Opinion ID: 1304991
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The transportation.

Text: (4) The principal difficulty in the matter before us arises from the police conduct following the detention when circumstances known to the police placed the case in that gray area in which the facts justify measures beyond detention but short of arrest. As we have noted, after questioning defendant and his companion the officers were presented with additional facts pointing to the suspects' possible involvement in the burglary, namely, their somewhat contradictory explanations regarding their presence in the neighborhood, and their nervous appearance. At that time the investigation imperceptibly entered a new stage. Suspicion was deepening. The officers fairly entertained growing doubts as to the veracity of defendant and his companion. The People urge that, at this point, despite the continued lack of reasonable cause to arrest the suspects, the officers properly could transport them to the scene of the crime for possible identification by the Marxes. The propriety of such an in-the-field transportation of suspects prior to arrest poses the principle issue in the case. Here lies the pressure point between the individual's right of liberty and personal freedom, sanctified by the Fourth Amendment, on the one hand, and society's continuing needs to protect itself and its citizens from criminal marauders on the other. Accommodation of both of these considerations requires, on occasion, a balancing in its most sensitive form. A detention of an individual which is reasonable at its inception may exceed constitutional bounds when extended beyond what is reasonably necessary under the circumstances. (See Willett v. Superior Court (1969) 2 Cal. App.3d 555, 559 [83 Cal. Rptr. 22]; Pendergraft v. Superior Court (1971) 15 Cal. App.3d 237, 242 [93 Cal. Rptr. 155]; People v. Rosenfeld (1971) 16 Cal. App.3d 619, 622-623 [94 Cal. Rptr. 380]; cf. People v. Gale, supra, 9 Cal.3d 788, 798-799.) In Pendergraft, a case involving an unduly prolonged detention, the court properly observed that [n]o hard and fast rule can be formulated for determining the reasonableness of the period of time elapsing during a detention. The dynamics of the detention-for-questioning situation may justify further detention, further investigation, search, or arrest. The significance of the events, discoveries, and perceptions that follow an officer's first sighting of a candidate for detention will vary from case to case. (Fns. omitted; 15 Cal. App.3d at p. 242.) As a general proposition, despite defendant's urging, we are disinclined to hold that under no circumstances short of probable cause to arrest may an officer transport a suspect to another location for further interrogation or possible identification. Although one court has suggested that such a procedure is unreasonable and amounts to an arrest without probable cause ( People v. Gonsoulin (1971) 19 Cal. App.3d 270, 275 [96 Cal. Rptr. 548]), other courts recognize that certain circumstances may justify a transport detention somewhat similar to that involved herein ( People v. Courtney (1970) 11 Cal. App.3d 1185, 1191-1192 [90 Cal. Rptr. 370]). For example, in Courtney, the investigating officer adjourned his interrogation of the suspect when a crowd of potentially hostile students gathered at the detention scene. He transported the suspect to a campus police department and resumed the interrogation there. The court held that there was no Fourth Amendment compulsion on the police to choose between an on-the-spot continuation of their investigation at the probable cost of their own safety, or abandoning the investigation, ... We recognize that it is only in a rare case where, absent probable cause for arrest, the removal of a suspect to a police station for further investigation is constitutionally permissible. (11 Cal. App.3d at p. 1192.) We can conceive of factual situations in which it might be quite reasonable to transport a suspect to the crime scene for possible identification. If, for example, the victim of an assault or other serious offense was injured or otherwise physically unable to be taken promptly to view the suspect, or a witness was similarly incapacitated, and the circumstances warranted a reasonable suspicion that the suspect was indeed the offender, a transport detention might well be upheld. Similarly, the surrounding circumstances may reasonably indicate that it would be less of an intrusion upon the suspect's rights to convey him speedily a few blocks to the crime scene, permitting the suspect's early release rather than prolonging unduly the field detention. Ordinarily there exist less intrusive and more reasonable alternatives to pre-arrest transportation. The officers may call or escort the witness to the detention scene for an immediate viewing of the suspect, or if they are able to procure satisfactory identification from the suspect, arrangements may be made for a subsequent confrontation with the witness. In addition, the consent of the suspect may be sought. As we suggested in People v. Mickelson, supra, 59 Cal.2d 448, 454, rather than conduct an illegal car search the officers could have requested defendant to accompany the officers the few blocks to the [crime scene] ... for possible identification.... (See also People v. Hanamoto (1965) 234 Cal. App.2d 6, 13-15 [44 Cal. Rptr. 153]; People v. Gibson (1963) 220 Cal. App.2d 15, 24 [33 Cal. Rptr. 775].) In the instant case, the officers pursued none of these alternative procedures. Instead, they handcuffed the suspects and conveyed them to the Marx home. Without arrest and in the absence of any exigency, the initial detention was continued by means of transportation followed by further interrogation. Under the facts of this case the officers' procedures violated defendant's constitutional rights. The applicable principles have been well expressed in a recent text on the subject of arrests: Decisions made at different stages in the criminal justice process vary in their effect upon the person being dealt with. Generally, it can be said that decisions carrying more serious consequences for the individual require a greater degree of certainty that he is in fact guilty. This suggests that the propriety of field interrogation where there are insufficient grounds for arrest may depend upon whether the harmful effects are substantially less than those which result from a formal arrest. (Fn. omitted; LaFave, Arrest, The Decision to Take a Suspect into Custody (1965) ch. 16 at p. 346; see also pp. 347-349.) While in the instant case the detention procedure employed by the officers was not necessarily harmful to defendant in any permanent sense, the restraint upon his personal freedom was measurably greater than mere stationary field interrogation. We hold that it was impermissibly so. The police activity in the record reveals proper initial detention, improper transportation, further interrogation and inspection of defendant's apparel. The sequence was unfortunate because the continued police investigation revealed circumstances that seemingly point unerringly to defendant's complicity in the burglary. Nonetheless, the identification of shoes and currency, so incriminating to defendant, followed the transportation detention. It is a fundamental principle in our jurisprudence that an illegal police procedure cannot be justified by its fruits. (See People v. Fein (1971) 4 Cal.3d 747, 756 [94 Cal. Rptr. 607, 484 P.2d 583] [illegal arrest]; Tompkins v. Superior Court (1963) 59 Cal.2d 65, 68 [27 Cal. Rptr. 889, 378 P.2d 113] [illegal search].) Defendant's motion to suppress evidence should have been granted, for that evidence was the result of an unlawful detention. (See Davis v. Mississippi (1969) 394 U.S. 721 [22 L.Ed.2d 676, 89 S.Ct. 1394]; People v. Moore (1968) 69 Cal.2d 674, 680 [72 Cal. Rptr. 800, 446 P.2d 800]; Pendergraft v. Superior Court, supra, 15 Cal. App.3d 237, 242-243; People v. Lingo (1970) 3 Cal. App.3d 661, 664-665 [83 Cal. Rptr. 755].) Since the challenged evidence formed the basis for defendant's conviction, the introduction of that evidence constituted reversible error. The judgment is reversed.