Title: State v. Drew Johnson

State: new-jersey

Issuer: New Jersey Supreme Court

Document:

(This syllabus is not part of the opinion of the Court. It has been prepared by the Office of the Clerk for the convenience of the reader. It has been neither reviewed nor approved by the Supreme Court. Please note that, in the interests of brevity, portions of any opinion may not have been summarized). COLEMAN, J., writing for a majority of the Court. The issue raised in this appeal is whether the police, under the plain view doctrine, were lawfully in a viewing area and whether they had probable cause to believe that a light-colored object, which they observed in defendant's hand as defendant placed the object into a hole beside a post on the porch of a multi-family dwelling, was contraband. On June 11, 1998, at 11:00 p.m., Officer Wilson of the Trenton Police Department's Pro-Active Unit, assigned to target drug violations, prostitution and violations of city ordinances, was approached by an area resident who told him that he had been observing a black male named Drew in the area of 695 Martin Luther King Boulevard selling crack cocaine in small zip-lock baggies. Officer Wilson approached the location in a marked vehicle when someone shouted Five-O. Officer Wilson observed defendant, whom he recognized from a prior narcotics investigation, and four other individuals, move towards the front entrance of the residence. Simultaneously, Officer Wilson observed defendant place a light-colored object near a support post for the overhanging porch roof. Officer Wilson suspected that defendant was attempting to conceal narcotics. Wilson exited the patrol car and ordered defendant to come down and assume the frisk position. It is not clear from the record whether the defendant was actually frisked, but Officer Wilson did not intend to permit defendant to leave the area. Officer Wilson then proceeded to search the area where he saw the defendant placing the object and, in a hole at the base of the post, he found, with the aid of his flashlight, a container he suspected contained crack cocaine packaged for street distribution. Officer Wilson placed defendant under arrest and searched his person, finding $381 in assorted U.S. currency. Defendant filed a motion to suppress evidence. The trial court granted the suppression motion after considering and rejecting the plain view exception to the warrant requirement. The trial court also considered and rejected whether probable cause existed at the time of defendant's arrest that would validate a search incident to that arrest, and whether probable cause existed to search the porch based on exigent circumstances. The State was granted leave to appeal. A divided Appellate Division panel affirmed the suppression order, based primarily on the lack of probable cause. The dissenting member on the appellate panel found that the police conduct was totally reasonable and that probable cause existed under the totality of the circumstances. The appeal is before the Supreme Court as of right under R. 2:2-1(a)(2) based on the dissenting opinion below. The Attorney General of New Jersey was granted amicus curiae status. Upon initial review, the Court remanded the matter to the trial court with specific instructions to supplement the record with information about the nature, size, color, and contents of the bag seized by Officer Wilson. The Court then proceeded to use that additional information in reaching its decision. HELD: The conduct of Officer Wilson in seizing the clear plastic bag from the hole was reasonable under the plain view doctrine and violated neither the federal nor the New Jersey Constitution. 1. The Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution and Article 1, paragraph 7 of the New Jersey Constitution protect citizens against unreasonable police searches and seizures by requiring warrants issued upon probable cause, unless the search falls within one of the few well-delineated exceptions to the warrant requirement. The plain view exception articulated by this Court in State v. Bruzzese, 94 N.J. 210 (1983), cert. denied, controls this case. For the plain view exception to apply, the officer must be lawfully in the viewing area, the officer has to discover evidence inadvertently, and the officer must have probable cause to believe criminal activity is afoot. (Pp. 11-16) 2. The conduct that enabled Officer Wilson to observe the object in the hole was not a search within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment. Any object in the hole could have been observed by inquisitive passers-by or any other member of the public. There is no reason why a diligent police officer should not be allowed to observe