Opinion ID: 1227989
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: facts

Text: Aerial surveillance by the police revealed what they suspected were marijuana gardens growing on appellant Mayoff's land. Based on the aerial views, the police obtained a warrant for a ground search of the property. Under its authority, they seized a portion of appellant's marijuana crop. He was charged with one count of cultivation of marijuana. (Health & Saf. Code, § 11358.) He moved to set aside the information and suppress the evidence against him (Pen. Code, §§ 995, 1538.5), urging that the aerial surveillance of his property violated his constitutional rights of privacy, and against unreasonable searches and seizures. (U.S. Const., Amend. IV; Cal. Const., art. I, §§ 1, 13.) The trial court denied appellant's motions after a hearing, and he entered a plea of guilty. He was sentenced to six months in county jail and two years' probation. He now appeals, solely on the constitutional grounds rejected below. The surveillance which led to discovery of appellant's crop was part of a program operated in several rural northern California counties where widespread commercial marijuana farming has taken root. The program is run jointly by local, state, and federal law enforcement personnel; it has been in effect in Humboldt County, where appellant resides, for approximately eight years. Fundamental to the scheme is a random pattern of warrantless flights over the entire county, focusing on rural areas. The flights are undertaken for the purpose of identifying plots of land on which it appears marijuana is being cultivated. [2] The viewing officers note such factors as the color and spacing of plants, their relationship to nearby structures, signs of cultivation, and the location and general characteristics of the terrain under scrutiny. The vast majority of flights are made without prior information about the existence of marijuana at a particular location. The areas surveyed during a particular flight are selected almost entirely at random. There is no exact pattern, one of the participating officers said at a preliminary hearing. I mean, I just fly wherever I feel like flying.... No set pattern. During each flight, the viewing officer is looking constantly at the ground below. Much of Humboldt County's terrain is extremely rugged and isolated. Appellant, like roughly one-tenth of the county's rural population of about 29,000, lives in territory so remote that it can be examined only from the air. His 40-acre parcel is in a mountainous, wooded region, almost a mile from the nearest paved road. It cannot be seen from the road, and is connected to it by a dirt path which winds its way toward the portion of the property on which appellant resides. Only the top of one of appellant's buildings is visible from the path, which abruptly ends shortly after connecting with a turnoff to his residence. This turnoff is so rocky it is difficult to traverse without benefit of a four-wheel-drive vehicle. On July 23, 1980, Agent Brown of the California Department of Justice and Detective Vulich of the Humboldt County Sheriff's Department made an antimarijuana surveillance flight from Eureka to the Garberville area in southern Humboldt County. They had no search warrant and no prior suspicion marijuana was being grown on appellant's property. From an altitude of at least 1,000 feet, one of the officers noticed what he believed to be marijuana growing on appellant's land. Nearly two weeks later, on August 4, 1980, Detective Vulich flew again over appellant's property in order to photograph the land below. Again, it appears that an altitude between 1,000 and 2,000 feet was maintained. Vulich still had no search warrant. Apparently using an 80-200 millimeter telephoto lens, he photographed the suspicious vegetation, two trailers parked on the property, and the surrounding area. On his return to police headquarters he showed the snapshots to Agent Brown, who then executed an affidavit in support of a search warrant. On August 15, 1980, the warrant was served, and marijuana was in fact discovered on appellant's property, in two separate gardens and in one of the inhabited trailers. At least one garden was fenced, and both were surrounded by steep slopes and wilderness. There was no public vantage point on land from which the gardens or the trailers could be seen. The aerial photographs introduced in evidence indicate that the gardens were at least 200 feet from the closest of the trailers. No fences formed a common enclosure around the trailers and the garden area.