Case Name: HAWKINS v. THE STATE
Court: Court of Appeals of Georgia
Jurisdiction: Georgia
Decision Date: 2010-12-01
Citations: 307 Ga. App. 253
Docket Number: A10A1575
Parties: HAWKINS v. THE STATE.
Judges: Smith, P. J., Johnson and Dillard, JJ., concur. Miller, C. J, concurs specially. Barnes, P. J., and Phipps, P J., concur in judgment only as to Divisions 2 and 3 and dissent as to Division 1.
Reporter: Georgia Appeals Reports
Volume: 307
Pages: 253–267

Head Matter:
A10A1575.
HAWKINS v. THE STATE.
(704 SE2d 886)

Opinion:
Blackwell, Judge.
Haley Hawkins was arrested and indicted for several violations and an attempted violation of the Georgia Controlled Substances Act. Hawkins moved the trial court to suppress evidence of certain text messages that police obtained from her cell phone and the cell phone of another individual. Following an evidentiary hearing, the trial court denied her motion. She then sought immediate review in this Court, which we allowed. On appeal, Hawkins claims that the trial court erred in denying her motion to suppress because the seizure and search of her cell phone were unreasonable and because the police did not have the authority to send text messages to her, and receive and read text messages from her, using the phone of the other individual. We see no error and affirm.
Viewed in the light most favorable to the disposition below, the evidence adduced at the hearing on the motion to suppress shows that an officer with the Lowndes County Sheriffs Office was contacted by a mother, who said that numerous text messages about narcotics were being sent to her son's cell phone, and who delivered the cell phone to the officer. Sometime thereafter, the officer received a text message on this phone from Hawkins, who evidently believed she was communicating with the son. At the time, the officer did not know Hawkins's identity. Hawkins inquired in her text message whether the son had received certain controlled substances. Posing as the son, the officer responded by text message and asked how many of the pills Hawkins wanted to acquire. In reply, Hawkins asked how many pills were available, and the officer answered in another text message that he had about 25 pills. Hawkins then responded that she wanted all 25 pills and had the money to buy them. The officer and Hawkins continued to correspond by text messages and ultimately agreed to meet at a local restaurant that evening.
Prior to the time designated for the meeting, the same officer arrived at the restaurant and took up a surveillance position in its parking lot. He observed Hawkins drive into the parking lot shortly thereafter. He then observed Hawkins entering data into her phone, and he almost contemporaneously received another text message on the son's cell phone, in which Hawkins announced her arrival at the restaurant.
The officer approached Hawkins's vehicle, identified himself, and placed her under arrest for unlawfully attempting to purchase a controlled substance. Hawkins admitted to the officer that she was the person with whom he had exchanged text messages throughout the day. After Hawkins was asked for and gave her consent, and as an incident to her arrest, police searched Hawkins's vehicle and found her cell phone inside her purse. The officer searched for, and found on Hawkins's cell phone, the text messages that he had exchanged throughout the day with Hawkins. To preserve these text messages, the officer downloaded and printed them. Police did not obtain a warrant before arresting Hawkins, searching her vehicle, or searching the text messages stored on her phone.
1. Hawkins claims that the officer violated the Fourth Amend ment when he seized her cell phone and searched the electronic data stored on it without first obtaining a warrant. We disagree.
As a general rule, "searches 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." Katz v. United States, 389 U. S. 347, 357 (88 SC 507, 19 LE2d 576) (1967). "Among the exceptions to the warrant requirement is a search incident to a lawful arrest." Arizona v. Gant, 556 U. S. 332 (129 SC 1710, 1716 (II), 173 LE2d 485) (2009). Here, the trial court properly found, and Hawkins does not dispute, that the officer lawfully arrested her for criminal attempt to purchase a controlled substance before searching the vehicle of which she was a recent occupant.
The Supreme Court in Gant said that when an officer lawfully arrests the occupant or recent occupant of an automobile, and "when it is reasonable to believe that evidence of the offense of arrest might be found in the vehicle," the officer may search the passenger compartment of the vehicle for such evidence as an incident of the arrest, regardless of whether the officer has any reason to be concerned about the potential destruction of evidence. Gant, 129 SC at 1714. Although Gant does not define the scope of such a search with precision, we know that it must be limited to a search for evidence of the crime of arrest. See id. at 1721 (IV). And the Supreme Court has told us that such a search is more limited in scope than a search based on probable cause that a vehicle contains evidence of criminal activity pursuant to United States v. Ross, 456 U. S. 798 (102 SC 2157, 72 LE2d 572) (1982), which permits a search of any place or thing in the vehicle that might contain any evidence of criminal activity. See Gant, 129 SC at 1721 (IV).
