Opinion ID: 2181717
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: State Expansion of Private Search

Text: Because no warrant was procured to authorize the chemical testing and no exception to the warrant requirement exists to justify its absence, the admission of these test results by the trial justice can only be permitted if it is determined that the subsequent testing was not a significant expansion of the prior private search. Although we decided in Eiseman that a remand to the trial justice was the proper procedure to follow in making such a determination, adopting the same course of action in this case would be inappropriate. Our remand in Eiseman was necessary because the trial justice's ruling was inadequately definitive for our review. State v. Eiseman, R.I., 461 A.2d at 377. Specifically, we were unable to ascertain in that case whether the trial justice made a specific finding that the subsequent state testing was an independent governmental search. Id. This case presents no such difficulty. We are confronted here with a situation in which the trial justice made the requisite findings concerning the significant expansion doctrine first enunciated in Walter v. United States, 447 U.S. 649, 100 S.Ct. 2395, 65 L.Ed.2d 410 (1980). [11] Therefore, his findings and ruling upon defendant's motion to suppress are sufficiently specific to be final for purposes of our review. The essential facts in Eiseman are virtually identical to those present in United States v. Jacobsen, ___ U.S. ___, 104 S.Ct. 1652, 80 L.Ed.2d 85 (1984). [12] The Court's majority opinion, authored by Justice Stevens, specifically held that in cases in which (1) a field test could disclose only one fact previously unknown to the agent  whether or not a suspicious white powder was cocaine, Id. at ___, 104 S.Ct. at 1661, (2) there was no other arguably `private' fact, Id. at ___, 104 S.Ct. at 1662, and (3) it was virtually certain that the powder could have been nothing but contraband, Id. at ___ n. 17, 104 S.Ct. at 1660 n. 17, the Fourth Amendment did not require the agent to obtain a warrant before conducting the field test. Id. at ___, 104 S.Ct. at 1662. Consequently, had Steven Eiseman come before this court subsequent to the Supreme Court's Jacobsen decision, our conclusion upon his Fourth Amendment claim would have been quite different. If one assumes the field test at issue in State v. Eiseman, R.I., 461 A.2d 369 (1983) could only reveal one fact  the presence or absence of cocaine  his appeal would not have been remanded to the trial justice for specific findings concerning the degree of governmental expansion of the prior private search. If Jacobsen had been the law of the land on June 10, 1983, Steven Eiseman's allegations of Fourth Amendment violations would have been dismissed. The mandate of Jacobsen is explicit  field tests for cocaine performed under factual circumstances similar to those that existed in Eiseman do not constitute a significant expansion of a private search. Notwithstanding the direct effect that the decision of United States v. Jacobsen would have had upon the result we reached in State v. Eiseman, R.I., 461 A.2d 369 (1983), the principles we announced in Eiseman, including our enunciation of the four factors to be considered in analyzing an expansion case, remain completely viable in non-field-test situations. Our decision in Eiseman owes its genesis to the Supreme Court's opinion in Walter v. United States, 447 U.S. 649, 100 S.Ct. 2395, 65 L.Ed.2d 410 (1980). Indeed, the doctrines we enunciated in Eiseman reflect this court's attempt to provide explicit guidance to a trial justice who is confronted with an expansion case. The Court's recent decision in United States v. Jacobsen, ___ U.S. ___, 104 S.Ct. 1652, 80 L.Ed.2d 85 (1984), not only is fully consistent with its earlier pronouncement in Walter but it actually also incorporates verbatim the doctrines previously announced therein. Id. at ___, 104 S.Ct. at 1659. In our view, United States v. Jacobsen does not in any way reflect the Court's abandonment of the expansion analysis it first defined in Walter, but rather represents a clear affirmance by the Court of the theoretical legitimacy of that doctrine in analyzing an expansion case. As Justice Stevens's opinion demonstrates, at least six justices of the Court are of the view that the legality of the governmental search must be tested by the scope of the antecedent private search. United States v. Jacobsen, ___ U.S. at ___, 104 S.Ct. at 1658. United States v. Jacobsen thus reaffirms the applicability of the Walter principles to those situations in which the government expands upon a lawful private search. The mandate of United States v. Jacobsen is that field tests conducted under factual circumstances similar to those present in that case do not constitute a significant expansion of a lawful private search. This appeal does not involve a field test at all. The chemical testing that defendant here challenges occurred, not in the field immediately