Source: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/526/295/
Timestamp: 2019-04-26 16:14:14+00:00

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Court's Fourth Amendment jurisprudence. Even if the historical evidence were equivocal, the balancing of the relative interests weighs decidedly in favor of searching a passenger's belongings. Passengers, no less than drivers, possess a reduced expectation of privacy with regard to the property they transport in cars. See, e. g., Cardwell v. Lewis, 417 U. S. 583, 590. The degree of intrusiveness of a package search upon personal privacy and personal dignity is substantially less than the degree of intrusiveness of the body searches at issue in United States v. Di Re, 332 U. S. 581, and Ybarra v. Illinois, 444 U. S. 85. In contrast to the passenger's reduced privacy expectations, the governmental interest in effective law enforcement would be appreciably impaired without the ability to search the passenger's belongings, since an automobile's ready mobility creates the risk that evidence or contraband will be permanently lost while a warrant is obtained, California v. Carney, 471 U. S. 386; since a passenger may have an interest in concealing evidence of wrongdoing in a common enterprise with the driver, cf. Maryland v. Wilson, 519 U. S. 408, 413-414; and since a criminal might be able to hide contraband in a passenger's belongings as readily as in other containers in the car, see, e. g., Rawlings v. Kentucky, 448 U. S. 98, 102. The Wyoming Supreme Court's "passenger property" rule would be unworkable in practice. Finally, an exception from the historical practice described in Ross protecting only a passenger's property, rather than property belonging to anyone other than the driver, would be less sensible than the rule that a package may be searched, whether or not its owner is present as a passenger or otherwise, because it might contain the object of the search. Pp. 299-307.
SCALIA, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which REHNQUIST, C. J., and O'CONNOR, KENNEDY, THOMAS, and BREYER, JJ., joined. BREYER, J., filed a concurring opinion, post, p. 307. STEVENS, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which SOUTER and GINSBURG, JJ., joined, post, p.309.
Paul S. Rehurek, Deputy Attorney General of Wyoming, argued the cause for petitioner. With him on the briefs were Gay Woodhouse, Acting Attorney General, and D. Michael Pauling, Senior Assistant Attorney General.
Barbara McDowell argued the cause for the United States as amicus curiae urging reversal. With her on the brief were Solicitor General Waxman, Assistant Attorney General Robinson, and Deputy Solicitor General Dreeben.
*Briefs of amici curiae urging reversal were filed for the State of Kentucky et al. by Albert B. Chandler III, Attorney General of Kentucky, Matthew Nelson, Assistant Attorney General, Dan Schweitzer, and John M. Bailey, Chief State's Attorney of Connecticut, and by the Attorneys General for their respective jurisdictions as follows: Bill Pryor of Alabama, Grant Woods of Arizona, Winston Bryant of Arkansas, Daniel E. Lungren of California, M. Jane Brady of Delaware, Thurbert E. Baker of Georgia, Gus F. Diaz of Guam, Margery S. Bronster of Hawaii, Alan G. Lance of Idaho, Thomas J. Miller of Iowa, Richard P. Ieyoub of Louisiana, Andrew Ketterer of Maine, J. Joseph Curran, Jr., of Maryland, Frank J. Kelley of Michigan, Hubert H. Humphrey III of Minnesota, Mike Moore of Mississippi, Jeremiah W (Jay) Nixon of Missouri, Joseph P. Mazurek of Montana, Don Stenberg of Nebraska, Frankie Sue Del Papa of Nevada, Peter Verniero of New Jersey, Dennis C. Vacco of New York, Michael F. Easley of North Carolina, Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota, Betty D. Montgomery of Ohio, W A. Drew Edmondson of Oklahoma, Charles M. Condon of South Carolina, Mark Barnett of South Dakota, and Jan Graham of Utah; for the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation by Kent S. Scheidegger and Charles L. Hobson; and for the National Association of Police Organizations by Stephen R. McSpadden.
Briefs of amici curiae urging affirmance were filed for the Legal Aid Society of New York City et al. by M. Sue Wycoff; for the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers by Paul Mogin and Lisa B. Kemler; and for the Rutherford Institute by Steven H. Aden and John W Whitehead.
passengers in the front seat of the car: David Young (the driver), his girlfriend, and respondent. While questioning Young, the officer noticed a hypodermic syringe in Young's shirt pocket. He left the occupants under the supervision of two backup officers as he went to get gloves from his patrol car. Upon his return, he instructed Young to step out of the car and place the syringe on the hood. The officer then asked Young why he had a syringe; with refreshing candor, Young replied that he used it to take drugs.