Although there is some uncertainty about the precise scope of a search for evidence under Gant in the absence of an imminent risk that evidence will be destroyed, we need not resolve that uncertainty today. The most restrictive plausible interpretation of Gant is that such a search is limited in scope to a search of places and things in a vehicle in which one reasonably might find the specific kinds of evidence of the crime of arrest that the officer has reason to believe may be found in the vehicle. Even under this standard, the search of electronic data in this case was reasonable.
Here, on the day of the arrest, the arresting officer exchanged several text messages with Hawkins, in which they made plans to meet at a specific place and time, ostensibly to transact the purchase and sale of controlled substances. When Hawkins arrived at the place and time of the planned meeting in a car, the officer observed her entering data into her cell phone, and he contemporaneously received a text message from her, in which she announced her arrival. The officer then approached her car, observed her entering more data into her cell phone, and immediately arrested her for attempted possession of a controlled substance. And when she was arrested, Hawkins admitted to the officer that she was the person with whom he had been exchanging text messages. So, the officer had every reason to believe that evidence of the crime for which Hawkins was arrested — in the form of the text messages that Hawkins had sent to, and received from, the officer using the cell phone in her vehicle — would be found in the vehicle at the time of her arrest. Under a narrow reading of Gant, the officer was authorized to search for these text messages in any place in the vehicle in which the text messages reasonably might be found.
That the text messages were stored in electronic form in Hawkins's cell phone, rather than in plain view, does not deny the officer the right to discover them. When an officer is authorized to search in a vehicle for a specific object and, in the course of his search, comes across a container that reasonably might contain the object of his search, the officer is authorized to open the container and search within it for the object. See Ross, 456 U. S. at 824 (IV) ("The scope of a warrantless search of an automobile thus is not defined by the nature of the container in which the contraband is secreted. 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."); see also Gant, 129 SC at 1719 (III) ("[In some cases], the offense of arrest will supply a basis for searching the passenger compartment of an arrestee's vehicle and any containers therein [for evidence of the crime of arrest].") (emphasis supplied). The pertinent question, in this case, then, is whether a cell phone is enough like a "container" to be treated like one in the context of a search for electronic data that might be stored on the phone. We think it is.
Although it is a matter of first impression for our Court, many other courts have addressed this issue. Most have concluded that, when a search for electronic data that might reasonably be stored in a cell phone is authorized, the cell phone is roughly analogous to an electronic "container" that properly can be "opened" and searched for the data, much as a traditional "container" can be opened to search for tangible objects within. See United States v. Finley, 477 F3d 250, 260 (III) (B), n. 7 (5th Cir. 2007); see also United States v. Wurie, 612 FSupp.2d 104, 109 (D. Mass. 2009) ("Decisions of district courts and Courts of Appeals (often analogizing cell phones to the earlier pager technology) trend heavily in favor of finding that the search incident to arrest. . . exception [ ] appl[ies] to searches of the contents of cell phones.") (citations omitted). Federal courts in Georgia are among those that have reached this conclusion. See, e.g., United States v. Cole, 2010 U. S. Dist. LEXIS 82822 at *60-68 (7) (N.D. Ga. 2010) (concluding that the defendant's cell phone was a "container" for purposes of applying an exception to the warrant requirement since it contained information not readily apparent without manipulating the cell phone itself); United States v. McCray, 2008 U. S. Dist. LEXIS 116044 at *13 (S.D. Ga. 2008) (concluding that "[a] cell phone, like a beeper, is an electronic 'container,' in that it stores information that may have great evidentiary value (and that might easily be destroyed or corrupted)"). We are persuaded that, as a general matter, these decisions are correct.
Cell phones and other mobile electronic data storage devices, however, are unlike traditional "containers" in several respects, and for this reason, we must apply the principles set forth in traditional "container" cases to searches for electronic data with great care and caution. A traditional "container" encloses tangible things and, therefore, can hold only a finite number of things and only things as voluminous as the physical volume of the container allows. An electronic "container," on the other hand, may contain innumerable electronic data of almost infinite variety in a volume having little, if any, relation to the physical size of the electronic "container." And, unlike a traditional "container," which simply contains whatever it contains, an electronic "container," through an Internet browser or other application, may have the capability to reach out and retrieve data from other places during the course of a search.
