IN THE COURT OF CRIMINAL APPEALS OF TENNESSEE

AT JACKSON

February 6, 2018 Session

STATE OF TENNESSEE v. WILLIAM ZACHARY WEATHERLY

Appeal from the Circuit Court for Dyer County

No. 16-CR-265 R. Lee Moore, Jr., Judge

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No. W2017-01014-CCA-R3-CD

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In this appeal, we address the constitutionality of police officers’ search of trash located 

within the curtilage of the home of the Defendant, Williams Zachary Weatherly. The 

police officers utilized evidence obtained from the Defendant’s trash to secure a search 

warrant for the Defendant’s home and vehicle. As a result of evidence seized from the 

Defendant’s trash and during the execution of the search warrant, the Defendant was 

charged with possession with the intent to sell or deliver more than one-half ounce of 

marijuana and possession of a firearm during the commission of a dangerous felony. The 

Defendant filed a motion to suppress. Following a hearing, the trial court granted the 

motion, finding that the warrantless search of the Defendant’s trash was unconstitutional 

and that the search warrant failed to establish probable cause. The State appealed. Upon 

reviewing the record and the applicable law, we affirm the trial court’s granting of the 

motion to suppress.

Tenn. R. App. P. 3 Appeal as of Right; Judgment of the Circuit Court Affirmed

JOHN EVERETT WILLIAMS, J., delivered the opinion of the court, in which CAMILLE R.

MCMULLEN and J. ROSS DYER, JJ., joined.

Herbert H. Slatery III, Attorney General and Reporter; Andrew C. Coulam, Assistant 

Attorney General; Danny Goodman, Jr., District Attorney General; and Karen Burns, 

Assistant District Attorney General, for the appellant, State of Tennessee.

Nathan B. Pride and Angela Hopson, Jackson, Tennessee, for the appellee, William 

Zachary Weatherly.

OPINION

05/17/2018
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FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

On December 9, 2015, officers with the Dyersburg Police Department obtained 

and executed a search warrant of the Defendant’s vehicle and home on Keats Street in 

Dyersburg, Tennessee. The affidavit in support of the search warrant was prepared by 

Officer Chris Pursell and provided as follows:

1. I am an officer with the Dyersburg Police Department where I have 

been employed for over seventeen years. Since October of 2013, I have 

been assigned to a specialized unit that investigates a variety of criminal 

cases[,] including the sale and distribution of illegal narcotics. I have been 

involved in numerous narcotic[-]related cases that have led to both 

misdemeanor and felony arrests and convictions. I have participated in the 

execution of numerous search warrants.

The affidavit continues with approximately five pages of Officer Pursell’s knowledge

regarding the general practices and activities of drug traffickers. The affidavit also 

provides:

3. On December 1, 2015, affiant was contacted by Captain Billy 

Williams of the Dyersburg Police Department in reference to drug activity 

being conducted by Matthew Pinson at Matthew’s residence.... A 

complaint had been made to the Tennessee Department of Children’s 

Services that Matthew Pinson was using and distributing marijuana and 

prescription pills at his residence.... During an investigation into Pinson[,] 

it was revealed that Pinson’s drug supplier was possibly William Zachary 

Weatherly. This [led] your affiant to do a “trash pull” in order to gather 

corroborating evidence on this information.

Your affiant checked with the City of Dyersburg Public Works Department, 

John Damesworth[,] who indicated that Tuesday was a regularly scheduled 

trash pickup for Keats St. Damesworth indicated that trash is regularly 

picked up on Keats St. on Tuesday between the hours of 9 and 10 [a.m.]. 

On Tuesday, December 8, 2015[,] at approximately 08:40 am, your affiant 

and Officer Thayer did recover 4 bags of trash from the South and East 

sides of the residence.... These bags were then brought to a separate 

location for further inspection. The following w[ere] located in the bags: 

One bag consisted of discarded mail addressed to the names Millie 

Johnson, Millie Johnson Weatherly, William Weatherly, and Zach 

Weatherly at [the residence on] Keats St. One opened plastic vacuum seal 

bag labeled “AF Goo 2” which had a strong odor that would be associated 
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with Marijuana emanating from it. Inside the bag was a small amount of 

green leafy substance which appears to be Marijuana. Research into the 

term “AF Goo” revealed that AF Goo, otherwise referred to as “AF 

Gooey[,]” refers to a strain of Marijuana. A small amount of plant material

believed to be Marijuana stems and an empty box of plastic sandwich bags 

were also located inside this same trash bag.