following a lawful private search, but rather in the state toxicology laboratory one week after its delivery to the State Police. The pills tested by the state in this case were not even in transit  they were totally at rest in State Police hands, having been inventoried and locked in the State Police evidence room one week prior to their warrantless testing. Secondly, the actual chemical tests performed by the state toxicology laboratory were substantially more extensive than that executed by the agent in Jacobsen. In the present case, the tests performed upon certain contents of the black bag clearly could reveal more than just whether these substances were contraband. Indeed, these tests positively identified the exact chemical composition of a myriad of substances whose identities were previously unknown to the state. [13] This is not a case in which the tests involved could only reveal one fact and no other arguably `private' fact. United States v. Jacobsen, ___ U.S. at ___, 104 S.Ct. at 1662. The third major difference between the case at bar and United States v. Jacobsen, ___ U.S. ___, 104 S.Ct. 1652, 80 L.Ed.2d 85, is that, in Jacobsen, it was a virtual certainty that the substances tested contained contraband and nothing else. Id. at ___ n. 17, 104 S.Ct. at 1660 n. 17. The evidence in this appeal demonstrates that of all the substances tested by the State Police, only one could not have been purchased with a doctor's prescription in a pharmacy in the condition in which it was found. Additionally, most, if not all, of the substances tested here were found in standard medicine bottles and vials. They were clearly not discovered in such a condition  for example, inside four zip-lock glassine bags placed inside a ten inch tube of silver tape in a cardboard box wrapped in brown paper  as would make it a virtual certainty that [they] contained nothing but contraband. Id. A fourth distinction between Jacobsen and the case at bar lies in the fact that in Jacobsen the field test represented a genuine law-enforcement technique employed to restrict the possession of a Congressionally condemned substance  cocaine. Id. at ___, ___, 104 S.Ct. at 1656, 1662. As Justice Stevens's opinion directly acknowledged, the Jacobsen decision is confined to [those cases involving] possession of contraband. Id. at 4418 n. 23. Unlike Jacobsen , the present case presents no exigent circumstances to legitimize the employment by the State Police of a warrantless law-enforcement technique. Nor does it clearly involve the possession of illegal substances. There is no evidence in the record to indicate that the State Police knew that these substances were unlawfully in the possession of defendant prior to the time that they were delivered to the State Police. In light of the substantial differences between the facts in Jacobsen and those in the case at bar and because of our conclusion that the principles announced in Eiseman retain complete vitality in non-field-test expansion cases even subsequent to the Jacobsen decision, defendant's Fourth Amendment claims must be analyzed in a manner consistent with the Eiseman test. In Eiseman we enunciated four specific factors to consider in determining whether a governmental expansion of a private search is so significant as to invoke the protection of the Fourth Amendment. Applied to this case, these include the following:
2. The question of whether in light of his expertise, the officer had formed an opinion with a reasonable degree of certainty concerning the identity of the substance previously searched by private parties before expanding the search. 3. The extent of the intrusion required to perform the expansion. 4. The question of whether such intrusion impinged upon any further expectation of privacy that remained after the exposure of the contents by private persons. See State v. Eiseman , R.I., 461 A.2d at 377. Having reviewed the evidence in light of these factors, we are convinced that all four militate against the trial justice's conclusion and in favor of our finding that the state's subsequent toxicological examination was a significant expansion of the private search subject to the protection of the Fourth Amendment. Lieutenant Reise and his subordinate, Detective Miranda, both had extensive experience with the State Police. Reise was a twenty-one year veteran of the State Police and a ten-year member of its detective division. Miranda had been employed by the State Police since 1969 and had been working in its detective division since 1974. Additionally, Reise was thoroughly familiar with the proper procedure to follow to obtain a search warrant to advance an investigation. Despite his expertise, Lieutenant Reise was unable to identify with a reasonable degree of certainty those substances that he had received from Alex without further testing. His testimony is replete with admissions that he sent samples to the state lab because he simply did not know what they were. In spontaneous response to two questions posed by