Continuing his search of the purse, the officer found a brown pouch and a black wallet-type container. Respondent denied that the former was hers, and claimed ignorance of how it came to be there; it was found to contain drug paraphernalia and a syringe with 60 ccs of methamphetamine. Respondent admitted ownership of the black container, which was also found to contain drug paraphernalia, and a syringe (which respondent acknowledged was hers) with 10 ccs of methamphetamine-an amount insufficient to support the felony conviction at issue in this case. The officer also found fresh needle-track marks on respondent's arms. He placed her under arrest.
nied her motion to suppress all evidence obtained from the purse as the fruit of a violation of the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments. The court held that the officer had probable cause to search the car for contraband, and, by extension, any containers therein that could hold such contraband. A jury convicted respondent as charged.
The court held that the search of respondent's purse violated the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments because the officer "knew or should have known that the purse did not belong to the driver, but to one of the passengers," and because "there was no probable cause to search the passengers' personal effects and no reason to believe that contraband had been placed within the purse." Ibid. We granted certiorari, 524 U. S. 983 (1998).
evaluate the search or seizure under traditional standards of reasonableness by assessing, on the one hand, the degree to which it intrudes upon an individual's privacy and, on the other, the degree to which it is needed for the promotion of legitimate governmental interests. See, e. g., Vernonia School Dist. J,7J v. Acton, 515 U. S. 646, 652-653 (1995).
It is uncontested in the present case that the police officers had probable cause to believe there were illegal drugs in the car. Carroll v. United States, 267 U. S. 132 (1925), similarly involved the warrantless search of a car that law enforcement officials had probable cause to believe contained contraband-in that case, bootleg liquor. The Court concluded that the Framers would have regarded such a search as reasonable in light of legislation enacted by Congress from 1789 through 1799-as well as subsequent legislation from the founding era and beyond-that empowered customs officials to search any ship or vessel without a warrant if they had probable cause to believe that it contained goods subject to a duty. Id., at 150-153. See also United States v. Ross, 456 U. S. 798, 806 (1982); Boyd v. United States, 116 U. S. 616, 623-624 (1886). Thus, the Court held that "contraband goods concealed and illegally transported in an automobile or other vehicle may be searched for without a warrant" where probable cause exists. Carroll, supra, at 153.
tainers of various kinds, just as it is today. Since Congress had authorized warrantless searches of vessels and beasts for imported merchandise, it is inconceivable that it intended a customs officer to obtain a warrant for every package discovered during the search; certainly Congress intended customs officers to open shipping containers when necessary and not merely to examine the exterior of cartons or boxes in which smuggled goods might be concealed. During virtually the entire history of our country-whether contraband was transported in a horse-drawn carriage, a 1921 roadster, or a modern automobile-it has been assumed that a lawful search of a vehicle would include a search of any container that might conceal the object of the search." I d., at 820, n. 26.
Ross summarized its holding as follows: "If probable cause justifies the search of a lawfully stopped vehicle, it justifies the search of every part of the vehicle and its contents that may conceal the object of the search." Id., at 825 (emphasis added). And our later cases describing Ross have characterized it as applying broadly to all containers within a car, without qualification as to ownership. See, e. g., California v. Acevedo, 500 U. S. 565, 572 (1991) ("[T]his Court in Ross took the critical step of saying that closed containers in cars could be searched without a warrant because of their presence within the automobile"); United States v. Johns, 469 U. S. 478, 479-480 (1985) (Ross "held that if police officers have probable cause to search a lawfully stopped vehicle, they may conduct a warrantless search of any containers found inside that may conceal the object of the search").
pressed. And, more importantly, one would have expected that limitation to be apparent in the historical evidence that formed the basis for Ross's holding. In fact, however, nothing in the statutes Ross relied upon, or in the practice under those statutes, would except from authorized warrantless search packages belonging to passengers on the suspect ship, horse-drawn carriage, or automobile.