4. According to the City of Dyersburg records[,] the gas and water 

utilities for [the residence] Keats St[.] are in the name of Millie Johnson 

Weatherly and William Z[.] Weatherly. The last payment made on the 

account was on 10/23/15.

5. William Zachary Weatherly’s criminal history shows that he pled 

guilty to Possession of a Schedule VI drug with intent to sell, in October of 

2001 in Newbern[,] Tennessee. He received a judicial diversion for this 

charge.

The Defendant filed a motion to suppress evidence seized during the execution of 

the search warrant, arguing that the affidavit in support of the search warrant failed to 

establish probable cause. The Defendant challenged the information provided by the 

confidential informant and the constitutionality of the trash collection by the officers. 

The State filed a response in which it maintained that the information in the affidavit 

established probable cause for the issuance of the search warrant and that the Defendant 

did not have a reasonable expectation of privacy in the trash bags.

During the suppression hearing, Dyersburg Police Officer Chris Pursell testified 

that he had been a police officer for almost nineteen years and was assigned to the Street 

Crimes Unit, which investigated drug-related offenses. He stated that in early December 

2015, Captain Williams from the Criminal Investigation Division provided officers with 

information that the Defendant was possibly supplying drugs to Mr. Matthew Pinson. 

Officer Pursell believed Captain Williams received the information from the Department 

of Children’s Services. 

Once the officers located the Defendant’s residence, they decided to do a “trash 

pull.” An officer contacted the head of trash services in the public works department and 

learned that trash was scheduled to be collected on the street where the Defendant lived 

on December 8, 2015, between 9:00 and 10:00 a.m. The officers arranged for the use of 

a garbage truck for the morning of December 8. At approximately 8:40 a.m., Officer 

Mason McDowell drove the truck down the street where the Defendant lived while 

Officer Pursell and Sergeant Todd Thayer, dressed as trash collectors, collected trash. 
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The officers placed the trash bags collected from other houses on the side of the street for 

the actual trash collectors to obtain later. 

Officer Pursell testified that when he reached the Defendant’s house, he observed 

the Defendant’s trash beside his house and next to the kitchen door. Trash from the 

Defendant’s neighbors was not in his yard or beside his trash. The officers collected four 

bags of trash from the Defendant. The officers took the Defendant’s trash to the rear of 

their truck and kept it at a location separate from the neighbors’ trash. The officers took 

the Defendant’s trash back to their office and searched it.

Officer Pursell recalled that three of the trash bags did not contain anything of 

interest. He stated that the fourth bag contained several pieces of mail or documents with 

the name of the Defendant or his wife and a large vacuumed sealed bag that contained a 

strong odor of marijuana and green leafy residue that appeared to be marijuana. The bag 

was labeled “AFGOO2,” which Officer Pursell stated was, based on his research, a strand 

of high-grade marijuana. He also stated that the vacuumed sealed bag looked like it 

could hold up to one pound of marijuana. Officers also located marijuana stems and an 

empty box of sandwich bags in the trash bag. Officer Pursell explained that sandwich 

bags are often used by drug dealers to package small amounts of drugs, especially high 

grade drugs, for resale. Although Officer Pursell researched the Defendant’s criminal 

history, he could not recall whether the Defendant had any prior criminal convictions. 

