Title: State v. Banks-Harvey

State: ohio

Issuer: Ohio Supreme Court

Document:

[Until this opinion appears in the Ohio Official Reports advance sheets, it may be cited as State 
v. Banks-Harvey, Slip Opinion No. 2018-Ohio-201.] 
 
 
 
NOTICE 
This slip opinion is subject to formal revision before it is published in an 
advance sheet of the Ohio Official Reports.  Readers are requested to 
promptly notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Court of Ohio, 65 
South Front Street, Columbus, Ohio 43215, of any typographical or other 
formal errors in the opinion, in order that corrections may be made before 
the opinion is published. 
 
 
SLIP OPINION NO. 2018-OHIO-201 
THE STATE OF OHIO, APPELLEE, v. BANKS-HARVEY, APPELLANT. 
[Until this opinion appears in the Ohio Official Reports advance sheets, it 
may be cited as State v. Banks-Harvey, Slip Opinion No. 2018-Ohio-201.] 
A law-enforcement agency’s policy that an arrestee’s personal effects must 
accompany the arrestee to jail cannot, on its own, justify the warrantless 
retrieval of an arrestee’s personal effects from a location that is protected 
under the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution. 
(No. 2016-0930—Submitted April 6, 2017—Decided January 16, 2018.) 
APPEAL from the Court of Appeals for Warren County, 
No. CA2015-08-073, 2016-Ohio-2894. 
____________________ 
 
O’NEILL, J. 
{¶ 1} This case addresses whether a law-enforcement agency’s policy that 
an arrestee’s personal effects must accompany the arrestee to jail can, on its own, 
justify the warrantless retrieval of an arrestee’s personal effects from a location that 
is protected under the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution.  We 
hold that it cannot.  We further hold that a search of personal effects obtained as a 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
2
result of following such a policy is not a valid inventory search.  We further 
conclude that in this case, the exclusionary rule applies to require the suppression 
of the evidence obtained during the unconstitutional search.  Accordingly, we 
reverse the judgment of the court of appeals, which upheld the trial court’s denial 
of the appellant’s motion to suppress the evidence found during the search of her 
purse, and we vacate the appellant’s convictions and sentence. 
Facts and Procedural History 
{¶ 2} This case arises out of a lawful traffic stop.  On October 21, 2014, an 
Ohio State Highway Patrol trooper stopped the appellant, Jamie Banks-Harvey, for 
speeding.  The stop was video and audio recorded, but because of the way the cars 
were positioned, the vehicle the appellant was driving cannot be seen in the video 
after she pulled over.  The vehicle had three occupants, the appellant, her boyfriend, 
Charles Hall, who owned the vehicle, and Shannon Holcomb.  When the trooper 
asked the appellant for her driver’s license, she told him that she did not have one.  
Instead, the appellant reached into her purse, retrieved her state of Ohio 
identification card, and gave it to the trooper.  She explained that she was driving 
Hall’s vehicle because Hall had hurt his hand and she was taking him to get medical 
attention.  The appellant also told the trooper that she and Hall lived together. 
{¶ 3} The trooper requested licenses from Hall and Holcomb, but neither of 
them were carrying their licenses, so he collected their Social Security numbers for 
identification purposes.  The trooper asked the appellant to step out of the vehicle.  
He performed a pat-down search of the appellant and placed her in the back seat of 
his cruiser.  The appellant did not have her purse with her when she was placed in 
the trooper’s cruiser; it remained in Hall’s vehicle.  The trooper’s computer alerted 
him that the appellant possibly had an outstanding warrant for her arrest for 
possession of heroin in Montgomery County and that Holcomb possibly had an 
outstanding warrant for her arrest for possession of drug paraphernalia in Warren 
County.  Hall, the vehicle owner, had no outstanding warrants for his arrest. 
January Term, 2018 
 
3
{¶ 4} A local police officer arrived on the scene while the trooper was 
waiting for confirmation of the warrants.  The trooper told the officer that the 
appellant and Holcomb both had outstanding warrants for their arrest and that Hall, 
the vehicle owner, did not.  The trooper then approached Hall and told him that 
both the appellant and Holcomb had drug-related warrants for their arrest.  He asked 
Hall whether the appellant and Holcomb used heroin regularly, and he told Hall 
that it was within his discretion to impound Hall’s vehicle but that he had not yet 
decided whether he would do so.  Then he asked if he and the officer could search 
Hall’s vehicle.  Hall did not grant consent.  Upon confirmation of the warrants, the 
trooper arrested Holcomb and put her in the back of his cruiser with the appellant.  
At this point, both the appellant and Holcomb were under arrest on the outstanding 
warrants and were going to be taken to jail. 
{¶ 5} The trooper then entered Hall’s vehicle, retrieved the appellant’s 
purse, placed it on the hood of his cruiser, and searched it.  As he searched the 
purse, the trooper laid the items from the purse on the hood of his cruiser.  The 
appellant’s purse contained, among other things, a baggy with ten yellow pills, three 
needles, one of which contained brown liquid, three clear capsules filled with 
brown powder, and three clear capsules filled with white powder.  The trooper 
showed the officer the drugs he had found in the appellant’s purse, and then the 
officer said that he might have observed a capsule in Hall’s vehicle.  The officer 
then searched the vehicle and found clear capsules and a needle.  No one was 
arrested or charged based upon anything found in the search of Hall’s vehicle.  
Hall’s vehicle was not impounded, and Hall was permitted to drive it away. 
{¶ 6} The appellant was charged with felony possession of drugs and 
misdemeanor possession of drug paraphernalia and drug-abuse instruments based 
on the items found in her purse.  She filed a motion to suppress the evidence, 
arguing that the search of her purse violated her rights under the Fourth Amendment 
to the United States Constitution.  In its response to the motion to suppress, the 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
4
appellee, the state of Ohio, argued that the evidence found in the appellant’s purse 
should not be suppressed, because it fell within at least one of the following three 
exceptions to the Fourth Amendment’s search-warrant requirement: (1) search-
incident-to-arrest exception, (2) plain-view exception, and (3) inventory-search 
exception. 
{¶ 7} The trial court rejected each of the three rationales the state put forth 
to justify the warrantless search of the appellant’s purse.  The court held that under 
Arizona v. Gant, 556 U.S. 332, 351, 129 S.Ct. 1710, 173 L.Ed.2d 485 (2009), the 
search of the appellant’s purse was not a lawful search incident to arrest.  The court 
found that the trooper retrieved and searched the purse after he had handcuffed and 
secured the appellant in his vehicle and so she was not within reach of her purse 
when he retrieved and searched it. 
{¶ 8} The trial court held that the plain-view exception, under Minnesota v. 
Dickerson, 508 U.S. 366, 375, 113 S.Ct. 2130, 124 L.Ed.2d 334 (1993), did not 
justify the search of the appellant’s purse, because there was no testimony to 
suggest that the appellant’s purse possessed an incriminating character that was 
immediately apparent.  And the trial court rejected the state’s argument that this 
was a valid inventory search under South Dakota v. Opperman, 428 U.S. 364, 372, 
96 S.Ct. 3092, 49 L.Ed.2d 1000 (1976), because the car that contained the 
appellant’s purse was not impounded. 
{¶ 9} Despite rejecting the state’s arguments, the trial court nevertheless 
denied the appellant’s motion to suppress.  The trial court concluded that regardless 
of the fact that the trooper did not have probable cause to search the vehicle at the 
time he searched the appellant’s purse, the officer had probable cause to search the 
car based on his observation of the capsule in the car and the suspicious behavior 
of the occupants.  Thus, the court held, the contraband in the appellant’s purse 
would inevitably have been discovered in the search of the vehicle.  United States 
v. Ross, 456 U.S. 798, 102 S.Ct. 2157, 72 L.Ed.2d 572 (1982). 
January Term, 2018 
 