In addition, as the Supreme Court has recognized, vehicles and the traditional "containers" transported in them " 'seldom serve as . the repository of [tangible] personal effects.' " Wyoming v. Houghton, 526 U. S. 295, 303 (II) (119 SC 1297, 143 LE2d 408) (1999). Electronic "containers," on the other hand — including small electronic "containers," such as cell phones, that frequently are transported in vehicles — often will contain the most sensitive kinds of personal information, in which individuals may reasonably have a substantial expectation of privacy and for which the law offers heightened protection. Indeed, it is easy to imagine that cell phones with text messaging or e-mail functionality — including the cell phone in this case — may contain a significant number of the electronic equivalent of private papers, which are exempted under Georgia law from the coverage of a search warrant when they merely are evidence of a crime. See Brogdon v. State, 287 Ga. 528, 533-534 (2) (697 SE2d 211) (2010); see also Smith v. State, 192 Ga. App. 298 (384 SE2d 459) (1989) ("[T]he concept of 'private papers' would include diaries, personal letters, and similar documents wherein the author's personal thoughts are recorded."). Moreover, such cell phones may very well contain privileged electronic communications, including communications between lawyers and clients, doctors and patients, and spouses.
Given the volume and diverse nature of data that may be contained in a cell phone or other mobile electronic data storage device, we think courts generally should, as one prominent commentator has put it, treat such a device "like a container that stores thousands of individual containers in the form of discrete files." Kerr, "Searches and Seizures in a Digital World," 119 Harv. L. Rev. 531, 555 (2005). Just because an officer has the authority to make a search of the data stored on a cell phone (that is, just because he has reason to "open" the "container") does not mean that he has the authority to sift through all of the data stored on the phone (that is, to open and view all of the sub-containers of data stored therein). Instead, his search must be limited as much as is reasonably practicable by the object of the search. See Ross, 456 U. S. at 824 (IV). Although it may not always be possible at the outset of a search to immediately identify the specific data that is the object of the search without examining something more, it more often than not will be possible to narrow in some meaningful way the sub-containers that might reasonably contain the object of the search. Where the object of the search is to discover certain text messages, for instance, there is no need for the officer to sift through photos or audio files or Internet browsing history data stored on the phone.
Applying these principles in this case, it seems quite clear that the search of the electronic data stored on Hawkins's cell phone was reasonable. The arresting officer searched for and found the specific text messages that he had good reason to believe were stored on the cell phone. The record made at the hearing on the motion to suppress does not suggest that the officer found or looked for any other data on the cell phone. Accordingly, the record shows that the search of data stored on the cell phone was limited in scope to a search for specific evidence of the crime for which Hawkins was arrested that the officer had good reason to believe was stored on the cell phone. For these reasons, the trial court did not err in finding that Hawkins's Fourth Amendment rights were not violated by the warrantless search of her cell phone.
2. Hawkins also claims on appeal that the evidence of the text messages should be suppressed because the officer did not have the authority to use the cell phone that the mother had delivered to him for the dual purposes of reading text messages that she sent (and intended for the son) and responding to these text messages (as if he were the son). We think this claim is without merit and does not warrant much discussion. Although Hawkins claims that the officer's conduct was comparable to a wiretap interception of a telephone conversation, it simply is not. It is more comparable to dialing a wrong number and speaking with someone that you believe is another. The officer was a party to the text message communications, notwithstanding that Hawkins did not know his true identity at the time. For this reason, her contention that the officer violated OCGA § 16-11-62 (2) — which prohibits the use of any device to record the activities of another in a private place and out of public view without his consent — is without merit. See OCGA § 16-11-66 (a) ("Nothing in Code Section 16-11-62 shall prohibit a person from intercepting a wire, oral, or electronic communication where such person is a party to the communication. . . ."). Hawkins also argues that the officer violated the rights of the son by using his cell phone without his proper consent, but Hawkins has no standing to claim a violation of the constitutional rights of the son. See English v. State, 288 Ga. App. 436, 441 (3) (654 SE2d 150) (2007) ("Because Fourth Amendment rights are personal, a defendant may move to suppress evidence obtained through an illegal search and seizure only when his own rights were violated.").
3. Finally, Hawkins claims that the trial court erred when it concluded that she voluntarily consented to a search of the electronic data stored on her cell phone. In light of our disposition in Division 1, supra, we need not address whether the search of the cell phone might also be justified by her voluntary consent.