Officer Pursell drafted an affidavit and obtained a search warrant on December 9, 

and officers executed the search warrant on the same day. The officers knocked on the 

front door and broke down the door when no one answered. The Defendant was standing 

in the hallway and partially inside a bathroom doorway. The officers announced why 

they were there, ordered the Defendant to the ground, and took him into custody. The 

Defendant’s wife also was present. The officers located a Charter Arms .38 caliber 

revolver, which Officer Pursell believed was loaded, inside the bathroom. The officers 

located three sandwich bags containing a total of seventy grams of marijuana, a small 

plastic bowl containing marijuana residue, and a set of digital scales in a dresser in the 

master bedroom. They found another sandwich bag containing fifteen grams of 

marijuana between the dresser and the wall. In a second bedroom, they located an 

unloaded Remington 870 shotgun, a loaded Rock Island .45 caliber handgun, and two 

boxes of shotgun shells. In a third bedroom, officers found a mason jar containing 

marijuana, a small plastic bowl with a leaf grinder containing marijuana, two glass water 

pipes, one small smoking pipe with marijuana residue in it, a small container which 

included two whole and several partial Xanax pills, four boxes of shotgun shells, one box 

of .45 caliber ammunition, and one box of .38 caliber ammunition. In the kitchen, 

officers located a prescription pill bottle containing a small amount of marijuana and a 

straight shooter pipe. Officers recovered a 12 gauge shotgun, a .308 rifle, two boxes of 
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shotgun shells, and two boxes of 308 ammunition from the Defendant’s vehicle. Cash in 

the amount of $229 was on the Defendant’s person.

On cross-examination, Officer Pursell testified that although the affidavit in 

support of the search warrant stated that officers collected the trash bags from the south 

and east sides of the Defendant’s home, they collected the bags from trash cans located 

beside the southeast corner of the house. Officer Pursell did not know how long the trash 

bags were outside of the Defendant’s home before the officers collected them. He 

acknowledged that the vacuumed sealed bag contained “[a] pinch” of marijuana residue

when officers located it and that the bag did not state the amount that it had once 

contained. 

Officer Pursell stated that the Defendant was not known to him as a drug dealer 

and believed this was the first time that he had investigated the Defendant. Officer 

Pursell acknowledged that the Defendant’s prior drug offense occurred in 2001 and that 

he did not believe that the charge occurred in the house in which the Defendant was 

living in 2015. Captain Williams told Officer Pursell that he received information from a 

juvenile in the custody of the Department of Children’s Services that Mr. Pinson was 

trafficking marijuana and that the juvenile had firsthand knowledge that the Defendant 

was supplying Mr. Pinson with marijuana. Officer Pursell acknowledged that he stated in 

the affidavit that the Defendant was “possibly” Mr. Pinson’s supplier. Officer Pursell 

was unaware of the time that elapsed between Captain Williams’s receipt of the 

information and his relaying the information to Officer Pursell. Officer Pursell stated that 

he believed Captain Williams relayed the information to him within one day of receiving 

it because “we don’t usually sit on that kind of thing for a long time.”

On redirect examination, Officer Pursell identified a photograph of the 

Defendant’s house and the trash can taken when officers executed the search warrant and 

stated that the trash can was in the same location as it had been when officers collected 

the Defendant’s trash bags. The photograph was taken next to the Defendant’s mailbox 

and depicts a driveway and a walkway that led to the front door. The trash can was 

located off the driveway and the walkway and on the side of the house in front of a 

privacy fence. 

Following the suppression hearing, the trial court entered an order finding that the 

affidavit in support of the search warrant failed to establish probable cause and granting 

the Defendant’s motion to suppress. The trial court found that the affidavit did not 

include any information establishing when the officers received the information from the 

confidential informant, the basis of the information, or the veracity of the informant. The 

trial court further found that the “trash pull” was unconstitutional because it was 

conducted within the curtilage of the Defendant’s home. The trial court subsequently 
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entered a consent order dismissing the Defendant’s charges because the State was unable 

to proceed with the prosecution without the suppressed evidence. The State filed a timely 

notice of appeal.

ANALYSIS

The State maintains that the trial court erred in granting the Defendant’s motion to 

suppress because the Defendant did not have a reasonable expectation of privacy in the 

trash and because the search warrant affidavit established probable cause justifying the 

issuance of the search warrant. The trial court’s findings of fact at the conclusion of a 

suppression hearing are binding upon this court unless the evidence preponderates against 

them. State v. Odom, 928 S.W.2d 18, 23 (Tenn. 1996). “Questions of credibility of the 

witnesses, the weight and value of the evidence, and resolution of conflicts in the 

evidence are matters entrusted to the trial judge as the trier of fact.” Id. The Defendant, 

as the prevailing party in the trial court, “is entitled to the strongest legitimate view of the 

evidence adduced at the suppression hearing as well as all reasonable and legitimate 

inferences that may be drawn from that evidence.” Id. This court’s review of the trial 

court’s application of law to the facts is de novo with no presumption of correctness. 