that which he or she could have observed as a private citizen. Officer Wilson had a right to be in a position where he could observe the light-colored object in defendant's hand as defendant placed it beside the post. The fact that the police were on the porch after dark and used artificial lighting to visualize the object does not affect the analysis. (Pp. 16-21) 3. The inadvertence requirement, as modified by the United States Supreme Court in Horton v. California, 496 U.S. 128 (1990), was satisfied in this case because the police officers did not know in advance that evidence would be found in a hole beside one of several posts on the porch. (Pp. 21-25) 4. When determining whether a police officer has probable cause to believe that criminal activity is afoot, the Court must look to what the officer knew at the time of the seizure. Probable cause does not demand any showing that such belief be correct or more likely true than false. In light of the totality of the circumstances that include Officer Wilson's experience, the information from the informant, the description of the light-colored object, and defendant's attempt to conceal the plastic bag from the police, it was entirely reasonable for Officer Wilson to conclude that the object was contraband and that defendant was attempting to conceal narcotics. (Pp. 25-35) The judgment of the Appellate Division is REVERSED. The matter is REMANDED to the Law Division for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. JUSTICE LONG, dissenting, in which JUSTICES STEIN and VERNIERO join, contends that the police lacked probable cause to arrest the defendant, defeating the State's claim that the search was incident to that arrest, and that the totality of the circumstances did not satisfy the probable cause prong of the plain view doctrine. CHIEF JUSTICE PORITZ and JUSTICES LaVECCHIA, and ZAZZALI join in Justice COLEMAN's opinion. JUSTICE LONG filed a separate dissenting opinion in which JUSTICES STEIN and VERNIERO join. STATE OF NEW JERSEY, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. DREW JOHNSON, Defendant-Respondent. Argued September 10, 2001 -- Decided March 19, 2002 On certification to the Superior Court, Law Division, Mercer County. Charles Ouslander, Special Assistant Prosecutor, argued the cause for appellant (Daniel G. Giaquinto, Mercer County Prosecutor, attorney). Jodi L. Ferguson, Assistant Deputy Public Defender, argued the cause for respondent (Peter A. Garcia, Acting Public Defender, attorney). Catherine A. Foddai, Deputy Attorney General, argued the cause for amicus curiae, Attorney General of New Jersey (John J. Farmer, Jr., Attorney General, attorney). The opinion of the Court was delivered by COLEMAN, J. The issue raised in this appeal is whether the police, under the plain view doctrine, were lawfully in a viewing area and whether they had probable cause to believe that a light-colored object which they observed in defendant's hand as defendant placed the object into a hole beside a post on the porch of a multi-family dwelling was contraband. The object was ultimately determined to be a clear plastic bag containing narcotics. On defendant's motion, the evidence taken from the porch was suppressed. The State appealed, and a divided Appellate Division affirmed in an unpublished opinion. The dissenting member of the panel found that the police officer's conduct was reasonable under the totality of the circumstances. The State appealed as of right based on the dissent. We hold that all of the elements of the plain view doctrine were satisfied. Hence, we reverse the order suppressing the evidence. Unlike the Ford case, there was no police observation of the defendant engaging in narcotics transactions alone or with others, as was the situation in Ford. There was no observation or recognition of the object, it was simply a white object, a white object that could be anything. It wasn't even plastic. If it were plastic, the court might be persuaded in some way differently, but the truthful testimony from this very credible officer was, it was something white that the defendant did what, slowly placed on the ground. You don't have the furtive movement; we don't have the quick actions; we don't have the secreting of something, the stuffing of something, the hiding of something. All of those words, those descriptions that we see often are, are absent here. The trial court also considered and rejected whether probable cause existed at the time of defendant's arrest that would validate a search incident to that arrest, and whether probable cause existed to search the porch based on exigent circumstances. In rejecting those exceptions to the warrant requirement, the court stated: The