5
{¶ 10} Following the trial court’s denial of her motion to suppress, the 
appellant pled no contest to the charges.  On August 7, 2015, she was sentenced to 
three years of community control, and she is subject to a one-year prison sentence 
if she violates the community-control sanctions.  She was also ordered to, among 
other things, complete inpatient drug treatment and to serve 90 days of 
electronically monitored house arrest after her release from the drug-treatment 
facility. 
{¶ 11} The appellant appealed her convictions, arguing that the trial court 
had erred in denying her motion to suppress.  She maintained her argument that the 
evidence had been seized in violation of her Fourth Amendment rights.  The state 
disagreed, arguing that the trial court had not erred in denying the appellant’s 
motion to suppress because (1) the drugs would inevitably have been discovered in 
a search of the vehicle, (2) the drugs were discovered during a valid inventory 
search of the purse, and (3) the drugs would inevitably have been discovered during 
an inventory search of the purse at the jail. 
{¶ 12} The appellate court upheld the reasonableness of this search under 
the Fourth Amendment, but its reasoning was different than the trial court’s.  The 
appellate court rejected the trial court’s conclusion that the evidence would 
inevitably have been discovered during a valid search of the vehicle.  The court 
found that the state had not produced any evidence to establish that the officer was 
pursuing a line of investigation involving Hall’s car prior to the search of the 
appellant’s purse.  The appellate court noted that the officer did not testify at the 
hearing and that the recording offered by the state established that the trooper found 
the syringes and drugs in the appellant’s purse before the officer informed the 
trooper that he had seen a capsule in Hall’s car.  Nonetheless, the appellate court 
upheld the denial of the motion to suppress, concluding that the retrieval of the 
appellant’s purse from the car was done pursuant to a standard Ohio State Highway 
Patrol policy and that the drugs and drug paraphernalia found in the appellant’s 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
6
purse were admissible as the fruits of a valid inventory search of the purse once it 
was in police custody. 
{¶ 13} This court accepted the appellant’s appeal on the following 
proposition of law: 
 
Because the mere adoption of a policy by the Highway Patrol 
to retrieve and inventory the belongings of an arrested person cannot 
authorize unconstitutional police action, the warrantless entry into a 
car to retrieve the purse of an already-arrested person and the 
subsequent warrantless removal and search of that purse violates the 
Fourth Amendment and Section 14, Article I of the Ohio 
Constitution. 
 
The state asserts the following proposition of law: 
 
When conducted pursuant to standard policy or procedure, 
the seizure and search of an arrestee’s purse before the arrestee is 
taken to jail or incarcerated falls within the inventory search 
exception to the warrant requirement and does not violate the Fourth 
Amendment of the United States Constitution or Article I, Section 
14 of the Ohio Constitution.  When the State’s evidence establishes 
that the seizure and search fall within the inventory search exception 
and further establishes that the contraband found in the purse would 
have been inevitably discovered in a lawful search of the vehicle 
and/or a search of the arrestee’s belongings at the jail, a trial court 
properly does not suppress the evidence. 
 
See 146 Ohio St.3d 1502, 2016-Ohio-5792, 58 N.E.3d 1173. 
January Term, 2018 
 
7
Standard of Review of a Ruling on a Motion to Suppress 
{¶ 14} Appellate review of a ruling on a motion to suppress presents a 
mixed question of law and fact.  State v. Burnside, 100 Ohio St.3d 152, 2003-Ohio-
5372, 797 N.E.2d 71, ¶ 8.  An appellate court must accept the trial court’s findings 
of fact if they are supported by competent, credible evidence.  See State v. Fanning, 
1 Ohio St.3d 19, 20, 437 N.E.2d 583 (1982).  But the appellate court must decide 
the legal questions independently, without deference to the trial court’s decision.  
Burnside at ¶ 8. 
The Fourth Amendment 
{¶ 15} The Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution provides: 
 
 
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, 
papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, 
shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable 
cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing 
the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized. 
 
{¶ 16} This court has held that in felony cases, Article I, Section 14 of the 
Ohio Constitution provides the same protection as the Fourth Amendment to the 
United States Constitution.  State v. Jones, 143 Ohio St.3d 266, 2015-Ohio-483, 37 
N.E.3d 123, ¶ 12. 
{¶ 17} The Fourth Amendment proscribes all unreasonable searches and 
seizures.  Ross, 456 U.S. at 825, 102 S.Ct. 2157, 72 L.Ed.2d 572.  It is a restraint 
on the government.  “[S]earches conducted outside the judicial process, without 
prior approval by judge or magistrate, are per se unreasonable under the Fourth 
Amendment—subject only to a few specifically established and well-delineated 
exceptions.”  (Footnote omitted.)  Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347, 357, 88 S.Ct. 
507, 19 L.Ed.2d 576 (1967). 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
8
{¶ 18} When a defendant moves to suppress evidence recovered during a 
warrantless search, the state has the burden of showing that the search fits within 
one of the defined exceptions to the Fourth Amendment’s warrant requirement.  
Athens v. Wolf, 38 Ohio St.2d 237, 241, 313 N.E.2d 405 (1974). 
{¶ 19} Here, the state asserts that the search of the appellant’s purse in this 
case fits within the inventory-search exception to the Fourth Amendment’s warrant 
requirement.  We disagree for the reasons explained below. 
Inventory-Search Exception 
{¶ 20} The inventory-search exception is a well-defined exception to the 
Fourth Amendment’s warrant requirement.  Illinois v. Lafayette, 462 U.S. 640, 643, 
103 S.Ct. 2605, 77 L.Ed.2d 65 (1983).  An inventory search is not subject to the 
Fourth Amendment’s warrant requirement or a probable-cause review, because it 
is a search that is made for administrative reasons and is unrelated to a criminal 
investigation.  State v. Mesa, 87 Ohio St.3d 105, 109, 717 N.E.2d 329 (1999) 
(upholding the search of an armrest console as part of the inventory search of a 
lawfully impounded vehicle). 
{¶ 21} As a practical matter, the personal effects with a person at the time 
of his or her arrest must be stored while the person is in jail.  And because the police 
are potentially responsible for the items, they are permitted to search and inventory 
the personal effects that come into their custody.  Colorado v. Bertine, 479 U.S. 
367, 373, 107 S.Ct. 738, 93 L.Ed.2d 739 (1987) (upholding the search of a backpack 
in a vehicle as part of an inventory search of a lawfully impounded vehicle).  This 
administrative search and inventory is intended to help guard against claims of theft 
or careless handling and also protects the police from dangerous instruments.  Id.  
Accord Illinois v. Lafayette, 462 U.S. 640, 647, 103 S.Ct. 2605, 77 L.Ed.2d 65 
(1983) (upholding the inventory search of an arrestee’s shoulder bag conducted at 
the police station).  Even if less intrusive means of protecting property are available, 
such as sealing items in a plastic bag and placing them in a secured locker rather 
January Term, 2018 
 