Finally, we must observe that the analytical principle underlying the rule announced in Ross is fully consistent-as respondent's proposal is not-with the balance of our Fourth Amendment jurisprudence. Ross concluded from the historical evidence that the permissible scope of a warrantless car search "is defined by the object of the search and the places in which there is probable cause to believe that it may be found." 456 U. S., at 824. The same principle is reflected in an earlier case involving the constitutionality of a search warrant directed at premises belonging to one who is not suspected of any crime: "The critical element in a reasonable search is not that the owner of the property is suspected of crime but that there is reasonable cause to believe that the specific 'things' to be searched for and seized are located on the property to which entry is sought." Zurcher v. Stanford Daily, 436 U. S. 547, 556 (1978). This statement was illustrated by citation and description of Carroll, 267 U. S., at 158-159, 167. 436 U. S., at 556-557.
In sum, neither Ross itself nor the historical evidence it relied upon admits of a distinction among packages or containers based on ownership. When there is probable cause to search for contraband in a car, it is reasonable for police officers-like customs officials in the founding era-to examine packages and containers without a showing of individualized probable cause for each one. A passenger's personal belongings, just like the driver's belongings or containers attached to the car like a glove compartment, are "in" the car, and the officer has probable cause to search for contraband in the car.
Even if the historical evidence, as described by Ross, were thought to be equivocal, we would find that the balancing of the relative interests weighs decidedly in favor of allowing searches of a passenger's belongings. Passengers, no less than drivers, possess a reduced expectation of privacy with regard to the property that they transport in cars, which "trave[l] public thoroughfares," Cardwell v. Lewis, 417 U. S. 583, 590 (1974), "seldom serv[e] as ... the repository of personal effects," ibid., are subjected to police stop and examination to enforce "pervasive" governmental controls "[a]s an everyday occurrence," South Dakota v. Opperman, 428 U. S. 364, 368 (1976), and, finally, are exposed to traffic accidents that may render all their contents open to public scrutiny.
tinction between drivers and passengers," rather than to a distinction between search of the person and search of property, which the dissent claims is "newly minted" by today's opinion-a "new rule that is based on a distinction between property contained in clothing worn by a passenger and property contained in a passenger's briefcase or purse." Post, at 309, 309-310.
"The Government says it would not contend that, armed with a search warrant for a residence only, it could search all persons found in it. But an occupant of a house could be used to conceal this contraband on his person quite as readily as can an occupant of a car." 332 U. S., at 587 (quoted post, at 312).
Does the dissent really believe that Justice Jackson was saying that a house search could not inspect property belonging to persons found in the house-say a large standing safe or violin case belonging to the owner's visiting godfather? Of course that is not what Justice Jackson meant at all. He was referring precisely to that "distinction between property contained in clothing worn by a passenger and property contained in a passenger's briefcase or purse" that the dissent disparages, post, at 309. This distinction between searches of the person and searches of property is assuredly not "newly minted," see post, at 310. And if the dissent thinks "pockets" and "clothing" do not count as part of the person, it must believe that the only searches of the person are strip searches.
into the package with or without the passenger's knowledge.2 When balancing the competing interests, our determinations of "reasonableness" under the Fourth Amendment must take account of these practical realities. We think they militate in favor of the needs of law enforcement, and against a personal-privacy interest that is ordinarily weak.
2 The dissent is "confident in a police officer's ability to apply a rule requiring a warrant or individualized probable cause to search belongings that are ... obviously owned by and in the custody of a passenger," post, at 311. If this is the dissent's strange criterion for warrant protection ("obviously owned by and in the custody of") its preceding paean to the importance of preserving passengers' privacy rings a little hollow on rehearing. Should it not be enough if the passenger says he owns the briefcase, and the officer has no concrete reason to believe otherwise? Or would the dissent consider that an example of "obvious" ownership? On reflection, it seems not at all obvious precisely what constitutes obviousness-and so even the dissent's on-the-cheap protection of passengers' privacy interest in their property turns out to be unclear, and hence unadministrable. But maybe the dissent does not mean to propose an obviously-owned-by-and-in-the-custody-of test after all, since a few sentences later it endorses, simpliciter, "a rule requiring a warrant or individualized probable cause to search passenger belongings," post, at 312. For the reasons described in text, that will not work.
tion house; and even at the site of the stop one can readily imagine a package clearly marked with the owner's name and phone number, by which the officer can confirm the driver's denial of ownership. The sensible rule (and the one supported by history and case law) is that such a package may be searched, whether or not its owner is present as a passenger or otherwise, because it may contain the contraband that the officer has reason to believe is in the car.
