of persons, the Fourth Amendment has drawn a firm line at the entrance to the house. Absent exigent circumstances, that threshold may not reasonably be crossed without a warrant.

445 U.S. at 589-90, 100 S.Ct. at 1381-82 (citations omitted) (emphasis added). The purpose of this rule is manifest from the rule itself: to protect an individual’s “zone of privacy.” Thus, the result of Payton is that “seizures inside a home without a warrant are presumptively unreasonable.” Id. at 586, 100 S.Ct. at 1380.

The government’s response to Vaneaton’s claim is that a warrantless arrest at the doorway of a suspect’s dwelling is constitutionally proper, provided that law enforcement has not misidentified itself, has not used coercion, and the suspect acquiesces to the encounter. In support of this argument, the government invokes this Court’s discussion in United States v. Whitten, 706 F.2d 1000, 1015-17 (9th Cir,1983), cert. denied, 465 U.S. 1100, 104 S.Ct. 1593, 80 L.Ed.2d 125 (1984), of the arrest of Whitten’s codefendant, John Gaiefsky, and United States v. Johnson, 626 F.2d 753 (9th Cir.1980), aff'd, 457 U.S. 537, 102 S.Ct. 2579, 73 L.Ed.2d 202 (1982). In Whitten, we held that Gaiefsky’s arrest while standing in the doorway of his hotel room did not violate Payton because “[a] doorway ..., unlike the interior of a hotel room, is a public place.” 706 F.2d at 1015. As authority for this proposition, we relied on United States v. Santana, 427 U.S. 38, 96 S.Ct. 2406, 49 L.Ed.2d 300 (1976).

As we read the controlling authority, the question presented in this cáse is not decided only on the basis of whether Vaneaton was standing inside or outside the threshold of his room, but whether he “voluntarily exposed himself to warrantless arrest” by freely opening thé door of his motel room to the police. Johnson, 626 F.2d at 757. If he so exposed himself, the presumption created by Payton is overcome. See id.2

A

In resolving whether Vaneaton voluntarily exposed himself to warrantless arrest, we find considerable guidance in United States v. Johnson, 626 F.2d 753 (9th Cir.1980). In Johnson, the question before us was whether Johnson’s warrantless arrest as he stood at an open doorway within his home satisfied Payton. We held that it did not because of the deceitful manner in which the door was caused by the arresting officers to.be opened. The agents had used a subterfuge to get Johnson to open the door, and because of their use of that subterfuge — they misrepresented. their identities — we held that “Johnson’s initial exposure to the view and the physical control of the agents was not consensual on his part.” Id. at 757.

On the basis of factual differences, Johnson explicitly distinguished Santana, and a pre-Payton case from our circuit, United States v. Botero, 589 F.2d 430 (9th Cir.1978), cert. denied, 441 U.S. 944, 99 S.Ct. 2162, 60 L.Ed.2d 1045 (1979). Johnson, 626 F.2d at 757. In Santana, the United States Supreme Court

upheld the warrantless arrest of a defendant who was standing within the frame of her doorway as the officers - approached and who then retreated into the vestibule of her home where the officers followed and effected the arrest. The Court held that once the defendant was exposed to public view in her doorway, her act of retreating into her house could not thwart an otherwise proper arrest by officers who pursued her inside.

Johnson, 626 F.2d at 756.

In Botero, officers without a warrant knocked on Botero’s door, and when he opened it, he was placed under arrest. We held in Botero, citing Santana, that under the circumstances the doorway in which he was standing was a public place. Botero, 589 F.2d at 432. Thus, implicit in Johnson is approval of the warrantless arrest of a suspect who voluntarily opens the door of his dwelling in response to a noncoercive knock by the police. This holding is consistent with our holding in Whitten.