9
than searching and inventorying them, it is not unreasonable for police, as part of 
routine procedure incident to incarceration, to search any article or container in the 
arrestee’s possession in accordance with established inventory procedures.  
Lafayette at 647-648. 
{¶ 22} Based on the trooper’s testimony at the suppression hearing, the trial 
court found that it is the policy of the Ohio State Highway Patrol to transport an 
arrestee’s property with the arrestee, but no written policy was offered as evidence 
at the hearing.  The question in this case is not whether the purse was taken from 
the car pursuant to a standardized law-enforcement policy, but whether such a 
policy was sufficient justification for the warrantless retrieval of the purse from the 
car.  We conclude that it was not and therefore that the subsequent search of the 
purse did not qualify as a valid inventory search, because the purse had not lawfully 
come into the custody of the police. 
{¶ 23} Certainly we take no issue with the reasonableness of an 
administrative policy requiring the search and inventory of personal items that 
necessarily come into police custody as a result of an arrest.  Indeed, R.C. 2981.11 
requires law-enforcement agencies to keep safe any lawfully seized property that 
comes into their custody.  However, this is not a case in which personal items came 
into the custody of the police as an incident of lawful police conduct.  In this case, 
the trooper retrieved a personal item belonging to an arrestee from a place that is 
protected under the Fourth Amendment (the car).  At the time the trooper retrieved 
the appellant’s purse, her identity had already been confirmed and she was 
handcuffed and under arrest in the trooper’s vehicle.  Neither her purse, nor the 
vehicle that contained her purse, came into police custody as a result of her arrest.  
On these facts, the state has failed to show that this search fits under the inventory-
search exception to the Fourth Amendment’s warrant requirement. 
{¶ 24} We note that had the trooper obtained the purse in a legal way, such 
as retrieving it from the car at the appellant’s request, we would have been 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
10 
compelled to reach a different result.  Likewise, if the appellant had been arrested 
on the street with her purse on her person, we would have been compelled to reach 
a different result.  But a law-enforcement policy that an arrestee’s personal effects 
go with them to jail, does not, by itself, authorize an officer to retrieve the arrestee’s 
personal effects from a place that is protected under the Fourth Amendment. 
Exclusionary Rule 
{¶ 25} The Fourth Amendment says nothing about suppressing evidence 
obtained in violation of its protections.  Nevertheless, the United States Supreme 
Court created the exclusionary rule, which precludes the use in a criminal 
proceeding of evidence obtained in violation of the Fourth Amendment, “to 
‘compel respect for the constitutional guaranty.’ ”  Davis v. United States, 564 U.S. 
229, 236, 131 S.Ct. 2419, 180 L.Ed.2d 285 (2011), quoting Elkins v. United States, 
364 U.S. 206, 217, 80 S.Ct. 1437, 4 L.Ed.2d 1669 (1960).  The purpose of the rule 
is not to redress the constitutional injury but to deter future constitutional violations.  
Id. at 236-237; State v. Johnson, 141 Ohio St.3d 136, 2014-Ohio-5021, 22 N.E.3d 
1061, ¶ 40.  When suppression would not yield “appreciable deterrence,” 
application of the exclusionary rule is unwarranted.  United States v. Janis, 428 
U.S. 433, 454, 96 S.Ct. 3021, 49 L.Ed.2d 1046 (1976).  The state argues that the 
exclusionary rule should not be applied in this case for two reasons: one, the 
contraband would inevitably have been discovered and two, the trooper acted in 
good faith. 
The state’s inevitable-discovery argument 
{¶ 26} The state asserts that the contraband in the appellant’s purse would 
inevitably have been discovered in the subsequent search of Hall’s vehicle and/or 
at the Montgomery County jail when the appellant was booked.  We disagree. 
{¶ 27} This court adopted the inevitable-discovery exception to the 
exclusionary rule in State v. Perkins, 18 Ohio St.3d 193, 480 N.E.2d 763 (1985).  
Under that exception, illegally obtained evidence may be admitted in a proceeding 
January Term, 2018 
 
11 
once the state establishes that the evidence would inevitably have been discovered 
in the course of a lawful investigation.  Id. at paragraph one of the syllabus, 
following Nix v. Williams, 467 U.S. 431, 104 S.Ct. 2501, 81 L.Ed.2d 377 (1984).  
If the state can establish by a preponderance of the evidence that it would inevitably 
have discovered the information by lawful means, “then the deterrence rationale 
[for the exclusionary rule] has so little basis that the evidence should be received.  
Anything less would reject logic, experience, and common sense.”  (Footnote 
omitted.)  Nix at 444.  The prosecution has the burden of demonstrating a reasonable 
probability that the evidence would have been discovered apart from the unlawful 
conduct.  Perkins at 196. 
{¶ 28} The state argues that the local police officer’s observation of an 
empty capsule on the vehicle’s floorboard provided probable cause to believe the 
vehicle contained contraband and, thus, to conduct a warrantless search of the 
vehicle under the automobile exception to the warrant requirement.  See Carroll v. 
United States, 267 U.S. 132, 155-156, 45 S.Ct. 280, 69 L.Ed. 543 (1925) 
(warrantless search of an automobile is not unreasonable under the Fourth 
Amendment when officers have probable cause to believe the vehicle contains 
contraband).  That search, the state maintains, would inevitably have uncovered the 
contraband in the appellant’s purse.  The record in this case suggests otherwise. 
{¶ 29} It was only after the trooper removed the appellant’s purse from the 
vehicle, began to search it, and stated that he had found narcotics in it that the local 
officer approached the trooper and told him that he was “pretty sure” he had 
observed a capsule on the vehicle’s floorboard.  While the local officer remained 
with the trooper outside his vehicle, the trooper relayed to dispatch his discovery of 
heroin, three caps, a crack pipe, and yellow pills in the appellant’s purse. 
{¶ 30} Even assuming that the local officer’s observation of the capsule 
afforded him probable cause to search the vehicle, the inevitable-discovery 
exception would not apply if the local officer based his decision to search the 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
12 
vehicle on knowledge of the contraband found in the unlawful search of the 
appellant’s purse.  See State v. Sharpe, 174 Ohio App.3d 498, 2008-Ohio-267, 882 
N.E.2d 960 (2d Dist.) (inevitable-discovery doctrine not applicable when search 
warrant that justified search was based on facts discovered when officers previously 
entered and searched home without a warrant); State v. Porter, 178 Ohio App.3d 
304, 2008-Ohio-4627, 897 N.E.2d 1149, at ¶ 44 (recognizing the danger of 
allowing law-enforcement officers “to exploit their own illegal conduct in order to 
engage in an ‘alternative line of investigation’ ”).  In the context of the related 
independent-source exception to the exclusionary rule, the United States Supreme 
Court has held that a search pursuant to a warrant is not an independent source of 
evidence, so as to avoid application of the exclusionary rule, if the decision to seek 
the warrant was prompted by an officer’s observations during a prior, unlawful 
entry, or if information from the unlawful entry affected the magistrate’s decision 
to issue the warrant.  Murray v. United States, 487 U.S. 533, 542, 108 S.Ct. 2529, 
101 L.Ed.2d 472 (1988). 
{¶ 31} There is no evidence that the local officer would have conducted a 
search based on his observation of the empty capsule absent awareness that the 
trooper had found drugs and drug-related contraband in his unlawful search of the 
appellant’s purse, in large part because the local officer did not testify at the 
suppression hearing.  The Twelfth District noted that the local officer informed the 
trooper about his observation of the capsule after the trooper discovered the drugs 
and drug paraphernalia in the appellant’s purse.  2016-Ohio-2894, 64 N.E.3d 570, 
¶ 7.  And the dashboard-camera video establishes that the local officer was aware 
of the trooper’s discovery of drugs and drug paraphernalia in the appellant’s purse 
before he began a search of the vehicle.  The local officer can be heard on the video 
suggesting a search of the vehicle several minutes after learning of the contraband 
in the appellant’s purse and just before the trooper asks the owner of the vehicle 
whether there is anything else in the vehicle he needs to know about.  The trooper’s 
January Term, 2018 
 