I join the Court's opinion with the understanding that history is meant to inform, but not automatically to determine, the answer to a Fourth Amendment question. Ante, at 299300. I also agree with the Court that when a police officer has probable cause to search a car, say, for drugs, it is reasonable for that officer also to search containers within the car. If the police must establish a container's ownership prior to the search of that container (whenever, for example, a passenger says "that's mine"), the resulting uncertainty will destroy the workability of the bright-line rule set forth in United States v. Ross, 456 U. S. 798 (1982). At the same time, police officers with probable cause to search a car for drugs would often have probable cause to search containers regardless. Hence a bright-line rule will authorize only a limited number of searches that the law would not otherwise justify.
scribes. Obviously, the rule applies only to automobile searches. Equally obviously, the rule applies only to containers found within automobiles. And it does not extend to the search of a person found in that automobile. As the Court notes, and as United States v. Di Re, 332 U. S. 581, 586-587 (1948), relied on heavily by JUSTICE STEVENS' dissent, makes clear, the search of a person, including even "'a limited search of the outer clothing,'" ante, at 303 (quoting Terry v. Ohio, 392 U. S. 1, 24-25 (1968)), is a very different matter in respect to which the law provides "significantly heightened protection." Ante, at 303; cf. Ybarra v. Illinois, 444 U. S. 85, 91 (1979); Sibron v. New York, 392 U. S. 40, 62-64 (1968).
Less obviously, but in my view also important, is the fact that the container here at issue, a woman's purse, was found at a considerable distance from its owner, who did not claim ownership until the officer discovered her identification while looking through it. Purses are special containers. They are repositories of especially personal items that people generally like to keep with them at all times. So I am tempted to say that a search of a purse involves an intrusion so similar to a search of one's person that the same rule should govern both. However, given this Court's prior cases, I cannot argue that the fact that the container was a purse automatically makes a legal difference, for the Court has warned against trying to make that kind of distinction. United States v. Ross, supra, at 822. But I can say that it would matter if a woman's purse, like a man's billfold, were attached to her person. It might then amount to a kind of "outer clothing," Terry v. Ohio, supra, at 24, which under the Court's cases would properly receive increased protection. See post, at 312-313 (STEVENS, J., dissenting) (quoting United States v. Di Re, supra, at 587). In this case, the purse was separate from the person, and no one has claimed that, under those circumstances, the type of container makes a difference. For that reason, I join the Court's opinion.
1 See, e. g., California v. Acevedo, 500 U. S. 565 (1991); California v.
Carney, 471 U. S. 386 (1985); United States v. Johns, 469 U. S. 478 (1985); United States v. Ross, 456 U. S. 798 (1982); Carroll v. United States, 267 U. S. 132 (1925); 3 W. LaFave, Search and Seizure § 7.2(c), pp. 487-488, and n. 113 (3d ed. 1996); id., § 7.2(d), at 506, n. 167.
a passenger and property contained in a passenger's briefcase or purse. In cases on both sides of the Court's newly minted test, the property is in a "container" (whether a pocket or a pouch) located in the vehicle. Moreover, unlike the Court, I think it quite plain that the search of a passenger's purse or briefcase involves an intrusion on privacy that may be just as serious as was the intrusion in Di Re. See, e. g., New Jersey v. T. L. 0., 469 U. S. 325, 339 (1985); Ex parte Jackson, 96 U. S. 727, 733 (1878).
Even apart from Di Re, the Court's rights-restrictive approach is not dictated by precedent. For example, in United States v. Ross, 456 U. S. 798 (1982), we were concerned with the interest of the driver in the integrity of "his automobile," id., at 823, and we categorically rejected the notion that the scope of a warrantless search of a vehicle might be "defined by the nature of the container in which the contraband is secreted," id., at 824. "Rather, it is defined by the object of the search and the places in which there is probable cause to believe that it may be found." Ibid. We thus disapproved of a possible container-based distinction between a man's pocket and a woman's pocketbook. Ironically, while we concluded in Ross that "[p]robable cause to believe that a container placed in the trunk of a taxi contains contraband or evidence does not justify a search of the entire cab," ibid., the rule the Court fashions would apparently permit a warrantless search of a passenger's briefcase if there is probable cause to believe the taxidriver had a syringe somewhere in his vehicle.