critical aspects are, from the State's perspective, as noted in the briefing and argument as well, there was an area resident who had information concerning Drew Johnson. Veracity is to be assumed in such a situation. There was a fair amount of information that was given there, not great specificity, but significant information to warrant further police action, which is exactly what happened. In my judgment, the police officer certainly had grounds at the time, based upon a reasonable suspicion, to speak to the defendant, to undertake an investigatory stop of the defendant, to approach the defendant, things of that nature. He avoided that step, he missed that step. He was prompted to immediate action, and he so testified, to an immediate arrest and frisking of the defendant, and then a search of the area. It was the search of the area with the flashlight on the porch itself, that first gave rise to the recognition that it was CDS that the defendant had, or it certainly appeared to be CDS at the time. In [this] case we don't have . . . ample probable cause; at best you might say there is negligible probable cause, but not enough, in this court's judgment, to reach the standard that is [required] to [satisfy] the state's burden. And here, we also don't even know what that bag is or what that object is. In the Ford case it was very clear evidence with regard to it. . . . Under all of the circumstances presented, once again, I'm satisfied the state has not met its burden. After granting the State leave to appeal, a divided Appellate Division panel affirmed the suppression order. In the majority's view, even to the extent the informant's tip was confirmed by the police officers' observations when they came upon the scene, there was not enough in what they saw to establish that criminal activity was afoot. The majority acknowledged, however, that suppression of the evidence would have been inappropriate if the police had witnessed any overt acts by defendant to suggest that he was involved in drug trafficking activity. The majority also rejected the State's argument that defendant abandoned the cocaine, but implied that it might have ruled differently if the contraband had been placed a sufficient distance from where defendant was sitting to separate it from his person. The dissenting member on the appellate panel found that the police conduct was totally reasonable under the totality of the circumstances. As a preliminary matter, the dissent noted that the Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution and Article I, paragraph 7 of the New Jersey Constitution provide a guarantee only against unreasonable searches and seizures. The dissent also argued that probable cause existed based on the totality of the circumstances and that there was no search because the police did not invade an area in which defendant had a reasonable expectation of privacy. After this Court denied the State's motion for leave to appeal, the indictment was dismissed because the State was unable to prosecute its case in light of the suppression order. The State appealed as of right, based on the dissent, pursuant to Rule 2:2-1(a)(2). Based on our review of the record and some of the trial court's factual findings, there exists some uncertainty concerning whether the evidence that was seized from the hole beside the post had been observed by the trial court despite the failure of the testimonial evidence to describe what was seized. For example, at one point the trial court found that when Officer Wilson looked into the hole beside the post, he saw a package, . . . and in the package was a number of decks or a number of baggies of crack _ - of cocaine of some kind. At another point, the trial court found [t]here was no observation or recognition of the object. The trial court also described the container as a white object, a white object that could be anything. It wasn't even plastic. Because those findings are not based on any evidentiary support in the record, we remanded the matter to the trial court to supplement the record so that we could properly perform our judicial review. On the remand, we directed the trial court to conduct a conference with counsel for the State and for the defense, on the record, to specify the nature, size and color of the bag and its contents seized by the police from the hole beside the post. The trial court stated that the evidence was not produced at the original suppression hearing. The court observed the evidence on remand and described it as a clear plastic-like bag, of thin texture, containing fifteen one-half inch by three- quarter inch pink plastic baggies, each of which contain [sic] a tan or a cream colored substance. The bag is