13 
testimony and the dashboard-camera video—the only evidence the state presented 
at the suppression hearing—fail to demonstrate by a preponderance of the evidence 
a reasonable probability that the local officer would inevitably have discovered the 
contraband in the appellant’s purse apart from the trooper’s removal and search of 
the purse in violation of the appellant’s Fourth Amendment rights.  On these 
grounds, we conclude that the state did not meet its burden of proving the 
applicability of the inevitable-discovery exception to the exclusionary rule. 
The state’s good-faith argument 
{¶ 32} The state also asserts that the exclusionary rule should not apply 
because the trooper was acting in good faith and in accordance with a written Ohio 
State Highway Patrol policy and not with the intent of performing an evidentiary 
search when he retrieved the appellant’s purse.  Again, we disagree. 
{¶ 33} When an officer acts with an objectively reasonable, good-faith 
belief that his or her conduct is lawful, the deterrence rationale for the exclusionary 
rule loses force.  Davis, 564 U.S. at 241, 131 S.Ct. 2419, 180 L.Ed.2d 285, citing 
United States v. Leon, 468 U.S. 897, 104 S.Ct. 3405, 82 L.Ed.2d 677 (1984).  The 
United States Supreme Court has applied the good-faith exception to searches 
conducted in objectively reasonable, good-faith reliance on an invalid search 
warrant issued by a detached and neutral magistrate, Leon at 922-923, to searches 
conducted in reasonable reliance on subsequently invalidated statutes, Illinois v. 
Krull, 480 U.S. 340, 107 S.Ct. 1160, 94 L.Ed.2d 364 (1987), to searches conducted 
in reasonable reliance on erroneous information in a warrant database, Arizona v. 
Evans, 514 U.S. 1, 115 S.Ct. 1185, 131 L.Ed.2d 34 (1995), and Herring v. United 
States, 555 U.S. 135, 129 S.Ct. 695, 172 L.Ed.2d 496 (2009), and to searches 
conducted in reasonable reliance on binding judicial precedent, Davis at 241. 
{¶ 34} This court recently applied the good-faith exception to evidence 
obtained from the warrantless attachment of a GPS device to a suspect’s vehicle 
when, based on the state of the law at the time, the officer had an objectively 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
14 
reasonable belief that his actions did not violate the suspect’s Fourth Amendment 
rights.  Johnson, 141 Ohio St.3d 136, 2014-Ohio-5021, 22 N.E.3d 1061, at ¶ 50.  
But even more recently, we refused to apply the good-faith exception when an 
officer’s search of a vehicle in which the defendant sat was not objectively 
reasonable under the Fourth Amendment.  State v. Leak, 145 Ohio St.3d 165, 2016-
Ohio-154, 47 N.E.3d 821, ¶ 37. 
{¶ 35} In Leak, an officer arrested the defendant, who was sitting in the 
passenger seat of a legally parked vehicle, on an outstanding warrant and secured 
him in the back of the officer’s patrol car.  The officer then called a tow truck and, 
purportedly pursuant to standard police procedure, conducted an inventory search 
of the vehicle.  The record, however, contained no evidence that the defendant 
owned the vehicle.  The lead opinion in Leak reasoned that testimony about a police 
procedure for conducting inventory searches was not sufficient to establish the 
reasonableness of the search if impoundment of the vehicle itself was unlawful.  Id. 
at ¶ 29.  Ultimately, the court held, “The fact that the arresting officer used 
established police procedure to conduct the inventory search does not overcome the 
unlawfulness of the impoundment in the first place.  This is precisely the type of 
governmental intrusion the Fourth Amendment seeks to prohibit.”  Id. at ¶ 37 (lead 
opinion). 
{¶ 36} Here, the trooper testified that it was standard Highway Patrol 
procedure for a trooper to transport a female arrestee’s purse with her to jail, but he 
also admitted that he could have left the appellant’s purse with her boyfriend.  The 
trooper stated that there is a written Highway Patrol policy to search a purse that a 
trooper will take into his or her cruiser.  He did not, however, state that the standard 
procedure to transport a female arrestee’s purse with her was reduced to a written 
policy.  That is the extent of the evidence regarding the existence or content of a 
Highway Patrol policy; the state did not introduce a written policy.  Even assuming 
that there is a written policy to not only search a purse that is to be transported with 
January Term, 2018 
 
15 
an arrestee, but also to retrieve an arrestees’s purse, the existence of such a policy 
is insufficient to establish the reasonableness of the search under the Fourth 
Amendment when the retrieval itself is unlawful.  See Leak, 145 Ohio St.3d 165, 
2016-Ohio-154, 47 N.E.3d 821, ¶ 29. 
{¶ 37} Courts use an objective standard for judging officers’ good faith 
when applying the good-faith exception to the exclusionary rule.  Leon, 468 U.S. 
at 919, 104 S.Ct. 3405, 82 L.Ed.2d 677, fn. 20.  The United States Supreme Court 
has stated, with respect to the applicable standard: 
 
We emphasize that the standard of reasonableness we adopt is an 
objective one.  Many objections to a good-faith exception assume 
that the exception will turn on the subjective good faith of individual 
officers.  “Grounding the modification in objective reasonableness, 
however, retains the value of the exclusionary rule as an incentive 
for the law enforcement profession as a whole to conduct themselves 
in accord with the Fourth Amendment.”  Illinois v. Gates, 462 U.S. 
[213,] 261, n. 15, 103 S.Ct. [2317, 76 L.Ed.2d 527] (WHITE, J., 
concurring in judgment); see Dunaway v. New York, 442 U.S. [200,] 
221, 99 S.Ct. [2248, 60 L.Ed.2d 824] (STEVENS, J., concurring).  
The objective standard we adopt, moreover, requires officers to have 
a reasonable knowledge of what the law prohibits.  United States v. 
Peltier, 422 U.S. 531, 542, 95 S.Ct. 2313, 2320, 45 L.Ed.2d 374 
(1975). 
 
Id. 
{¶ 38} We do not question the objective reasonableness of a policy that 
requires a trooper to transport with an arrestee any personal property, including a 
purse, that is on the arrestee’s person at the time of the arrest.  But the appellant’s 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
16 
purse was not on her person; it was in the vehicle.  The trooper testified that he 
relied on standard Highway Patrol procedure to retrieve the purse from the vehicle.  
Even so, such a policy is insufficient to justify an objectively unreasonable intrusion 
into a place protected by the Fourth Amendment. 
Conclusion 
{¶ 39} Under the Fourth Amendment, a warrantless search is per se 
unreasonable unless it falls into one of the few well defined exceptions to the Fourth 
Amendment’s warrant requirement.  State v. Kessler, 53 Ohio St.2d 204, 207, 373 
N.E.2d 1252 (1978).  When a motion to suppress evidence obtained in a warrantless 
search is filed, the state has the burden of establishing that one of the exceptions 
applies.  Id.  We do not question the reasonableness of an administrative policy that 
requires troopers to search and inventory personal effects that lawfully come into 
their custody when a person is arrested.  However, when a law-enforcement officer 
relies solely on his or her department’s policy to retrieve personal effects from a 
place that is protected by the Fourth Amendment, those items have not lawfully 
come into the custody of the officer.  Therefore, the search of the appellant’s purse 
in this case does not fall within the inventory exception to the Fourth Amendment’s 
warrant requirement.  Accordingly, we reverse the court of appeals’ judgment, and 
we vacate the appellant’s convictions and sentence, which were based solely on the 
evidence found in her purse. 
Judgment reversed 
and convictions and sentence vacated. 
FRENCH and FISCHER, JJ., concur. 
KENNEDY, J., concurs in judgment only, with an opinion. 
O’DONNELL, J., dissents, with an opinion. 
DEWINE, J., dissents, with an opinion joined by O’CONNOR, C.J. 
_________________ 
 