the prosecutor upon direct examination, Lieutenant Reise gave virtually identical answers to explain why he ordered the testing: I had no idea what it was (papaveretum); I sent it for the same reason I just didn't know what it was (lidocaine). And on subsequent cross-examination, Lieutenant Reise reaffirmed the fact that he ordered the chemical analysis of certain substances precisely because he lacked knowledge of their identity. He stated that the reason he had had the state lab perform the testing was because there were some unknowns in there that I couldn't identify just through a Physicians Desk Reference. Although he did testify that he felt certain substances delivered by Alex were a contraband substance or something of that nature, a full reading of his testimony convinces us that these statements were nothing more than an expression of his own vague, subjective suspicions about their identity. These statements clearly do not support a finding that Lieutenant Reise was able to identify the substances delivered by Alex with any reasonable degree of certainty without the aid of the state toxicological tests. The final two Eiseman factors we shall consider in tandem. The extent of the intrusion and whether it impinged upon a further expectation of privacy retained by defendant are two integrally related factors. If defendant retains a constitutionally protected expectation of privacy in the items delivered to the state by private parties, and the state intrudes upon that expectation of privacy, it does so subject to the proscription of the Fourth Amendment. In this case defendant originally possessed a reasonable expectation of privacy in the pills and other contents of the black bag. These items were originally found in an opaque black bag inside a metal box in a locked closet in defendant's home. The fact that they were unexpectedly seized, inspected, and delivered to the State Police by a private party does not alter defendant's legitimate original expectation of privacy. Walter v. United States, 447 U.S. at 658-59, 100 S.Ct. at 2402-03, 65 L.Ed.2d at 418-19. [T]he Government may not exceed the scope of the private search unless it has the right to make an independent search. Id. at 657, 100 S.Ct. at 2402, 65 L.Ed.2d at 418. Consequently, unless the private inspection and testing of the black bag and its contents was so complete as to be virtually coextensive with the State Police search, it only partially frustrated defendant's original expectation of privacy. It did not    strip the remaining unfrustrated portion of that expectation of all Fourth Amendment protection. Walter v. United States, 447 U.S. at 659, 100 S.Ct. at 2403, 65 L.Ed.2d at 419. The facts of this case readily demonstrate that the state's toxicological examination of the contents of the black bag did exceed the scope of the private tests performed by Bio-Science Laboratories at the request of Dr. Stock. In addition to the chemical analysis of both the blue liquid and the white powder performed by Dr. Stock, the state toxicologist chemically analyzed five samples of pills, including three capsules and two tablets, and two samples of ampoules that were never tested by Dr. Stock. The state concedes that one of these capsules, a red capsule marked Lilly F-40, could not have been identified by a simple sight examination. [14] The state therefore did intrude upon a further expectation of defendant's privacy. The extent of the state's intrusion is significant because, without it, the initial view of the objects tested produced only an inference of criminal conduct by defendant. See id. at 657, 100 S.Ct. at 2402, 65 L.Ed.2d at 418; see also United States v. Jacobsen, ___ U.S. ___, 104 S.Ct. 1652, 80 L.Ed.2d 85 (1984). In this case, as in Walter, the state exceeded the scope of the private search by employing chemical or mechanical means to reveal the hidden nature of these objects. This governmental activity represents a significant expansion of the private search because it positively identified the unknown composition of the pills delivered to the state police. See State v. Morgan, 32 Wash. App. 764, 768, 650 P.2d 228, 231 (1982). This additional investigation, being necessary in order to obtain the evidence which was to be used at trial, Walter v. United States, 447 U.S. at 654, 100 S.Ct. at 2400, 65 L.Ed.2d at 416, was an independent search subject to the Fourth Amendment. Since we hold that the state's subsequent chemical analysis of certain contents of the black bag was a significant expansion of the private search and that there were no exceptions to the warrant requirement, defendant's conviction must be reversed. In a case in which the authorities have not relied on what is in effect a private search,    [they] presumptively violate the Fourth Amendment if they act without a warrant. United States v. Jacobsen, ___ U.S. at ___, 104 S.Ct. at 1659. The state may not significantly expand the scope of a private search unless it obtains a warrant. State v. Eiseman, R.I., 461 A.2d at 381.