The trial court did not err in denying the motion to suppress.
Judgment affirmed.
Smith, P. J., Johnson and Dillard, JJ., concur. Miller, C. J, concurs specially. Barnes, P. J., and Phipps, P J., concur in judgment only as to Divisions 2 and 3 and dissent as to Division 1.
More specifically, she was charged with one count of unlawfully attempting to purchase a controlled substance in violation of OCGA § 16-4-1, one count of unlawfully using a communications facility in violation of OCGA § 16-13-32.3, and two counts of unlawfully possessing a controlled substance in violation of OCGA § 16-13-30.
On appeal from the denial of a motion to suppress, we construe the evidence "most favorably to uphold the findings and judgment of the trial court." Sprinkles v. State, 227 Ga. App. 112 (1) (488 SE2d 492) (1997).
The special concurrence argues that we should consider whether some danger that the electronic data on the phone might be destroyed justified an immediate search. But a danger that evidence may be destroyed is not, according to Gant, the only circumstance in which a vehicle can be searched for evidence incident to arrest. And another such circumstance is present in this case — reasonable cause to believe that evidence of the crime of arrest would be found in the vehicle — so we do not need to consider whether the search also could be justified to prevent the imminent destruction of evidence.
Moreover, as the dissent observes, nothing in the record indicates that the arresting officer had any reason to be concerned that digital evidence on the cell phone might be destroyed before a warrant could be procured. The officer gave no testimony about whether Hawkins was in a place, at the time he searched the data stored on the cell phone, from which she might have intentionally destroyed or tampered with the data. In addition, the officer never said that a concern about preserving the evidence was a reason for his search of the electronic data, and he offered no testimony about his knowledge of cell phones and the ease with which data stored therein may be deleted. Finally, the State has never urged its unquestionable interest in preventing the imminent destruction of evidence as a justification for this search.
We do not mean to imply that this limited reading of Gant is the only interpretation, but we think it is a plausible one. Such a reading is consistent with Ross, supra, in which the Supreme Court said that the permissible scope of a search is defined by its object: "A lawful search of fixed premises generally extends to the entire area in which the object of the search may be found. . A warrant to search a vehicle would support a search of every part of the vehicle that might contain the object of the search." 456 U. S. at 820-821 (IV) (emphasis supplied).
See also Silvan W. v. Briggs, 309 Fed. Appx. 216, 225 (10th Cir. 2009); United States v. Ortiz, 84 F3d 977, 984 (7th Cir. 1996); United States v. Salgado, 2010 U. S. Dist. LEXIS 77266 at *9-12 (N.D. Ga. 2010); United States v. Garcia-Aleman, 2010 U. S. Dist. LEXIS 65333 at *29-37 (E.D. Tex. 2010); United States v. Monson-Perez, 2010 U. S. Dist. LEXIS 20575 at *21-23 (E.D. Mo. 2010); Newhard v. Borders, 649 FSupp.2d 440, 448 (W.D. Va. 2009); Brady v. Gonzalez, 2009 U. S. Dist. LEXIS 57836 at *8-10 (N.D. Ill. 2009); United States v. Santillan, 571 FSupp.2d 1093, 1102 (D. Ariz. 2008); United States v. James, 2008 U. S. Dist. LEXIS 34864 at *9-11 (E.D. Mo. 2008); United States v. Fierros-Alvaraez, 547 FSupp.2d 1206, 1214 (D. Kan. 2008); United States v. Chan, 830 FSupp. 531, 535-536 (N.D. Cal. 1993).
By requiring that searches of electronic data be limited in this way, we give adequate guidance, we think, to law enforcement officers and judges. Although this approach admittedly requires a fact-specific assessment in each case of the reasonable scope of the search at issue, that is something with which both police officers and judges are accustomed to dealing. It is, we think, preferable to the approach proposed by the special concurrence, which would require police officers and judges to distinguish between "ordinary" cell phones and those with a "capacity comparable to that of a computer."
We also think that this approach keeps faith with the Fourth Amendment's prohibition of general and exploratory searches and addresses much of the potential mischief about which the dissent is concerned. We too would worry if officers were permitted without good cause or reason to rummage through all the data stored on a cell phone without limitation. But we sanction no such thing today, and we think our approach is adequate to prevent any such practice. We note also that the case on which the dissent principally relies - State v. Smith, 920 NE2d 949 (Ohio 2009) - does not involve a vehicle search and does not analyze whether Gant would justify the search at issue.