 
January Term, 2018 
 
17 
KENNEDY, J., concurring in judgment only. 
{¶ 40} I agree with the lead opinion that the inventory search conducted 
here was a pretextual investigatory search for contraband and that the state failed 
to prove that the trooper acted in good faith, which if proved would have barred 
application of the exclusionary rule.  However, because of the breadth of the lead 
opinion and because the lead opinion, in my view, does not address the narrow 
questions before us, I concur in judgment only and write separately. 
{¶ 41} I agree with the statement in Justice DeWine’s dissenting opinion 
that the Fourth Amendment protects people, not property, against arbitrary 
invasions by the government.  See United States v. Brignoni-Ponce, 422 U.S. 873, 
878, 95 S.Ct. 2574, 45 L.Ed.2d 607 (1975).  Moreover, “the Fourth Amendment 
does not require that every search be made pursuant to a warrant.  It prohibits only 
‘unreasonable searches and seizures.’ ”  Coolidge v. New Hampshire, 403 U.S. 443, 
509-510, 91 S.Ct. 2022, 29 L.Ed.2d 564 (1971) (Black, J., concurring in part and 
dissenting in part).  “[W]hether a search and seizure is unreasonable within the 
meaning of the Fourth Amendment depends upon the facts and circumstances of 
each case.”  Cooper v. California, 386 U.S. 59, 87 S.Ct. 788, 17 L.Ed.2d 730 
(1967). 
{¶ 42} “With respect to noninvestigative police inventories * * *, the 
policies underlying the warrant requirement * * * are inapplicable.”  South Dakota 
v. Opperman, 428 U.S. 364, 370, 96 S.Ct. 3092, 49 L.Ed.2d 1000 (1976), fn. 5.  
Inventory searches are not conducted for the purpose of discovering evidence of a 
crime, and the “officer [performing an inventory search] does not make a 
discretionary determination to search based on a judgment that certain conditions 
are present.”   Id. at 383, (Powell, J., concurring).  In Opperman, the United States 
Supreme Court upheld an inventory search of a vehicle as a reasonable exception 
to the Fourth Amendment warrant requirement based on the caretaking function of 
law enforcement. 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
18 
{¶ 43} “[I]nventory procedures serve to protect an owner’s property while 
it is in the custody of the police, to insure against claims of lost, stolen, or 
vandalized property, and to guard the police from danger.”  Colorado v. Bertine, 
479 U.S. 367, 372, 107 S.Ct. 738, 93 L.Ed.2d 739 (1987).  So long as law-
enforcement officers follow a standardized policy and they do not act in bad faith 
or for the sole purpose of investigation, an inventory search is valid.  Id. 
{¶ 44} The United States Supreme Court extended the caretaking-
inventory-search exception to the search of an arrestee and his possessions incident 
to incarceration in Illinois v. Lafayette, 462 U.S. 640, 648, 103 S.Ct. 2605, 77 
L.Ed.2d 65 (1983).  In Lafayette, the defendant was arrested for disturbing the peace 
and was brought to the police station for the booking process.  After being 
instructed to empty his pockets, the defendant removed a package of cigarettes from 
his shoulder bag and placed the bag on the counter.  Thereafter, the booking officer 
removed the remaining contents of the shoulder bag and found ten amphetamine 
pills.  The defendant was charged with possession of a controlled substance.  At the 
suppression hearing, relying on Opperman, the state argued that the search was a 
valid inventory search.  The trial court granted the defendant’s motion to suppress, 
and the court of appeals affirmed.  The Illinois Supreme Court declined to review 
the case. 
{¶ 45} In reversing the Illinois appellate court, the United States Supreme 
Court held that “it is not ‘unreasonable’ for police, as part of the routine procedure 
incident to incarcerating an arrested person, to search any container or article in his 
possession, in accordance with established inventory procedures.”  Lafayette at 
648.  The United States Supreme Court “has recognized that the ‘governmental 
interests underlying a station-house search of the arrestee’s person and possessions 
may in some circumstances be even greater than those supporting a search 
immediately following arrest.”  Maryland v. King, 569 U.S. 435, 456, 133 S.Ct. 
1958, 1974, 186 L.Ed.2d 1 (2013), citing Lafayette at 645.  When a person is 
January Term, 2018 
 
19 
formally processed into police custody, “ ‘the law is in the act of subjecting the 
body of the accused to its physical dominion.’ ”  King at 449-450, quoting People 
v. Chiagles, 237 N.Y. 193, 197, 142 N.E. 583 (1923) (Cardozo, J.). 
{¶ 46} The difference between an investigative search and an inventory 
search is that an inventory search serves an administrative or caretaking function, 
see Opperman, 428 U.S. at 369-371, 96 S.Ct. 3092, 49 L.Ed.2d 1000.  And 
“reasonable police regulations relating to inventory procedures administered in 
good faith satisfy the Fourth Amendment.”  Bertine, 479 U.S. at 374, 107 S.Ct. 738, 
93 L.Ed.2d 739. 
{¶ 47} The state argues that the evidence would inevitably have been 
discovered as a result of the officer’s alternative line of investigation, i.e., his search 
of the car based on the capsule in the car.  However, I agree with the appellate 
court’s holding that the state failed to prove the “alternative line of investigation” 
requirement of the inevitable-discovery doctrine.  2016-Ohio-2894, 64 N.E.3d 570, 
¶ 20. 
{¶ 48} Relying, however, on the uncontroverted testimony of the trooper 
that the Highway Patrol has a standardized policy regulating an inventory search 
performed incident to incarnation and its finding that the trooper’s search was 
executed in conformance with the policy, the appellate court held the search valid.  
2016-Ohio-2894, 64 N.E.3d 570, at ¶ 28.  I disagree. 
{¶ 49} This case presents two interrelated questions.  The first question is 
whether it is reasonable, within the context of the Fourth Amendment, for a law-
enforcement officer to execute a standardized procedure or policy permitting an 
inventory search incident to incarceration when the officer has no intention of 
taking the arrested person to a station house for booking and incarceration.  The 
second question is whether it is reasonable, within the context of the Fourth 
Amendment, for a law-enforcement procedure or policy to give an officer 
discretionary authority to take an arrestee’s personal effects, which were not in the 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
20 
arrestee’s possession at the time of arrest and were safely secured, to the station 
house in order to subject those personal effects to an inventory search incident to 
incarceration.  I would hold that both are unreasonable under the Fourth 
Amendment. 
{¶ 50} The law-enforcement community-caretaking function is centered on 
the interest of public safety.  Opperman, 428 U.S. at 368, 96 S.Ct. 3092, 49 L.Ed.2d 
1000.  To be sure, law-enforcement officers frequently engage in “community 
caretaking functions, totally divorced from the detection, investigation, or 
acquisition of evidence relating to the violation of a criminal statute.”  Cady v. 
Dombrowski, 413 U.S. 433, 441, 93 S.Ct. 2523, 37 L.Ed.2d 706 (1973).  The United 
States Supreme Court has recognized the caretaking function of law enforcement 
in relation to motor vehicles, see id., and in rendering emergency aid, see Mincey 
v. Arizona, 437 U.S. 385, 392, 98 S.Ct. 2408, 57 L.Ed.2d 290; Michigan v. Fisher, 
558 U.S. 45, 47, 130 S.Ct. 546, 175 L.Ed.2d 410 (2009).  The three main objectives 
of inventory searches are “to protect an owner’s property while it is in the custody 
of the police, to insure against claims of lost, stolen, or vandalized property, and to 
guard the police from danger.”  Bertine, 479 U.S. at 372, 107 S.Ct. 738, 93 L.Ed.2d 
739.  However, the Fourth Amendment prohibits the unreasonable exercise of the 
community-caretaking function, even when “conducted pursuant to a standardized 
policy,” because such protection “is part and parcel of the Fourth Amendment’s 
guarantee against unreasonable searches and seizures.”  United States v. Sanders, 
796 F.3d 1241, 1250 (10th Cir.2015). 
{¶ 51} When the trooper initially placed appellant, Jamie Banks-Harvey, in 
the backseat of his patrol car, her purse remained with her live-in boyfriend in his 
vehicle.  After the trooper got confirmation that there was a warrant out of 
Montgomery County for appellant’s arrest, he removed her from the patrol car, told 
her there was a warrant for her arrest, handcuffed her, and immediately returned 
her to the patrol car. 
January Term, 2018 
 
