Opinion ID: 2572600
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: denial of defendant's suppression motion

Text: At trial, the prosecution introduced fragments of a burnt check found in defendant's apartment and identified by bar owner Sharon Munns as a check that she had left in the bar cashbox. On July 21, 1993, Sergeant Timothy York and Lieutenant Clarence Finmand of the Anderson Police Department searched defendant's apartment under a search warrant that authorized them to seize .22-caliber ammunition marked with the letter F, faded blue pants, a red T-shirt, a red baseball cap, a holster for a .22-caliber revolver with a five-and-a-half-inch barrel, and bloodstained currency. During that search, the officers seized from the kitchen floor a brown paper grocery bag containing discarded coin roll wrappers and charred fragments of paper. Before trial, defendant moved unsuccessfully under section 1538.5 to suppress the contents of the paper grocery bag, arguing that the warrant did not authorize seizure of the bag or its contents and that the bag's contents did not come within the exception for items in plain view because their incriminating character was not immediately apparent. On the same grounds, defendant again unsuccessfully sought to exclude evidence of the bag's contents at trial. He now argues that the trial court erroneously denied these motions. Our review of issues related to the suppression of evidence seized by the police is governed by federal constitutional standards. (Cal. Const., art. I, § 28, subd. (d); People v. Bradford (1997) 15 Cal.4th 1229, 1291, 65 Cal.Rptr.2d 145, 939 P.2d 259.) Although the warrant clause of the Fourth Amendment [to the federal Constitution] provides that no warrant may issue except those `particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized,' officers who search with a warrant may seize items specifically named in a valid warrant, as well as other items in plain view. ( People v. Kraft (2000) 23 Cal.4th 978, 1041, 99 Cal.Rptr.2d 1, 5 P.3d 68; Horton v. California (1990) 496 U.S. 128, 136, 110 S.Ct. 2301, 110 L.Ed.2d 112.) Items in plain view, but not described in the warrant, may be seized when their incriminating character is immediately apparent. ( Horton v. California, supra, at p. 136, 110 S.Ct. 2301.) The incriminating character of evidence in plain view is not immediately apparent if some further search of the object is required. (See Minnesota v. Dickerson (1993) 508 U.S. 366, 375, 113 S.Ct. 2130, 124 L.Ed.2d 334.) In reviewing a trial court's ruling on a motion to suppress evidence, we defer to that court's factual findings, express or implied, if they are supported by substantial evidence. ( People v. Weaver (2001) 26 Cal.4th 876, 924, 111 Cal.Rptr.2d 2, 29 P.3d 103.) We exercise our independent judgment in determining whether, on the facts presented, the search or seizure was reasonable under the Fourth Amendment. ( Ibid. ) At the hearing on the suppression motion, Lieutenant Finmand testified that while he was in the kitchen he noticed on the floor an open paper grocery bag in which he could see a noticeable quantity of ashes, fragments of unburned material, and what appeared to be a crinkled up coin wrapper. Looking into the bag he saw paper fragments with writing in numbers, some type of a lined column which he suspected might be a check or some type of accounting document of the sort normally kept in a cashbox like the one missing from the bar. When Finmand asked Sergeant York to look into the bag, York, who had been one of the first officers at the crime scene, pointed out the coin wrapper. The defense argued that the officers' seizure of the paper grocery bag was impermissible because there was no nexus between the items they saw in the bag and items taken from the bar. The trial court denied the suppression motion, noting that Lieutenant Finmand (who eventually became the lead investigator on the case) knew the bar was missing currency, coin wrappers, accounts and items related to retail business transactions commonly kept in a cash box. Given that knowledge, the officers' observations of a crumpled coin wrapper and burnt fragments of what appeared to be financial records in the open grocery bag made it immediately apparent to the officers, without additional examination, that these items might be discarded evidence of the robbery. (See People v. Bradford supra, 15 Cal.4th at pp. 1295-1296, 65 Cal.Rptr.2d 145, 939 P.2d 259.) The trial court did not err in denying defendant's motion to suppress.