As in Johnson and Whitten, the arrest in the instant case involves factors that distinguish it from the arrests made in Payton and its consolidated companion case, Riddick v. New York. In Payton, the police who entered Payton’s apartment broke through a closed door with crowbars. No one was home, but incriminating evidence seen in plain view was seized and used to convict him. 445 U.S. at 576-77, 100 S.Ct. at 1374-75. In Riddick, the closed door of Riddick’s house on which, the police knocked was opened by Riddick’s young son. Riddick could be seen sitting inside the apartment on a bed. He was covered by a sheet. Without any behavior on Riddick’s part that could be construed as consent, the police entered and arrested him on the spot. 445 U.S. at 578, 100 S.Ct. at 1376. In both cases, the entries preceded the arrests.

By contrast, in Vaneaton’s case the uniformed police used no force or threats, and unlike Johnson, they did not resort to a subterfuge or a ruse, or draw weapons-. When Vaneaton saw them through the window, he voluntarily opened the door and exposed both himself and the immediate area to them. No threats or force were used by the police to get him to open the door, and his actions were not taken in response to-a claim of lawful authority. The police did not enter the house until they formally placed Vaneaton under arrest. The magistrate’s findings of fact that (1) Vaneaton opened the door voluntarily, and (2) no coercion was used by the police, are fully supported by the record. “A trial court’s finding on voluntariness should not be overturned unless it is clearly erroneous.” United States v. Al-Azzawy, 784 F.2d 890, 895 (9th Cir.1985) (citation omitted), cert. denied, 476 U.S. 1144, 106 S.Ct. 2255, 90 L.Ed.2d 700 (1986). Accordingly, by opening the door as he did, Vaneaton exposed himself in a public place. His warrantless arrest, therefore, does riot offerid the Fourth Amendment. United States v. Watson, 423 U.S. 411, 421-24, 96 S.Ct. 820, 826-28, 46 L.Ed.2d 598 (1976) (The Fourth Amendment is not violated by a warrantless felony arrest in a public place).³

In summary, this episode does not materially resemble the kinds of “invasions” or “intrusions” against which Payton seeks to guard. Knocking on a door to attempt to contact a person inside is a common event and hardly a hallmark of a police state, and indeed, under these facts the zone of privacy sought by Payton to be protected is not implicated. Accordingly, we hold that Pay-ton was not violated, and that Vaneaton’s arrest was proper.⁴

CONCLUSION

We conclude that the seizure in this case did not offend the Fourth Amendment. Thus we affirm the district court’s denial of Vaneaton’s motion to suppress.

AFFIRMED.

1 . The defendant-appellant’s name is spelled many different ways' in the record. We hope our choice is correct.

2 . -Because we conclude that Vaneaton’s exposure to the police was voluntary, we need not discuss exigent circumstances.

3 . Our analysis is consistent with our holding in United States v. Winsor, 846 F.2d 1569 (9th Cir.1988) (en banc),-which dealt with the validity of a search rather than a seizure. To quote the en banc panel,

In United States v. Hersh, 464 F.2d 228, 229-30 (9th Cir.), cert. denied, 409 U.S. 1008, [93 S.Ct. 442, 34 L.Ed.2d 301] ... (1972), the police, while standing on the front porch, looked through a window and saw incriminating evidence inside the residence. We held no search was effected because police merely did what any member of the public was free to do — walk onto the front porch and observe whatever was in plain view through an unobstructed window. Similarly, in Davis v. United States, 327 F.2d 301, 303 (9th Cir.1964), the police did what any person could do — they knocked on the front door of a residence, hut did not use their authority as police officers to command the occupants to open the door. When the occupant opened the door, he did so voluntarily, not, as Dennis Winsor did, in response to a claim of lawful authority.

Winsor, 846 F.2d at 1573.

4 . Accord United States v. Carrion, 809 F.2d 1120, 1128 (5th Cir.1987) (a suspect standing in an open doorway stands in a public place). But cf. United States v. Morgan, 743 F.2d 1158, 1166 n. 2 (6th Cir.1984) (Payton requires exigent circumstances before a warrantless arrest can be made of an individual standing in the doorway of a private residence.), cert. denied, 471 U.S. 1061, 105 S.Ct. 2126, 85 L.Ed.2d 490 (1985).