21 
{¶ 52} However, the trooper did not intend to book appellant in at the 
station house.  When asked at the suppression hearing what he intended to do with 
appellant after he got confirmation of the warrant, the trooper testified, “I was going 
to take her into investigative detention custody” until Montgomery County law-
enforcement officers arrived to “extradite her.”  In an attempt to justify his intrusion 
into appellant’s purse on the basis of an inventory search incident to incarceration, 
the trooper testified that he had wanted to prevent appellant from illegally 
conveying illegal substances into the jail and he wanted to keep the Montgomery 
County Sheriff’s Office from having to “deal with it” and to avoid “chain of 
custody” problems.  It was only after the trooper conducted what the appellate court 
described as an inventory search incident to incarceration and discovered the 
evidence at issue in this case that he intended to book her in on local charges. 
{¶ 53} Additionally, in response to the state’s questioning, the trooper 
indicated that it is standard procedure when a female is taken into custody for the 
trooper to retrieve and take her purse.  However, that standard procedure was 
plainly not hard and fast, because he subsequently admitted that he could have left 
appellant’s purse with her live-in boyfriend in his vehicle. 
{¶ 54} While the “reasonableness of any particular governmental activity 
does not necessarily or invariably turn on the existence of alternative ‘less intrusive’ 
means,” Lafayette, 462 U.S. at 647, 103 S.Ct. 2605, 77 L.Ed.2d 65, a valid seizure 
must be supported by probable cause or be consistent with the community-
caretaking role of law enforcement, see Opperman, 428 U.S. 364, 96 S.Ct. 3092, 
49 L.Ed.2d 1000.  Because the trooper was not going to book appellant in at a 
station house and because appellant’s purse was safe with her live-in boyfriend in 
his vehicle and the Highway Patrol’s policy permitted the trooper to leave the purse 
with the boyfriend, the community-caretaking function was not triggered. 
{¶ 55} To be sure, if the arrest of appellant would have caused her purse to 
be abandoned in a public or semipublic area or the matter of ownership of the purse 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
22 
was in doubt or the identity of appellant was in dispute, the trooper would have had 
a duty to retrieve and safeguard the purse.  See United States v. Perea, 986 F.2d 
633 (2d Cir.1993) (a duffel bag that a defendant was transporting while riding in a 
taxi was subject to impoundment and an inventory search upon the defendant’s 
arrest); see also State v. Scroggins, 297 Minn. 144, 148, 210 N.W.2d 55 (1973) 
(search of arrestee’s pockets proper to ensure accurate preincarceration 
identification).  But our determination whether a search and seizure was reasonable 
turns on the specific facts and circumstances of the particular case.  See Cooper, 
386 U.S. 59, 87 S.Ct. 788, 17 L.Ed.2d 730. 
{¶ 56} Even when a standardized procedure or policy permits an inventory 
search of an arrested person’s effects incident to incarceration, it is unreasonable, 
within the context of the Fourth Amendment, for a law-enforcement officer to 
execute that inventory search when he is not taking the arrested person to a station 
house for booking and incarceration.  Moreover, it is unreasonable, within the 
context of the Fourth Amendment, for a law-enforcement procedure or policy to 
give an officer discretionary authority to take personal effects that are not in an 
arrestee’s possession at the time of arrest and are safely secured be retrieved and 
taken to the station house, where they will be subject to an inventory search.  
Therefore, based on the facts of this case, I would find the inventory search incident 
to incarceration at issue here unreasonable. 
{¶ 57} As the lead opinion points out, even when an inventory search 
incident to incarceration is unreasonable, absent a showing that the law-
enforcement officer acted in bad faith or for the sole purpose of investigation, and 
so long as the officer followed a standardized caretaking policy or procedure, 
evidence obtained in the inventory search will not be suppressed. 
{¶ 58} The trooper here testified that he searched appellant’s purse to 
safeguard her possessions, to look for weapons for officer safety considerations, 
and to look for evidence of a crime.  Categorically, therefore, the trooper’s search 
January Term, 2018 
 
23 
of appellant’s purse to ferret out evidence of a crime was per se invalid.  Id.  In 
evaluating the trooper’s other stated motives, we look to what the United States 
Supreme Court has said on the subject of evaluating an officer’s good faith: 
  
“[O]ur good-faith inquiry is confined to the objectively 
ascertainable question whether a reasonably well trained officer 
would have known that the search was illegal” in light of “all of the 
circumstances.” [United States v.] Leon, 468 U.S. [897], at 922, n. 
23, 104 S.Ct. 3405 [82 L.Ed.2d 677 (1984)].  These circumstances 
frequently include a particular officer’s knowledge and experience, 
but that does not make the test any more subjective than the one for 
probable cause, which looks to an officer’s knowledge and 
experience, Ornelas v. United States, 517 U.S. 690, 699-700, 116 
S.Ct. 1657, 134 L.Ed.2d 911 (1996), but not his subjective intent, 
Whren v. United States, 517 U.S. 806, 812-813, 116 S.Ct. 1769, 135 
L.Ed.2d 89 (1996). 
 
Herring v. United States, 555 U.S. 135, 145-146, 129 S.Ct. 695, 703, 172 L.Ed.2d 
496 (2009).  Applying this standard to this case, the trooper did not act in good faith 
when he searched and seized the defendant’s purse for purposes of safeguarding 
her possessions or to ensure officer safety. 
{¶ 59} With regard to safeguarding appellant’s possessions, the trooper had 
no intention of booking her in on the active warrant, and the purse was in a safe 
location when he retrieved it.  The trooper testified that he had taken her purse from 
the car because she had no relation to the vehicle and the purse might contain a 
“cell phone, jewelry, something in there that could get stolen.”  However, if 
safeguarding her possessions was the trooper’s true motive, then he would have 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
24 
asked appellant or her live-in boyfriend whether any other property in the vehicle 
belonged to her, and he did not do that. 
{¶ 60} Lastly, officer safety is of paramount importance, and all law-
enforcement officers should employ their training and experience to first ensure 
their own safety as they protect and serve the citizens of their communities.  
However, in this case, appellant was handcuffed and contained in the back seat of 
the patrol car when the trooper retrieved her purse.  Officers may conduct a 
constitutionally sound search of a vehicle “incident to a recent occupant’s arrest 
only when the arrestee is unsecured and within reaching distance of the passenger 
compartment at the time of the search.”  Arizona v. Gant, 556 U.S. 332, 343, 129 
S.Ct. 1710, 173 L.Ed.2d 485 (2009).  Therefore, officer safety was not a legitimate 
reason for the inventory search here. 
{¶ 61} An inventory search executed in bad faith or for the sole purpose of 
investigation is not a valid inventory search, see Bertine, 479 U.S. at 372, 107 S.Ct. 
738, 93 L.Ed2d 739, and a pretextual search for evidence “is not an inventory 
search,” State v. Robinson, 58 Ohio St.2d 478, 480, 391 N.E.2d 317 (1979).  By his 
own admission, the trooper retrieved appellant’s purse from her live-in boyfriend’s 
vehicle to look for evidence of a crime.  Having no valid exceptions to the Fourth 
Amendment warrant requirement, the trooper relied on an inventory search incident 
to incarceration as a pretext to search appellant’s purse for evidence of a crime. 
{¶ 62} A trooper’s subjective belief that the Highway Patrol policy permits 
an inventory search incident to incarceration is not objectively justified when the 
trooper has no intention of taking appellant to a station house for booking and 
incarceration.  Moreover, a trooper’s subjective belief that the Highway Patrol 
policy gave him discretionary authority to ensure that the purse of a female arrestee 
went with her to the station house is not objectively justified when the purse was in 
a secure location.  A reasonably well-trained officer would know that the United 
January Term, 2018 
 