State v. Talley, 307 S.W.3d 723, 729 (Tenn. 2010).

I. Constitutionality of the “Trash Pull”

The Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution provides that “[t]he 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....” U.S. Const. amend. IV. Article I, section 7 of the Tennessee 

Constitution provides that “the people shall be secure in their persons, houses, papers and 

possessions, from unreasonable searches and seizures” and that general warrants that lack 

particularity or evidentiary support “ought not to be granted.” Tenn. Const. art. I, § 7. 

“The purpose of the prohibition against unreasonable searches and seizures under the 

Fourth Amendment is to ‘safeguard the privacy and security of individuals against 

arbitrary invasions [by] government officials.’” State v. Yeargan, 958 S.W.2d 626, 629 

(Tenn. 1997) (quoting Camara v. Municipal Court, 387 U.S. 523, 528 (1967)). The 

search and seizure provision in the Tennessee Constitution is “‘identical in intent and 

purpose with the Fourth Amendment.’” State v. Christensen, 517 S.W.3d 60, 68 (Tenn. 

2017) (quoting Sneed v. State, 423 S.W.2d 857, 860 (Tenn. 1968)). Therefore, “‘under 

both the federal and state constitutions, a warrantless search or seizure is presumed 

unreasonable, and evidence discovered as a result thereof is subject to suppression unless 

the State demonstrates that the search or seizure was conducted pursuant to one of the 

narrowly defined exceptions to the warrant requirement.’” Id. at 69 (quoting Yeargan, 

958 S.W.2d at 629).
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A search occurs when the government obtains information (1) by violating a 

person’s reasonable expectation of privacy, see Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347, 360-

61 (1967) (Harlan, J., concurring); Christensen, 517 S.W.3d 77-78; or (2) through 

physical invasion into a constitutionally protected area, see Florida v. Jardines, 569 U.S. 

1, 5 (2013) (citing United States v. Jones, 565 U.S. 400, 406 n.3 (2012)); Christensen, 

517 S.W.3d at 69-71.

 The State argues that the Defendant did not have a reasonable expectation of 

privacy in the trash collected and searched by police officers. The State relies upon 

California v. Greenwood, 486 U.S. 35, 37, 39 (1988), in which the United States 

Supreme Court applied the reasonable expectation of privacy test and held that the Fourth 

Amendment did not prohibit “the warrantless search and seizure of garbage left for 

collection outside the curtilage of a home.” The Court concluded that the defendants’ 

exposing their trash to the public was sufficient to defeat their claim of Fourth 

Amendment protection and noted that “[i]t is common knowledge that plastic garbage 

bags left on or at the side of a public street are readily accessible to animals, children, 

scavengers, snoops, and other members of the public.” Id. at 40 (footnotes omitted). The 

Court further noted that the defendants placed their trash “at the curb for the express 

purpose of conveying it to a third party, the trash collector,” who might have sorted 

through the trash or permitted others, such as the police, to do so. Id. The Court 

concluded that the defendants did not have a reasonable expectation of privacy in the 

inculpatory items included in the trash “having deposited their garbage in an area 

particularly suited for public inspection and, in a manner of speaking, public 

consumption, for the express purpose of having strangers take it.” Id. at 40-41 (quotation 

omitted).

Unlike the Court in Greenwood, the trial court in the present case found that the 

Defendant’s trash was located within the curtilage of his home, a finding that the State 

does not challenge on appeal. The constitutional protection afforded to a house extends 

to the curtilage, which is “the area immediately surrounding and associated with a 

particular house.” Christensen, 517 S.W.3d at 69 (citing Jardines, 569 U.S. at 6; Talley, 

307 S.W.3d at 729; State v. Prier, 725 S.W.2d 667, 671 (Tenn. 1987)). The reasonable 

expectation of privacy test relied upon by the State “does not subtract anything from the 

[Fourth] Amendment’s protections ‘when the Government does engage in [a] physical 

intrusion of a constitutionally protected area.’” Jardines, 569 U.S. at 5 (quoting United 

States v. Knotts, 460 U.S. 276, 286 (1983) (Brennan, Jr., concurring in the judgment)) 

(emphasis in original). 

