Wolf v. State

260 So. 2d 425
CourtMississippi Supreme Court
DecidedMarch 27, 1972
Docket46695
StatusPublished
Cited by38 cases

This text of 260 So. 2d 425 (Wolf v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Mississippi Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Wolf v. State, 260 So. 2d 425 (Mich. 1972).

Opinion

260 So.2d 425 (1972)

Donald J. WOLF
v.
STATE of Mississippi.

No. 46695.

Supreme Court of Mississippi.

March 27, 1972.
Rehearing Denied April 17, 1972.

*427 Billy J. Jordan, Columbus, for appellant.

A.F. Summer, Atty. Gen., by William Jeff East, Sp. Asst. Atty. Gen., Jackson, for appellee.

GILLESPIE, Chief Justice:

Donald J. Wolf was convicted in the Circuit Court of Lowndes County of possession of marijuana. He was sentenced to two years in the state penitentiary and fined the sum of $1,000. Wolf was also found guilty of constructive contempt of court and sentenced to thirty days in jail and fined $250. He appeals both judgments.

The defendant was driving a Karmann Ghia Volkswagon automobile on a Columbus street at about 10:15 p.m., when he was stopped by Sergeant Harry Dowdle of the Columbus Police Force. The car was searched and a marijuana cigarette was found in a plastic bag lying on the rear seat. Wolf and his two passengers were then arrested for possession of marijuana and were transported to police headquarters in Sergeant Dowdle's police car, while another officer who had been summoned to the scene drove Wolf's car to police headquarters where it was parked on the police lot outside the door of the chief of detectives. After arriving at headquarters, Wolf was booked for possession of marijuana and his passengers, David Toole and Gail Loftis, were released. After their release, Miss Loftis and Toole talked to Officer Dowdle for sometime and they indicated there was more marijuana in the defendant's car. Dowdle then went to Wolf's car and found a bag of marijuana in a plastic bag over the driver's sun visor.

I.

One assignment of error raises the question whether the officer had probable cause to stop and make the initial search of defendant's automobile. Defendant relies on Aguilar v. Texas, 378 U.S. 108, 84 S.Ct. 1509, 12 L.Ed.2d 723 (1964), and O'Bean v. State, 184 So.2d 635 (Miss. 1966).

Defendant concedes that the informer involved in this case was reliable because the proof showed that he had furnished reliable information many times before. The unidentified informer first called Chief of Detectives Walters at about 6:30 p.m., and told him that there was a "pot party" in progress at 513 — 6th Street South in Columbus, Mississippi. Chief Walters then communicated with Sergeant Dowdle and told him to check the address and to take the tag numbers of the cars parked there. This was done. About 10:10 p.m., the informer called Chief Walters and told him that people were going out to a Karmann Ghia automobile and smoking "pot." The informer also told Walters that defendant Wolf would be leaving shortly, driving a beige colored Karmann Ghia Volkswagon with a Florida license tag, and that marijuana would be in the automobile. Walters then called Dowdle and gave him the information furnished by the informer. Walters instructed Dowdle to proceed to the address and if he saw the described Karmann Ghia automobile moving to stop and search it.

Sergeant Dowdle immediately went to the address given him, and just as he arrived, the Karmann Ghia automobile, driven by defendant Wolf, was leaving the driveway. A short distance away, Sergeant Dowdle stopped the car, and told the driver he was going to search it. He then asked Wolf and his two passengers to get out of the automobile, after which he found a marijuana cigarette in a plastic bag lying on a rear seat. Wolf and his *428 passengers were then arrested for possession of marijuana.

On the probable cause question, the standards applicable to a search of an automobile without a warrant are substantially the same as those required for a search warrant. Whiteley v. Warden, Wyoming State Penitentiary, 401 U.S. 560, 91 S.Ct. 1031, 28 L.Ed.2d 306 (1971).

Aguilar laid down the two-pronged test applicable to the factual basis supporting a magistrate's assessment of probable cause for a search warrant, and that test applies with respect to an officer's assessment of probable cause for a warrantless search. As already stated, the defendant in this case concedes that the informer involved here was reliable under the Aguilar test. It remains to be determined whether the evidence offered on the motion to suppress was sufficient to meet the Aguilar basis-of-knowledge test and applied and expounded on in Spinelli v. United States, 393 U.S. 410, 89 S.Ct. 584, 21 L.Ed.2d 637 (1969). In the later case of United States v. Harris, 403 U.S. 573, 91 S.Ct. 2075, 29 L.Ed.2d 723 (1971), the Court again considered the requirements of the underlying factual basis necessary for the issuance of a search warrant, and enunciated the court's commonsense and nontechnical approach in reviewing probable cause questions by quoting from United States v. Ventresca, 380 U.S. 102, 85 S.Ct. 741, 13 L.Ed.2d 684 (1965), as follows:

[T]he Fourth Amendment's commands, like all constitutional requirements, are practical and not abstract. If the teachings of the Court's cases are to be followed and the constitutional policy served, affidavits for search warrants, such as the one here, must be tested in a commonsense and realistic fashion. They are normally drafted by the non-lawyers in the midst and haste of a criminal investigation. Technical requirements of elaborate specificity once exacted under common law pleadings have no proper place in this area. A grudging or negative attitude by reviewing courts toward warrants will tend to discourage police officers from submitting their evidence to a judicial officer before acting. (91 S.Ct. at 2079, 29 L.Ed.2d at 730).

In Spinelli, the Court recognized the importance of the detail with which an informer describes the accused's criminal activity, saying:

In the absence of a statement detailing the manner in which the information was gathered, it is especially important that the tip describe the accused's criminal activity in sufficient detail that the magistrate may know that he is relying on something more substantial than a casual rumor circulating in the underworld or an accusation based merely on an individual's general reputation. (393 U.S. at 416, 89 S.Ct. at 589).

In White v. United States, 448 F.2d 250 (8th Cir.1971), the Court upheld an investigative stop because the informer's tip was specific, containing considerably more detail than that disapproved in Spinelli. The Court stated:

Here the informant's reliability was bolstered both by the specificity of the tip and by the independent corroboration of a substantial number of the facts it contained. It is true that at the time of the stop the conclusion that the defendant was connected with the crime had not yet been independently corroborated but that is generally the situation with most investigations, and we do not think that is determinative in a situation where the police are stopping for purposes of investigation only and not for purposes of arrest. (448 F.2d at 253).

In Strode v. State, 231 So.2d 779 (Miss. 1970), this Court, in determining whether the two-part test of Aguilar and

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Bluebook (online)
260 So. 2d 425, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/wolf-v-state-miss-1972.