25 
States Supreme Court decision in Lafayette, 462 U.S. 640, 103 S.Ct. 2605, 77 
L.Ed.2d 65, does not support the inventory search as it was conducted here. 
{¶ 63} As guardians of the Constitution, the judiciary must protect the 
people’s right to live free from unconstitutional government intrusions by carefully 
applying the Supreme Court’s “jealously and carefully drawn exceptions to the 
warrant requirement,” United States v. Jones, 635 F.2d 1357, 1360 (8th Cir.1980), 
and by carefully reviewing administrative searches to ensure that they were 
executed in good faith and in line with the community-caretaking function, Bertine 
at 372.  “There is always a temptation in criminal cases to let the end justify the 
means, but as guardians of the Constitution, we must resist that temptation.”  State 
v. Gardner, 135 Ohio St.3d 99, 2012-Ohio-5683, 984 N.E.2d 1025, ¶ 24, citing 
United States v. Mesa, 62 F.3d 159, 163 (6th Cir.1995). 
{¶ 64} The exclusionary rule exists to deter police misconduct.  Davis v. 
United States, 564 U.S. 229, 236-237, 131 S.Ct. 2419, 180 L.Ed.2d 285 (2011).  
Regarding the rule, the United States Supreme Court has stated: “[T]he significant 
costs of this rule have led us to deem it ‘applicable only * * * where its deterrence 
benefits outweigh its substantial social costs.’  * * * ‘Suppression of evidence * * * 
has always been our last resort, not our first impulse.’ ” Utah v. Strieff, __ U.S. __, 
136 S.Ct. 2056, 2061, 195 L.Ed.2d 400 (2016), quoting Hudson v. Michigan, 547 
U.S. 586, 591, 126 S.Ct. 2159, 165 L.Ed.2d 56 (2006). 
{¶ 65} Here, because the search of appellant’s purse was not executed 
pursuant to a standardized procedure or policy in good faith and was executed for 
the sole purpose of investigation, I am compelled to apply the exclusionary rule.  
For all the foregoing reasons, I concur in judgment only. 
_________________ 
O’DONNELL, J., dissenting. 
{¶ 66} Respectfully, I dissent. 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
26 
{¶ 67} I would dismiss this case as having been improvidently allowed 
because the Ohio State Highway Patrol policy is not in evidence, the case is 
factually specific, and no general rule of law can be formulated from its resolution. 
_________________ 
DEWINE, J., dissenting. 
{¶ 68} The retrieval of Jamie Banks-Harvey’s purse from a car was not an 
illegal seizure, and the subsequent inventory search of the purse was not an illegal 
search.  Thus, her motion to suppress was properly denied.  Because the lead 
opinion concludes differently—and misapplies Fourth Amendment law on the 
way—I respectfully dissent. 
{¶ 69} For the most part, the lead opinion takes no issue with the Ohio State 
Highway Patrol trooper’s actions in this case.  The lead opinion agrees that the stop 
of the car driven by Banks-Harvey and her subsequent arrest for an outstanding 
warrant were lawful.  Further, the lead opinion recognizes that an inventory search 
is a “well-defined exception to the Fourth Amendment’s warrant requirement.”  
Lead opinion at ¶ 20.  And according to the lead opinion, “it is not unreasonable 
for police, as part of routine procedure incident to incarceration, to search any 
article or container in the arrestee’s possession in accordance with established 
inventory procedures.”  Lead opinion at ¶ 21.  The lead opinion doesn’t even 
question the trooper’s assertion that there was a standard policy to take a purse 
along with an arrestee to jail. 
{¶ 70} In the end, the lead opinion’s determination that the search of Banks-
Harvey’s purse violated the Fourth Amendment hinges on one fact—that the purse 
was removed from a car prior to the inventory search.  With little, if any, analysis, 
the lead opinion concludes that the trooper did not have lawful custody of the purse 
when he conducted the inventory search, because he retrieved the purse “from a 
place that is protected by the Fourth Amendment.”  Lead opinion at ¶ 39.  The 
problem with the reasoning is that it is contrary to well-established Fourth 
January Term, 2018 
 
27 
Amendment jurisprudence and misses the real question: Was taking the purse from 
the car an illegal seizure?  
The car is a nonstarter 
{¶ 71} The fallacy in the lead opinion’s reasoning is laid bare by reference 
to the Fourth Amendment itself: “The right of the people to be secure in their 
persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, 
shall not be violated * * *.”  (Emphasis added.)  Two concepts bear emphasis.  First, 
the amendment protects the right of the people, not the property.  That principle is 
reflected in the oft-quoted line from Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347, 351, 88 
S.Ct. 507, 19 L.Ed.2d 576 (1967):  “[T]he Fourth Amendment protects people, not 
places.”  The second point relevant here is that the amendment protects people’s 
rights in their—not others’—effects.  See generally Minnesota v. Carter, 525 U.S. 
83, 92, 119 S.Ct. 469, 142 L.Ed.2d 373 (1998) (Scalia, J., concurring).  In other 
words, contrary to the lead opinion’s assertion, it matters not whether the car was 
protected under the Fourth Amendment—it wasn’t—but whether the trooper’s 
retrieval of Banks-Harvey’s purse somehow violated any interest of hers in the car. 
{¶ 72} In Rakas v. Illinois, 439 U.S. 128, 99 S.Ct. 421, 58 L.Ed.2d 387 
(1978), the court considered whether a search of a car violated the rights of 
passengers who did not own the car.  The court concluded that the passengers could 
claim no violation of their Fourth Amendment rights because they had no 
possessory interest in the car or expectation of privacy in the places searched.  Id. 
at 148.  Although here, Banks-Harvey was the driver of the car, rather than a 
passenger, Rakas’s analysis applies.  The car was not Banks-Harvey’s; it belonged 
to Charles Hall.  According to Hall, he had allowed Banks-Harvey to drive the car 
only because he had hurt his hand.  Like the passengers in Rakas, Banks-Harvey 
had neither a possessory interest in the car nor an expectation of privacy in the car. 
 
 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
28 
The focus should be on the purse 
{¶ 73} By directing its focus onto the car, the lead opinion blurs the real 
object of interest—the purse.  There is no question that Banks-Harvey had a 
possessory interest in her own purse.  The question is whether that interest was 
infringed upon by the trooper.  In other words, was there an unreasonable seizure 
or an unreasonable search of the purse?  I would hold that there was neither.  The 
removal of the purse from the car was not a “seizure” under the Fourth Amendment.  
And even if it were a seizure, the removal of the purse from the car would not have 
been unreasonable.  Moreover, the subsequent inventory search of the purse was 
lawful. 
{¶ 74} The Fourth Amendment proscribes unreasonable searches and 
seizures.  While the prohibition against unreasonable searches protects “the interest 
in maintaining personal privacy,” the prohibition against unreasonable seizures 
protects “the interest in retaining possession of property.”  Texas v. Brown, 460 
U.S. 730, 747, 103 S.Ct. 1535, 75 L.Ed.2d 502 (1983) (Stevens, J., concurring).  
“[N]ot every governmental interference with a person’s property constitutes a 
seizure of that property under the Constitution.”  United States v. Va Lerie, 424 
F.3d 694, 702 (8th Cir.2005).  Rather, “[a] ‘seizure’ of property occurs when there 
is some meaningful interference with an individual’s possessory interests in that 
property.”  United States v. Jacobsen, 466 U.S. 109, 113, 80 L.Ed.2d 85, 104 S.Ct. 
1652 (1984). 
{¶ 75} Although caselaw from the United States Supreme Court on what 
constitutes a seizure of property is scant, id. at fn. 5, lower federal courts have 
provided some guidance.  In determining whether the removal of a checked or 
stowed bag from a bus amounts to “meaningful interference,” courts have focused 
on the duration of the bag’s detention and the distance that the bag was moved, the 
extent of the owner’s possessory interest at the time of the removal, and whether 
the owner’s movement was impeded by the removal.  Thus, in United States v. 
January Term, 2018 
 