Since the officers’ investigation occurred in a constitutionally protected area, we 

must examine whether the “trash pull” was accomplished through “an unlicensed 

physical intrusion.” Id. at 7. Not every entry upon curtilage by police officers constitutes 
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a search. See id. at 8; Christensen, 517 S.W.3d at 69. For example, “‘the knocker on the 

front door is treated as an invitation or license to attempt an entry, justifying ingress to 

the home by solicitors, hawkers and peddlers of all kinds.’” Jardines, 569 U.S. at 8 

(quoting Breard v. Alexandria, 341 U.S. 622, 626 (1951)). “This implicit license 

typically permits the visitor to approach the home by the front path, knock promptly, wait 

briefly to be received, and then (absent invitation to linger longer) leave.” Id. 

Accordingly, a police officer may approach a home without a warrant and knock because 

“that is ‘no more than any private citizen might do.’” Id. (quoting Kentucky v. King, 563 

U.S. 452, 469 (2011)). 

However, the scope of an express or implied license to physically intrude into a 

constitutionally protected area is limited to both a particular area and a specific purpose. 

Jardines, 569 U.S. at 9. While a visitor typically has an implicit license to approach the 

front door of a home and knock, “to spot the same visitor exploring the front path with a 

metal detector, or marching his bloodhound into the garden before saying hello and 

asking permission, would inspire most of us to—well, call the police.” Id. Furthermore, 

“the background social norms that invite a visitor to the front door do not invite him there 

to conduct a search.” Id. Based on these principles, the United States Supreme Court 

held in Jardines that a police officer conducted an unconstitutional search when he used a 

drug-sniffing dog on the defendant’s front porch to investigate the contents of the 

defendant’s home. Id. at 3, 10.

In the present case, the police officers entered the curtilage of the Defendant’s 

home and approached his trash can, which was located off the driveway and next to the 

kitchen door on the right side of the Defendant’s home. The officers retrieved the trash 

bags from the trash can for the express purpose of searching their contents. There is no 

evidence that the trash can was at a location where trash collectors would have collected 

the trash for disposal on that day. We conclude that the police officers entered a 

constitutionally protected area and gathered evidence through an unlicensed physical 

intrusion. Accordingly, the “trash pull” was an unconstitutional, warrantless search. See 

Commonwealth v. Ousley, 393 S.W.3d 15, 33 (Ky. 2013) (holding that police officers 

engaged in an unconstitutional search by entering the curtilage of the defendant’s home 

without a search warrant and removing trash bags from a trash container).

We need not decide whether the officers’ investigation violated the Defendant’s 

reasonable expectation of privacy. “One virtue of the Fourth Amendment’s propertyrights baseline is that it keeps easy cases easy.” Jardines, 569 U.S. at 11. The fact that 

“the officers learned what they learned only by physically intruding on [the Defendant’s] 

property to gather evidence is enough to establish that a search occurred.” Id. 
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II. Validity of the Search Warrant

We next consider whether the search warrant established probable cause 

independent of the evidence discovered during the unconstitutional search of the 

Defendant’s trash. Under the “fruit of the poisonous tree” doctrine, evidence that is 

obtained through exploitation of an unlawful search or seizure must be suppressed. See 

Wong Sun v. United States, 371 U.S. 471, 488 (1963). However, “[p]ursuant to the 

independent source doctrine, an unlawful entry does not mandate the suppression of 

evidence located inside a residence if the evidence is subsequently discovered following 

the execution of a valid warrant based upon facts independent and separate from 

information discovered as a result of the unlawful entry.” State v. Carter, 160 S.W.3d 

526, 532 (Tenn. 2005); see State v. Clark, 833 S.W.2d 597, 600 (Tenn. 1992). 