soft and wrinkled making it difficult to discern the contained baggies. . . . [I]t is estimated that its dimensions approximate two inches by two and one-half to three inches. . . . At a distance of a few feet it would be reasonable to describe the bag and its contents as simply a light colored object. We will utilize that additional information in our decision. There is merit in adopting these Texas v. Brown requirements to establish the plain view exception. We do not believe that a police officer lawfully in the viewing area must close his eyes to suspicious evidence in plain view. The Supreme Court's rule merely requires that the facts available to the officer would 'warrant a man of reasonable caution in the belief' [citation omitted] that certain items may be contraband, or stolen property or useful as evidence of a crime, it does not demand any showing that such belief be correct or more likely true than false. Id. The Supreme Court's three plain view requirements comport with overall constitutional standard of reasonableness. Hence, we adopt them as the law of New Jersey. [State v. Bruzzese, supra, 94 N.J. at 236-38 (footnote omitted) (alterations in original)]. Four years after our decision in Bruzzese, the United States Supreme Court made explicit the probable cause requirement that the plurality opinion in Texas v. Brown had required. Arizona v. Hicks, 480 U.S. 321, 327, 107 S. Ct. 1149, 1153, 94 L. Ed. 2d 347, 354-55 (1987). The Court stated: We have not ruled on the question whether probable cause is required in order to invoke the plain view doctrine. Dicta in Payton v. New York, 445 U.S. 573, 587, 100 S. Ct. 1371, 1380, 63 L. Ed. 2d 639 (1980), suggested that the standard of probable cause must be met, but our later opinions in Texas v. Brown, 460 U.S. 730, 103 S. Ct. 1535, 75 L. Ed. 2d 502 (1983), explicitly regarded the issue as unresolved, see id., at 742, n. 7, 103 S. Ct. at 1543 n. 7 (plurality opinion); id., at 746, 103 S. Ct. at 1545 (STEVENS, J., concurring in judgment). We now hold that probable cause is required. [Ibid.] [LaFave, supra, 2.3(f) (footnotes omitted) (quoting United States v. Magana, 512 F.2d 1169 (9th Cir. 1975), cert. denied, 423 U.S. 826, 96 S. Ct. 42, 46 L. Ed. 2d 43 (1975)). That is so because [w]hat a person knowingly exposes to the public, even in his own home or office, is not a subject of Fourth Amendment protection. Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347, 351, 88 S. Ct. 507, 511, 19 L. Ed. 2d 576, 582 (1967). For those reasons, the police may enter upon portions of private property normally open to the public, such as a front porch, and attain a plain view observation through a window. State v. Alexander, 170 N.J. Super. 298, 304 (Law Div. 1979), aff'd o.b., 173 N.J. Super. 260 (App. Div. 1980). Viewed in that context, the porch involved in this case, although part of the curtilage, has a diminished expectation of privacy. We agree with the Appellate Division that [t]he curtilage concept has limited applicability with respect to multi-occupancy premises because none of the occupants can have a reasonable expectation of privacy in areas that are also used by other occupants. State v. Ball, 219 N.J. Super. 501, 506-07 (App. Div. 1987). Here, Officer Wilson and his partner went to 695 Martin Luther King Boulevard to investigate a report of drug activity. They were there for a legitimate investigative purpose. Officer Wilson did not go beyond the porch, thus restricting his movements to the places that any other visitor could be expected to go. Defendant's diminished expectation of privacy on the porch was further indicated by the fact that when he placed the package in a hole beside the post on the porch of the multiple-family row house, a portion of the home which all residents and visitors must use to enter, there were four other people on the porch that evening. In short, the conduct that enabled Officer Wilson to observe the object in the hole was not a search within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment. Any object in the hole could have been observed by inquisitive passers-by or any other member of the public. There is no reason why a diligent police officer should not be allowed to observe that which he or she could have observed as a private citizen. We conclude, therefore, that the light-colored object was in plain view because Officer Wilson had a right to be in a position where he could observe that object in defendant's hand as defendant placed it beside the post. The fact that the police were on the porch after dark does not affect the analysis. It is well-settled by the great weight of authority in this country that no distinction is to be made based on whether natural or artificial lighting was used to visualize the light-colored object as it was being placed in the hole and after it had been placed in the hole. [T]he use of artificial means to illuminate a darkened area simply does not constitute a search, and thus triggers no Fourth Amendment protection. Texas v. Brown, supra, 460 U.S. at 740, 103 S. Ct. at 1542, 75 L. Ed 2d at ; accord United States v. Dunn, supra, 480 U.S. at 305, 107 S. Ct. at 1141, 94 L. Ed 2d at ; United States v. Lee, 274 U.S. 559, 563, 47 S. Ct. 746, 748, 71 L. Ed. 1202, 1204 (1927); State v. Moller, 196 N.J. Super. 