29 
Gant, 112 F.3d 239 (6th Cir.1997), the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals held that the 
removal of a bag from an overhead compartment on a bus so that it could be 
examined by a drug-sniffing dog was not a seizure.  In concluding that police had 
not meaningfully interfered with the owner’s possessory interest in the bag, the 
court noted that it had been moved only a short distance for a brief time, that the 
removal had occurred after the bag was left unattended by the owner, so the owner’s 
access had not been impaired, and that, absent the subsequent indication by the dog 
that the bag contained drugs, the owner’s travel would not have been interrupted.  
Id. at 242.  The Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals similarly determined that removal 
of a checked bag from a bus to take it to the bus terminal to seek consent for a 
search did not amount to meaningful interference to trigger a violation of the Fourth 
Amendment.  Va Lerie. 
{¶ 76} In this case, the trooper retrieved Banks-Harvey’s purse to bring it 
with her to the jail.  At the time he retrieved the purse, Banks-Harvey’s possessory 
interest in it was diminished; she had lost access to her purse when she was put in 
the cruiser.  And the retrieval of the purse did not impede Banks-Harvey’s 
movement.  She had already been detained.  Indeed, it is hard to see how the trooper 
“meaningfully interfered” with Banks-Harvey’s possessory interest when his intent 
in retrieving the purse was to be sure that it went with her to the jail.  I would 
conclude that his retrieval of the purse was not a seizure under the Fourth 
Amendment. 
{¶ 77} Setting aside the question whether there was a seizure here, I would 
conclude that, in any event, there was no unreasonable seizure.  The trooper’s 
testimony that he acted pursuant to standard procedure that a purse goes with an 
arrestee was not disputed.  The policy makes sense.  A purse could hold 
identification, money, medication, or other items needed at the jail.  And taking and 
inventorying an arrestee’s purse and its contents protects police from claims that 
the purse was left in an unsafe place and was stolen.  See also United States v. 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
30 
Perea, 986 F.2d 633, 643 (2d Cir.1993), quoting Cabbler v. Superintendent, 
Virginia State Penitentiary, 528 F.2d 1142, 1146 (4th Cir.1975) (“When a person 
is arrested in a place other than his home, the arresting officers may ‘impound the 
personal effects that are with him at the time to ensure the safety of those effects or 
to remove nuisances from the area’ ”). 
{¶ 78} In her opinion concurring in judgment only, Justice Kennedy refers 
to the trooper’s comment that he did not intend to take Banks-Harvey to the station 
himself.  Instead, he was going to hand her over to law-enforcement officers from 
Montgomery County.  Nonetheless, this detail about the planned transport of 
Banks-Harvey does not change the fact that the trooper retrieved the purse so it 
could accompany her to jail.  The fact that a law-enforcement officer from 
Montgomery County, instead of the trooper, might actually drive Banks-Harvey to 
the police station does not make unreasonable the policy that a purse accompanies 
an arrestee. 
{¶ 79} The opinion concurring in judgment only also challenges the 
reasonableness of a policy that requires that personal effects go with an arrestee 
when the effects were not with the person when he or she was arrested and when 
they are in a secure location.  The opinion emphasizes that the purse was in the car 
with Hall, Banks-Harvey’s live-in boyfriend.  It may well be that in this case, 
Banks-Harvey’s purse would have been secure if left behind, but the point of a 
policy is to give troopers guidelines so that they don’t have to undertake the 
responsibility of assessing the security of an item on a case-by-case basis.  “ ‘ “[A] 
single familiar standard is essential to guide police officers, who have only limited 
time and expertise to reflect on and balance the social and individual interests 
involved in the specific circumstances they confront.” ’ ”  Illinois v. Lafayette, 462 
U.S. 640, 648, 77 L.Ed.2d 65, 103 S.Ct. 2605 (1983), quoting New York v. Belton, 
453 U.S. 454, 458, 101 S.Ct. 2860, 69 L.Ed.2d 768 (1981), quoting Dunaway v. 
New York, 442 U.S. 200, 213-214, 99 S.Ct. 2248, 60 L.Ed.2d 824 (1979).  And 
January Term, 2018 
 
31 
surely it is not unreasonable to have a policy that generally recognizes that a 
person’s effects are more secure with the person than with someone else, even if 
that someone else is a live-in boyfriend.  Moreover, as the opinion concurring in 
judgment only acknowledges, “the ‘reasonableness of any particular governmental 
activity does not necessarily or invariably turn on the existence of alternative “less 
intrusive” means.’ ”  ¶ 54 (Kennedy, J., concurring in judgment only), quoting 
Lafayette at 647. 
The inventory search of the purse was lawful 
{¶ 80} Because he properly took the purse from the car, the question 
becomes whether it was lawful for the trooper to search it without a warrant.  As 
acknowledged in the lead opinion, an inventory search of personal effects is a 
recognized exception to the requirement that searches be conducted pursuant to 
warrants.  See Lafayette at 643. 
{¶ 81} In Lafayette, the defendant was arrested in a theater for disturbing 
the peace.  At the police station, an officer conducted a search of a shoulder bag the 
defendant had carried with him to the station and discovered drugs.  The court 
concluded that the search of the bag “in accordance with established inventory 
procedures” had been reasonable.  Id. at 648.  The court cited a “range of 
governmental interests” supporting the search.  Id. at 646.  These interests include 
deterring theft and false claims of theft, keeping dangerous items away from the 
arrestee, and confirming the arrestee’s identity.  Id. 
{¶ 82} Here, the trooper testified that his inventory search of Banks-
Harvey’s purse was performed pursuant to written policy.  Although the policy 
itself was not entered into evidence, no one challenges its existence.  Although the 
trooper searched the purse on the hood of his cruiser rather than at the police station 
as in Lafayette that difference is of no significance.  The United States Supreme 
Court’s “opinion in Lafayette * * * did not suggest that the station-house setting of 
the inventory search was critical to [its] holding in that case.”  Colorado v. Bertine, 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
32 
479 U.S. 367, 373, 107 S.Ct. 738, 93 L.Ed.2d 739 (1987).  What matters instead is 
that the inventory is done in support of the governmental interests cited above. 
{¶ 83} The concurring  opinion proclaims that the trooper’s search of the 
purse was “per se invalid” because he conceded that in addition to searching the 
purse to safeguard its contents and to make certain it did not contain weapons, he 
looked for evidence of a crime.  ¶ 58 (Kennedy, J., concurring in judgment only).  
True, an inventory search, even when done according to a standard policy, is not 
reasonable if it is done in bad faith or for the sole purpose of investigation.  Bertine 
at 372.  But “a legitimate non-pretextual inventory search is not made unlawful 
simply because the investigating officer remains vigilant for evidence during his 
inventory search.”  United States v. Khoury, 901 F.2d 948, 959, citing United States 
v. Orozco, 715 F.2d 158, 161 (5th Cir.1983).  Here, despite the attempts to cast 
aspersions on the trooper’s motivation, there is no evidence that the trooper’s 
primary purpose was other than to secure the purse so that it could accompany 
Banks-Harvey to the station.  That he was also on the lookout for illegal items does 
not render the inventory search unreasonable.  I would conclude that the inventory 
search here was reasonable. 
Conclusion 
{¶ 84} Because I would hold that the removal of the purse from the car and 
the subsequent inventory search were lawful, I respectfully dissent. 
O’CONNOR, C.J., concurs in the foregoing opinion. 
_________________ 
 
David P. Fornshell, Warren County Prosecuting Attorney, and Kirsten A. 
Brandt, Assistant Prosecuting Attorney, for appellee. 
 
Timothy Young, Ohio Public Defender, and Eric M. Hedrick, Assistant 
Public Defender, for appellant. 
January Term, 2018 
 
33 
 
Michael DeWine, Attorney General, Eric E. Murphy, State Solicitor, and 
Peter T. Reed, Deputy Solicitor, urging affirmance for amicus curiae, Ohio 
Attorney General. 
_________________