“[E]vidence seized pursuant to an unreasonable search and seizure cannot be used to 

establish probable cause for the issuance of a search warrant.” State v. Vanderford, 980 

S.W.2d 390, 399 (Tenn. Crim. App. 1997). 

Under both the United States and Tennessee Constitutions, no search warrant may 

be issued except upon probable cause, which has been defined as “a reasonable ground 

for suspicion, supported by circumstances indicative of an illegal act.” State v. Henning, 

975 S.W.2d 290, 294 (Tenn. 1998). When the information regarding the unconstitutional 

“trash pull” is redacted from the search warrant, the only information that remains is the 

officer’s generalized knowledge regarding drug trafficking, a statement that a complaint 

was made to the Tennessee Department of Children’s Services that Mr. Pinson was using 

and distributing marijuana and prescription pills at his residence, a statement that an 

investigation revealed that the Defendant was “possibly” Mr. Pinson’s drug supplier, and 

a statement that the Defendant pleaded guilty in 2001 to possession with the intent to sell 

a Schedule VI controlled substance.

The information in a search warrant need not be admissible in a criminal trial and 

need not reflect the direct personal observations of the affiant. State v. Tuttle, 515 

S.W.3d 282, 301 (Tenn. 2017). Information from a law enforcement officer or a citizen 

informant is presumed to be reliable if the affidavit identifies the source of the 

information as a police officer or a citizen informant. Id. A presumption of reliability 

does not attach to information provided by “an unknown informant or an informant from 

the ‘criminal milieu.’” Id. (citations omitted). 

At the time of the suppression hearing in the present case, a supporting affidavit 

that included information supplied by an unknown informant or a criminal informant was 

required to show (1) the informant’s basis of knowledge; and (2) the veracity of the 

informant or the reliability of the informant’s information. See State v. Jacumin, 778 

S.W.2d 430, 436 (Tenn. 1989) (citing Spinelli v. United States, 393 U.S. 410, 415-16 
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(1969); Aguilar v. Texas, 378 U.S. 108, 114 (1964)). The Tennessee Supreme Court has 

since adopted the totality-of-the-circumstances test, which requires the issuing magistrate 

to “‘make a practical, commonsense decision whether, given all the circumstances set 

forth in the affidavit before him, including the veracity and basis of knowledge of persons 

supplying hearsay information, there is a fair probability that contraband or evidence of a 

crime will be found in a particular place.’” Tuttle, 515 S.W.3d 303-04 (quoting Illinois v. 

Gates, 462 U.S. 213, 238 (1983)) (internal quotations omitted). Under the totality-of-thecircumstances analysis, the informant’s basis of knowledge and veracity or credibility are 

no longer separate and independent considerations but are “‘closely intertwined issues 

that may usefully illuminate the commonsense, practical question [of] whether there is 

probable cause to believe that contraband or evidence is located in a particular place.’” 

Id. at 308 (quoting Gates, 462 U.S. at 230) (internal quotations omitted). Barebones 

affidavits including only conclusory statements remain insufficient, and independent 

police corroboration of the information provided by the informant continues to add value 

to the affidavit. Id. at 307-08.

In the present case, the affidavit does not include any information regarding the 

basis of the knowledge of the confidential informant who submitted a complaint to the 

Tennessee Department of Children’s Services or the informant’s veracity or credibility. 

Furthermore, the confidential informant did not implicate the Defendant in any criminal 

activity. The affidavit includes a conclusory statement that an investigation revealed that 

the Defendant was “possibly” Mr. Pinson’s supplier, but there is nothing in the affidavit 

setting forth the details of the investigation or what the investigation specifically 

revealed. Furthermore, the Defendant’s criminal conviction occurred more than fourteen 

years before the search warrant was sought. Upon considering the totality of the 

circumstances, we conclude that the information remaining in the affidavit after the 

information relating to the “trash pull” is redacted is insufficient to establish probable 

cause for issuance of the search warrant. Accordingly, the trial court was correct in

denying the Defendant’s motion to suppress.

CONCLUSION

Upon reviewing the record and the applicable law, we uphold the trial court’s 

order granting the Defendant’s motion to suppress, and we affirm the judgment of the 

trial court.

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JOHN EVERETT WILLIAMS, JUDGE