COURT OF APPEALS OF VIRGINIA 

Present: Judges Elder, Bray and Fitzpatrick 

COMMONWEALTH OF VIRGINIA 

 MEMORANDUM OPINION* BY 

v. Record No. 2067-95-2 JUDGE LARRY G. ELDER 

 FEBRUARY 13, 1996 

ORAL WELLESLEY GRIGGS, a/k/a 

 WILBERT WELLSBY GAYLE 

FROM THE CIRCUIT COURT OF THE CITY OF RICHMOND 

Walter W. Stout, III, Judge 

 H. Elizabeth Shaffer, Assistant Attorney General 

 (James S. Gilmore, III, Attorney General, on 

 brief), for appellant. 

 Cullen D. Seltzer, Assistant Public Defender 

 (David J. Johnson, Public Defender, on brief), 

 for appellee. 

 

 *Pursuant to Code § 17-116.010 this opinion is not 

designated for publication. 

 The Commonwealth appeals the trial court's pretrial ruling 

to suppress marijuana and cocaine found in Oral Wellesley Grigg's 

(appellee's) luggage. The Commonwealth contends that the trial 

court erred in deciding that appellee did not abandon his 

luggage. Because the trial court did not err, we affirm its 

ruling. 

 I. 

 FACTS 

 On May 10, 1995, Detective Ronnie L. Armstead of the 

Richmond Bureau of Police was working at the Greyhound Bus 

Station in Richmond. At approximately 3:25 a.m., Armstead 
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noticed appellee exit a bus parked at Gate 15, carrying a tan 

folding clothes bag. A baggage handler shortly thereafter handed 

appellee a black bag. Appellee then walked into the bus 

terminal, proceeded to Gate 17, and set both pieces of luggage 

down in the line of Gate 17. For a period of time, appellee 

walked around the terminal, went to the men's room, went to the 

game room, and then sat down, nervously waiting for the bus at 

Gate 17 to be called. 

 When the dispatcher announced the departure of Gate 17's 

bus, appellee retrieved both of his bags and placed the black bag 

at the left side of the Gate 17 bus, near the bins where the 

baggage handler loads luggage onto the bus. At this time, 

Armstead approached appellee at the doorway to the bus, informed 

appellee of his status as a police officer, and requested 

appellee's permission to talk to him, to which appellee 

consented. 

 Armstead explained to appellee that his purpose was to stop 

the flow of drugs through the terminal, and he asked for 

appellee's cooperation in the effort. Armstead asked appellee 

whether he had any illegal drugs on his person "or in any of the 

bags that he may have." Appellee replied "no" and consented to a 

search of the tan bag he carried with him. Armstead then asked 

appellee if he had any other bags, to which appellee responded 

"no." Armstead did not specifically ask appellee about the black 

bag at any time. 
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 Armstead found no illegal drugs on appellee's person or in 

the tan bag. Armstead thanked appellee and allowed him to board 

the bus. Armstead then retrieved the black bag, which had yet to 

be loaded onto the bus, and searched it. After Armstead found 

cocaine and marijuana in the black bag, he boarded the bus and 

arrested appellee. 

 Appellee filed a pretrial motion to suppress the drug 

evidence. The trial court granted the motion to suppress, 

finding that appellee never abandoned his black bag and that the 

police search was unconstitutional. The Commonwealth appeals. 

 II. 

ABANDONMENT OF THE LUGGAGE 

 Upon appeal from a trial court's denial of a motion to 

suppress, we must review the evidence in the light most favorable 

to the prevailing party, granting to it all reasonable inferences 

fairly deducible therefrom. Commonwealth v. Grimstead, 12 Va. 

App. 1066, 1067, 407 S.E.2d 47, 48 (1991); Reynolds v. 

Commonwealth, 9 Va. App. 430, 436, 388 S.E.2d 659, 663 (1990). 

The trial court's findings will not be disturbed unless "plainly 

wrong," Grimstead, 12 Va. App. at 1067, 407 S.E.2d at 48, and the 

burden is upon the appellant to show that the denial constituted 

reversible error. Fore v. Commonwealth, 220 Va. 1007, 1010, 265 

S.E.2d 729, 731, cert. denied, 499 U.S. 1017 (1980). 

 At the core of the trial court's ruling to grant appellee's 

suppression motion was its decision that appellee never abandoned 
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his black bag containing the illegal drugs. The trial court 

found that because appellee did not abandon the bag, appellee 

retained a reasonable privacy interest in its contents. This 

finding led directly to the trial court's conclusion that the 

police performed an illegal warrantless search of the bag. 

Applying the appropriate standards of review to the facts in this 

case, we hold that the trial court did not err in its ruling. 

 "'One who voluntarily abandons property forfeits any 

expectation of privacy he or she may have in it' and all standing 

to complain of its warrantless search and seizure." Commonwealth 

v. Holloway, 9 Va. App. 11, 18, 384 S.E.2d 99, 103 (1989)(citing 

United States v. Thomas, 864 F.2d 843, 845 (D.C. Cir. 1989)). 

Whether a person intends to retain a reasonable expectation of 

privacy in property is determined by objective standards such as 

the person's words and acts. Wechsler v. Commonwealth, 20 Va. 

App. 162, 173, 455 S.E.2d 744, 749 (1995). "Two factors are 

particularly relevant in ascertaining intent: [1] physical 

relinquishment of the property and [2] denial of ownership." Id.

 The record in this case reveals that neither of these factors 

was satisfied in this case. 

 First, the evidence did not prove that appellee relinquished 

control over the black bag. Appellee deposited the bag in a 

location where he intended for a bus terminal employee to 

properly place it in the bus on which appellee planned to depart. 

 The reasonable inference arises that appellee intended to 
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transport the bag with him to the bus' destination, where he 

could reclaim his property. These facts stand in contrast to 

those in Wechsler, where this Court held that the defendant 

voluntarily abandoned his luggage in an airport terminal after he 

departed the terminal building and attempted to enter a taxi cab, 

leaving the luggage at the terminal's baggage carousel. 

Wechsler, 20 Va. App. at 173, 455 S.E.2d at 749. Here, appellee 

remained within the bus terminal at all times and left the black 

bag in an area designated for loading onto his departing bus; his 

actions in no way diminished his privacy expectation in his 

property. 

 Second, appellee's general denial of ownership of luggage 

other than the tan bag did not prove he intended to abandon the 

black bag. As this Court has stated, "[e]very disclaimer of 

ownership of personalty [] does not conclusively establish the 

intent to relinquish one's expectation of privacy. . . . 

Similarly, an absence of assertion of ownership does not 

necessarily constitute abandonment." Holloway, 9 Va. App. at 18, 

384 S.E.2d at 104. In this case, although appellee told the 

police that he had no bags other than his tan bag, the 

Commonwealth failed to prove abandonment under all of the 

attendant circumstances. See Wechsler, 20 Va. App. at 173-74, 

455 S.E.2d at 749 (the defendant expressly denying ownership 

after government agents specifically confronted him with baggage 

claim tickets). 
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 "A trial court's finding that there has not been abandonment 

is a factual finding which, even when arguably mixed with 

questions of law, is subject to attack only if clearly 

erroneous." Holloway, 9 Va. App. at 19, 384 S.E.2d at 104. 

Based on the foregoing, we do not believe the trial court's 

ruling was clearly erroneous. 

 Accordingly, we affirm the trial court's suppression order. 

Affirmed.