511, 515 (App. Div. 1984); State v. Griffin, 84 N.J. Super. 508, 517 (App. Div. 1964). [T]he use of a flashlight does not transform an otherwise reasonable observation into an unreasonable search within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment or under the New Jersey Constitution. State v. Gibson, 318 N.J. Super. 1, 11 (App. Div. 1999) (citations omitted). Many other courts have reached similar conclusions. Mollica v. Volker, 229 F.3d 366, 369 (2d Cir. 2000); United States v. Rickus, 737 F.2d 360, 367 n.3 (3d Cir. 1984); United States v. Chesher, 678 F.2d 1353, 1356 n.2 (9th Cir. 1982); United States v. Ocampo, 650 F.2d 421, 427 (2d Cir. 1981); United States v. Coplen, 541 F.2d 211, 215 (9th Cir. 1976), cert. denied, 429 U.S. 1073, 97 S. Ct. 810, 50 L. Ed. 2d 791 (1977); United States v. Lara, 517 F.2d 209, 211 (5th Cir. 1975); United States v. Johnson, 506 F.2d 674, 676 (8th Cir. 1974), cert. denied, 421 U.S. 917, 95 S. Ct. 1579, 43 L. Ed. 2d 784 (1975); United States v. Booker, 461 F.2d 990, 992 (6th Cir. 1972); United States v. Hanahan, 442 F.2d 649, 654 (7th Cir. 1971); Albo v. State, 379 So. 2d 648, 650 (Fla. 1980); Redd v. State, 243 S.E.2d 16, 18 (Ga. 1978), cert. denied, 442 U.S. 934, 99 S. Ct. 2870, 61 L. Ed. 2d 304 (1979); State v. Chattley, 390 A.2d 472, 476 (Me. 1978); Livingston v. State, 564 A.2d 414, 417 (Md. 1989); State v. Vohnoutka, 292 N.W.2d 756, 757 (Minn. 1980); Dick v. State, 596 P.2d 1265, 1267 (Okla. Crim. App. 1979); State v. Miller, 608 P.2d 595, 597 (Or. Ct. App.), review denied, 289 Or. 275 (1980); State v. Lee, 633 P.2d 48, 51-52 (Utah), cert. denied, 454 U.S. 1057, 102 S. Ct. 606, 70 L. Ed. 2d 595 (1981). [Id. at 138-39, 110 S. Ct. at 2309, 110 L. Ed 2d at .] The Court concluded that the seizure of the weapons was authorized because the items seized from [the defendant's] home were discovered during a lawful search authorized by a valid warrant. When they were discovered, it was immediately apparent to the officer that they constituted incriminating evidence. He had probable cause, not only to obtain a warrant to search for the stolen property, but also to believe that the weapons and handguns had been used in the crime he was investigating. The search was authorized by the warrant; the seizure was authorized by the plain view doctrine. [Id. at 142; 110 S. Ct. at 2310-11, 110 L. Ed 2d at .] Here, there is no suggestion in the evidence presented that the visit to 695 Martin Luther King Boulevard was a pretext whereby evidence of narcotics violations might be uncovered in plain view. Officer Wilson went to the area to investigate the tip from the citizen informant. While conducting that investigation he saw defendant place the light-colored object into the hole. [T]he seizure of an object in plain view does not involve an intrusion on privacy. If the interest in privacy has been invaded, the violation must have occurred before the object came into plain view and there is no need for an inadvertence limitation on seizures to condemn it. The prohibition against general searches and general warrants serves primarily as a protection against unjustified intrusions on privacy. But reliance on privacy concerns that support that prohibition is misplaced when the inquiry concerns the scope of an exception that merely authorizes an officer with a lawful right of access to an item to seize it without as warrant. [Id. at 141-42, 110 S. Ct. at 2310, 110 L. Ed 2d at .] We conclude that whatever remains of the inadvertence requirement of plain view since Horton was satisfied in this case because the police officers did not know in advance that evidence would be found in a hole beside one of several posts on the porch. STATE OF NEW JERSEY, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. DREW JOHNSON, Defendant-Respondent. LONG, J., dissenting. I would affirm the suppression of evidence substantially for the reasons expressed by the Appellate Division. Like the Appellate Division, I would hold that the trial court properly concluded that the police lacked probable cause to arrest Drew Johnson thus defeating the state's claim that the