Amendment required a warrant to search Houghton's purse, cf. Carroll v. United States, 267 U. S. 132, 153 (1925), at the very least the trooper in this case had to have probable cause to believe that her purse contained contraband. The Wyoming Supreme Court concluded that he did not. 956 P. 2d 363, 372 (1998); see App. 20-21.
Finally, in my view, the State's legitimate interest in effective law enforcement does not outweigh the privacy concerns at issue.3 I am as confident in a police officer's ability to apply a rule requiring a warrant or individualized probable cause to search belongings that are-as in this case-obviously owned by and in the custody of a passenger as is the Court in a "passenger-confederate[']s" ability to circumvent the rule. Ante, at 305. Certainly the ostensible clarity of the Court's rule is attractive. But that virtue is insufficient justification for its adoption. Arizona v. Hicks, 480 U. S.
dividualized suspicion); Ybarra v. Illinois, 444 U. S. 85, 91, 94-96 (1979) (explaining that "a person's mere propinquity to others independently suspected of criminal activity does not, without more, give rise to probable cause to search that person," and discussing Di Re); Brown v. Texas, 443 U. S. 47, 52 (1979); Sibron v. New York, 392 U. S. 40, 62-63 (1968); see also United States v. Padilla, 508 U. S. 77, 82 (1993) (per curiam) ("Expectations of privacy and property interests govern the analysis of Fourth Amendment search and seizure claims. Participants in a criminal conspiracy may have such expectations or interests, but the conspiracy itself neither adds to nor detracts from them").
3 To my knowledge, we have never restricted ourselves to a two-step Fourth Amendment approach wherein the privacy and governmental interests at stake must be considered only if 18th-century common law "yields no answer." Ante, at 299. Neither the precedent cited by the Court, nor the majority's opinion in this case, mandate that approach. In a later discussion, the Court does attempt to address the contemporary privacy and governmental interests at issue in cases of this nature. Ante, at 303-306. Either the majority is unconvinced by its own recitation of the historical materials, or it has determined that considering additional factors is appropriate in any event. The Court does not admit the former; and of course the latter, standing alone, would not establish uncertainty in the common law as the prerequisite to looking beyond history in Fourth Amendment cases.
321,329 (1987); Mincey v. Arizona, 437 U. S. 385, 393 (1978). Moreover, a rule requiring a warrant or individualized probable cause to search passenger belongings is every bit as simple as the Court's rule; it simply protects more privacy.
"We see no ground for expanding the ruling in the Carroll case to justify this arrest and search as incident to the search of a car. We are not convinced that a person, by mere presence in a suspected car, loses immunities from search of his person to which he would otherwise be entitled." Di Re, 332 U. S., at 587.
by a warrant supported by probable cause).4 Instead of applying ordinary Fourth Amendment principles to this case, the majority extends the automobile warrant exception to allow searches of passenger belongings based on the driver's misconduct. Thankfully, the Court's automobile-centered analysis limits the scope of its holding. But it does not justify the outcome in this case.
4 In response to this dissent the Court has crafted an imaginative footnote suggesting that the Di Re decision rested, not on Di Re's status as a mere occupant of the vehicle and the importance of individualized suspicion, but rather on the intrusive character of the search. See ante, at 303-304, n. 1. That the search of a safe or violin case would be less intrusive than a strip search does not, however, persuade me that the Di Re case would have been decided differently if Di Re had been a woman and the gas coupons had been found in her purse. Significantly, in commenting on the Carroll case immediately preceding the paragraphs that I have quoted in the text, the Di Re Court stated: "But even the National Prohibition Act did not direct the arrest of all occupants but only of the person in charge of the offending vehicle, though there is better reason to assume that no passenger in a car loaded with liquor would remain innocent of knowledge of the car's cargo than to assume that a passenger must know what pieces of paper are carried in the pockets of the driver." United States v. Di Re, 332 U. S., at 586-587.

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