Opinion ID: 804522
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Officer Marcus’ second command

Text: [4] The government concedes that Officer Marcus’ second command (for Pope to place the marijuana on the hood of the patrol car) effected a Fourth Amendment search. The magistrate judge held that the second command was a permissible search under the search-incident-to-lawful-arrest exception. The district court affirmed, but it held that Officer Marcus’ initial order “was a search which was supported by probable cause and was incident to arrest.” It did not, therefore, separately analyze the second command. The district court also held that “whether [Pope] was actually arrested is irrelevant” and that “[a]t the moment [Pope] removed the marijuana from his pocket and placed it on the hood of the car, he was effectively under arrest.” The district court cited no authority for the proposition that the search-incident-to-arrest exception can apply even if the Circuit involve “words alone” without compliance with those words. In each case, a government official commanded a suspect to empty his pockets or to expose an area otherwise concealed from the public, and the suspect complied. See Safford Unified Sch. Dist. No. 1 v. Redding, 129 S. Ct. 2633, 2641-42 (2009) (holding that a school official’s verbal order was a search where a student was ordered to pull out her bra and the elastic on her underpants so that school officials could see if pills were being hidden, and she complied); see also United States v. Reyes, 349 F.3d 219, 225 (5th Cir. 2003); United States v. Dalpiaz, 494 F.2d 374, 377 (6th Cir. 1974); United States v. Foust, 461 F.2d 328, 331 (7th Cir. 1972). While an officer may not sidestep the requirements of the Fourth Amendment by directing a suspect to do something that would violate its proscriptions were it done by the officer himself, see, e.g., Winsor, 846 F.2d at 1573, words alone, not complied with, are not enough to infringe upon an individual’s reasonable expectation of privacy under Katz. UNITED STATES v. POPE 8217 suspect is not actually arrested. However, we may affirm on any basis supported by the record. Washington, 969 F.2d at 755. We affirm because the search was supported by probable cause to arrest, and because the evanescent nature of the evidence justified a limited warrantless search. See Cupp v. Murphy, 412 U.S. 291, 296 (1983). The United States Supreme Court in Murphy made clear that a formal arrest is not always necessary to conduct a search without a warrant. Id. at 295-96. In Murphy, the Court upheld the warrantless search for scrapings under a suspect’s fingernails, which ultimately revealed traces of blood and skin cells and fabric from the strangled victim’s nightgown, even though the suspect had not been placed under formal arrest. Id. First, prior to the search there was probable cause to believe the suspect committed murder. Id. at 294-95. Second, the search of the suspect’s fingernails was reasonably related to the circumstances necessitating the intrusion because (1) the detention of the suspect “sufficiently apprised” the suspect of the officer’s suspicions “to motivate him to attempt to destroy what evidence he could without attracting further attention”; (2) the evidence (the residue of blood, skin, and fabric under the suspect’s fingernails) was “read[ily] destructib[le]”; and (3) the search itself was a “very limited intrusion.” Id. at 296. To reach this conclusion, the Court relied on the principles of Chimel v. California, 395 U.S. 752 (1969), which delineates the search-incident-to-lawful-arrest exception. Murphy, 412 U.S. at 295. The Murphy Court stated that Chimel “recognized [that] the scope of a warrantless search must be commensurate with the rationale that excepts the search from the warrant requirement.” Id. The Court also distinguished a “full Chimel search” incident to a formal arrest from the “very limited search” present in Murphy where no arrest took place at the time of the search. Murphy, 412 U.S. at 296. Later cases in this circuit applying Murphy use the term “exigent circumstances” to refer to the high risk that evidence 8218 UNITED STATES v. POPE will be destroyed in a particular situation. See, e.g., United States v. Chapel, 55 F.3d 1416, 1419 (9th Cir. 1995) (en banc) (“Seizures of evidence based on exigent circumstances do not, of course, have to be accompanied by an arrest.”); United States v. Device, Labeled Theramatic, 641 F.2d 1289, 1294 (9th Cir. 1981) (“Such [exigent] circumstances exist where . . . there is a high risk that evidence will be destroyed.”). See generally 3 Wayne R. LaFave, Search and Seizure § 5.4(b) (4th ed. 2004 & Supp. 2011-2012) (discussing search of a person for evidence without arrest). [5] Accordingly, the search of Pope was justified notwithstanding Officer Marcus’ failure to obtain a warrant if (1) there was probable cause to arrest Pope, (2) there was a high risk that evidence would have been destroyed (i.e., an exigent circumstance), and (3) the search was commensurate with the circumstances necessitating the intrusion. Cf. Chapel, 55 F.3d at 1419 (discussing the requirements to take a blood sample under exigent circumstances). When Pope admitted that he was in possession of marijuana, Officer Marcus obviously had probable cause to arrest him for possession of a controlled substance. Furthermore, if Officer Marcus had allowed Pope to leave his presence without conducting the search, there was a high risk that the evidence would have been hidden or destroyed. Pope knew he was under suspicion, and the pocket-sized amount of marijuana that Officer Marcus suspected him of possessing could have easily gone “up in smoke” if Pope had had the chance to dispose of it. Finally, the search was minimally intrusive. Officer Marcus merely instructed Pope to place whatever marijuana he had on the hood of the car. Cf. Murphy, 412 U.S. at 296 (“very limited search . . . under [defendant’s] fingernails”). In addition, the incident took place in a remote forest area, which could have affected the time needed to get a warrant and would have increased the risk that Pope might hide or destroy the evidence. Therefore, Officer Marcus’ warrantless search was justified under Murphy. UNITED STATES v. POPE 8219