search was incident to that arrest. I part company from my colleagues in connection with their additional determination that the plain view doctrine was a justification for the search. I The facts are straightforward. Based on an anonymous tip, from a person who identified himself as a local resident, that a black male named Drew was selling crack cocaine in small ziplock baggies at 695 Martin Luther King Boulevard, the police went to that location, which they characterized as being in a high drug area. When they pulled up in front of the multi- family house, someone shouted, Five-O , a well-known alert that police are present. The police shined a light on the porch of the house where they saw Johnson seated. One officer knew him from a prior drug investigation. As the people on the porch began to move toward the entrance of the house, the police observed Johnson slowly place a light colored object near a support post for the porch roof in what the trial court found was not a furtive movement. (Emphasis added.) Office Wilson ordered Johnson off the porch and directed him to assume the frisk position next to the police car. The officer then went onto the porch with his flashlight, shined it on the light colored object and retrieved it. The majority acknowledges that Officer Wilson did not testify that he could see the drugs inside the bag before he seized it. II The majority has not taken issue with the Appellate Division's conclusion that the police lacked probable cause to arrest Drew Johnson prior to the seizure of the drugs. It seems clear that at best, the police had a reasonable suspicion of Johnson's criminality, based on all the circumstances. Thus their brief detention of him was justified. Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 88 S. Ct. 1868, 20 L. Ed. 2d 889 (1968); State v. Thomas, 110 N.J. 673 (1988). I have doubts about the validity of the warrantless entry onto Johnson's porch after he was secured in the street. But even assuming, as the majority does, that such entry was lawful, if prior to that entry the police lacked probable cause to arrest Johnson based on the totality of the circumstances, it is inescapable that what occurred on the porch did not satisfy the probable cause prong of the plain view doctrine. Officer Wilson could not see what was in the bag before he seized it. Thus, while he was on the porch, he had no more evidence in hand than he had had when he was on the street - at which point the majority has conceded no probable cause existed. To suggest that the probable cause prong of the plain view doctrine was met is logically out of synchronicity not only with the facts but with the remainder of the majority's holding. This case would be entirely different if the officer had testified that when he got a closer look at the light colored object, he could see that it contained vials of pills or glassine envelopes of powder. It would also be different if the officer had testified that from his training or experience he knew, when he shined his flashlight on the light colored object, that it was of a type used by drug sellers transporting their wares. In those circumstances, a new fact would have been added to the probable cause calculus to change it from what it had been on the street. No such new fact is present here. According to his own testimony, what the officer saw on the porch was essentially nothing more than what he had seen from the street - a closed container whose contents were hidden from his eyes. If he lacked probable cause to arrest Johnson, that closed container, which did not reveal its contents, could have provided no additional evidence to satisfy the probable cause prong of plain view and justify the seizure. Separate and apart from probable cause, I disagree with the majority's holding that the inadvertency prong of the plain view doctrine was satisfied. Officer Wilson went onto the porch specifically to retrieve what he saw Johnson put down. No definition of inadvertency encompasses such a scenario. However, in light of the fact that it appears that in Horton v. California, 496 U.S. 128, 110 S. Ct. 2301, 110 L. Ed. 2d 112 (1990), the Supreme Court eliminated the requirement of inadvertency under the Fourth Amendment, U.S. Const. amend. IV, that error is of no consequence. It would be important, however, if the gravamen of the majority opinion is to reserve the inadvertency issue for resolution under the New Jersey Constitution. N.J. Const. art. I, 7. For those reasons, I dissent. Justices Stein and Verniero join in this dissent. NO. A-50 STATE OF NEW JERSEY, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. DREW JOHNSON, Defendant-Respondent. DECIDED March 19, 2002 Chief Justice Poritz