Opinion ID: 1105501
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Did the trial court commit reversible error by admitting evidence obtained during what Payne says was an illegal search of his automobile?

Text: We agree with the reasoning of the Court of Criminal Appeals on this issue, and we adopt it as our own: At a suppression hearing, Cullman County Sheriff's Deputy Mitch Love testified as follows. On March 23, 1992, he received a number of radio transmissions regarding a robbery-abduction at West Point Grocery. The sheriff's deputies were given a description of the suspect, Max Payne: a white male, driving a light blue Ford Maverick, and carrying a shotgun. Love drove to Payne's residence. Payne was not there, but his mother and his sister, Wilma Faye Easterling, were. Love spoke to Easterling and to Payne's mother. Easterling told Love that when she was at her house earlier that evening, Payne had arrived with Brown, bank deposit bags, and a weapon. She further stated that Payne left her house in the Maverick with the victim. After this conversation, Love left Payne's house and continued searching for the Maverick. He found it parked at Easterling's house, and called for assistance. The automobile windows were down, and Love looked into the automobile with his flashlight. He observed empty beer cans, shotgun shells on the floorboard, a sling in the back seat, and keys in the ignition. Sheriff Laney and Officers Yarbrough, DeMonia, Nichols, and Weston joined Love at the automobile a few minutes after Love called for assistance. Sheriff Laney removed the keys from the ignition. Sheriff Laney testified as follows. He was investigating the crime when he heard Love's call. Laney was one of the first to arrive on the scene with Love. He looked into the automobile and saw the same things Love testified to seeing. He removed the keys from the ignition and opened the trunk. The victim's whereabouts were not known at that time. Laney stated that when he looked in the trunk, he was looking for the victim. Phillip Lambert, chief investigator for the Cullman County Sheriff's department, testified as follows. Lambert arrived after the trunk had been searched. He looked into the automobile and observed the same items Laney and Love testified to seeing, with the exception of the automobile keys. Lambert then spoke with Easterling. She told him that the Maverick parked on the property was the same automobile Payne was driving when he left with Brown. She also told Lambert that he and the other officers `could look in it, do what [they] wanted to, take it with [them] or anything [they] wanted to do.' Lambert then determined that Easterling and her husband were renting the property upon which the automobile was parked. Ted Manus obtained Easterling's written consent to search the premises. The sheriff called for a wrecker, and the Maverick was towed to the sheriff's department, where it was locked and later searched. Generally, a valid warrantless search must be accompanied by certain circumstances that would render the act of obtaining a warrant either useless or unreasonable. One such situation in which a warrant is not required is when exigent circumstances exist concurrently with probable cause. Land v. State, 678 So.2d 201 (Ala.Cr.App.1995) (holding that warrantless search of appellant's vehicle was valid because the police had probable cause to believe that appellant had committed the crime, and the vehicle's inherent mobility was a sufficiently exigent circumstance); see also Johnson v. State, 554 P.2d 51 (Okla.Crim.App.1976), cert. denied, 429 U.S. 943, 97 S.Ct. 364, 50 L.Ed.2d 314 (1976) (holding that immediate warrantless search of the trunk of defendant's automobile was proper, because the police believed the kidnapped victim was in there and were acting `in hopes of saving a human life'). In this case, the police had the following information before they removed the automobile keys and opened the trunk: that Brown's grocery store had been robbed by a white male with a shotgun; that the suspect was driving a light blue Ford Maverick; that Brown had been abducted; that after the robbery, Payne drove to Easterling's house in his light blue Ford Maverick; that when he arrived there, Brown was with him and he had bank deposit bags and a gun; that Payne left Easterling's house in his Maverick with Brown, the bank deposit bags, and the gun; that the Maverick was not parked in front of Easterling's house between 10:00 p.m. and 10:15 p.m., but that it was parked there at 10:30 p.m. Therefore, the police had sufficient information to `warrant a man of reasonable caution in the belief' that several crimes had been committed, that the appellant had committed them, and that the vehicle contained evidence of the crimes. Texas v. Brown, 460 U.S. 730, 742, 103 S.Ct. 1535, 1543, 75 L.Ed.2d 502, 514 (1983) (quoting Carroll v. United States, 267 U.S. 132, 162, 45 S.Ct. 280, 288, 69 L.Ed. 543, 555 (1925)). Furthermore, in cases involving searches of automobiles the vehicle's inherent mobility establishes a presumption of exigent circumstances. Mewbourn v. State, 570 So.2d 805, 810 (Ala.Cr.App.1990) (`a vehicle's potential for mobility raises the presumption of exigent circumstances'). In this case, however, the vehicle's mobility was accompanied by several additional exigent circumstances. For example, the Maverick had been returned to Easterling's house less than 30 minutes before Love located it. Love testified that he called for backup and that the whereabouts of Payne and the victim were unknown at that time. Laney testified that he looked inside the automobile to determine whether anyone was hiding in the automobile. Laney further testified that he removed the keys from the ignition in order to open the trunk to search for the victim. We conclude that the police had sufficient probable cause to search the automobile, and that the concomitant exigent circumstances were overwhelming; therefore, the warrantless visual search of the interior and the trunk of the Maverick was valid. The Maverick was later towed to the sheriff's department, where it was thoroughly searched. However, before the automobile was towed, Easterling gave her express verbal and written consent to the search. In Johnson v. State, 584 So.2d 881 (Ala.Cr.App.1991), this court held: `A defendant has no constitutional right of privacy where he does not have exclusive possession and control over the place searched. The person who does have present, exclusive possession and control over the place in question, or who shares the premises coequally with the person claiming to be aggrieved, may give consent to search.'  Id., at 886 (quoting C. Gamble, McElroy's Alabama Evidence § 334.01(3)(b) (3d ed.1977). See also Zumbado v. State, 615 So.2d 1223 (Ala.Cr.App.1993) (applying this rule in upholding a consensual search where the appellant parked his automobile at the house trailer where he lived with his girlfriend; the girlfriend was present, but the appellant was not; the girlfriend was apparently in exclusive control of the premises; and the girlfriend consented to the search of the automobile). In this case, Payne parked his automobile on property rented by Easterling and her husband. Payne left the windows of the automobile down and left the keys in the ignition. Therefore, Payne did not have exclusive control over the automobile when it was searched. Easterling, in contrast, did have apparent exclusive control of the property, including the automobile. Accordingly, she was capable of giving valid consent to the search of the automobile. She gave her consent; therefore, the warrantless search of the automobile at the sheriff's office was valid. Furthermore, we note that the automobile was in plain view, and the police had probable cause to believe that the automobile itself was evidence of the crimes. See Watson v. State, 533 So.2d 737 (Ala.Cr. App.1988) (`[P]lain view is obtained without any prior entry or opening of the vehicle.... when the car itself is in plain view and it is subject to seizure as evidence of a crime....'); Cardwell v. Lewis, 417 U.S. 583, 94 S.Ct. 2464, 41 L.Ed.2d 325 (1974). Therefore, the warrantless seizure of the automobile was proper. The judgment of the Court of Criminal Appeals is affirmed. AFFIRMED. HOOPER, C.J., and MADDOX, ALMON, SHORES, HOUSTON, INGRAM, COOK, and BUTTS, JJ., concur.