Opinion ID: 1929377
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Residence

Text: That there was probable cause to find a nexus in the instant matter is supported by Mills v. State, 278 Md. 262, 363 A.2d 491 (1976). Mills was convicted of kidnapping two women and of raping and robbing one of them. He was arrested on the day following the crimes when he was identified by the rape victim while he was on a public street. The crimes had been effected by threatening the victims with a hunting knife which was not on Mills's person when he was arrested. The victims were able to give a detailed description of the knife which the police seized under a warrant, issued after Mills's arrest, for the search of his residence. Mills contended, inter alia, on appeal to the Court of Special Appeals that there was no probable cause for the search. Mills v. State, 28 Md.App. 300, 303, 345 A.2d 127, 129-30 (1975). The opinion by the Court of Special Appeals does not quote from the application for the warrant, but the court upheld the search on the following rationale: The remaining question is, therefore, whether the affidavit as presented demonstrated probable cause within its four corners, as required. We think that the law in Maryland is clear in this regard. In Grimm v. State, 6 Md.App. 321, 251 A.2d 230 (1969), cert. denied 397 U.S. 1001[, 90 S.Ct. 1150, 25 L.Ed.2d 412] (1970) and Reidy v. State, 8 Md.App. 169, 259 A.2d 66 (1969) this Court found no defects in warrants issued to search residences where weapons used in the commission of recent crimes could reasonably be found. Chief Judge Murphy, in Reidy, where the affidavit related that an individual had been shot with a .22 caliber weapon and that there was a witness to the crime who identified the defendant as the perpetrator, observed: `We think that it was reasonable, given the information set out in the application for the warrant, for police to believe that the gun used in the crime could be found in appellant's house.' [Citing Grimm.] We reach the same conclusion concerning the knife and sheath in the instant case and therefore find no error in their admission. Id. at 305, 345 A.2d at 130-31. This Court granted certiorari in Mills and affirmed. The opinion summarized the affidavit which described in detail the offense, the arrest of Mills, the knife, and the place to be searched. The only express facts dealing with the nexus between the knife and Mills's residence was that Mills, when arrested, was `not carrying a weapon similar to the one described by' the two victims. Mills, 278 Md. at 276, 363 A.2d at 499. We quoted favorably the following passage from United States v. Lucarz, 430 F.2d 1051, 1055 (9th Cir.1970), a prosecution for theft from the mails: `[T]his court and others, albeit usually without discussion, have upheld searches although the nexus between the items to be seized and the place to be searched rested not on direct observation, as in the normal search-and-seizure case, but on the type of crime, the nature of the missing items, the extent of the suspect's opportunity for concealment, and normal inferences as to where a criminal would be likely to hide stolen property.' Mills, 278 Md. at 277, 363 A.2d at 499. We concluded that Mills' home was a probable place for secreting objects such as a hunting knife and a sheath. Id. at 280, 363 A.2d at 501. In Malcolm v. State, 314 Md. 221, 550 A.2d 670 (1988), we parenthetically described Mills as upholding warrant based on police allegation of a crime, knowledge of the suspect's address, detailed description of the weapon and absence of weapon on suspect at time of arrest. Id. at 233, 550 A.2d at 676 (emphasis added). There is no substantial difference between there being no hunting knife on Mills's person when he was arrested and there being no handgun on Ward when he was brought to police headquarters for questioning one day before the warrant was issued. A considerable body of authority supports the position taken by this Court in Mills. In each of the cases reviewed or cited below, there was probable cause to believe that a crime of violence, involving the use of a weapon, had been committed, that the defendant was the criminal agent, and that the defendant resided at the place to be searched. Thus, we shall focus on the various courts' rationales as to nexus, to the extent that it might be articulated, between the object to be seized and the defendant's residence. The Mills opinion cited a number of earlier cases that sustained warrants, without any express evidence of nexus, where the affidavit contained the factors that we set forth above. These opinions seem to have considered the facts relating to the elements listed above sufficient to satisfy the nexus requirement. See Commonwealth v. Butler, 448 Pa. 128, 291 A.2d 89 (1972); Riddle v. State, 257 Ind. 501, 275 N.E.2d 788 (1971); People v. Alvarado, 255 Cal.App.2d 285, 62 Cal.Rptr. 891 (1967). Mills and Lucarz were cited with approval in State v. Couture, 194 Conn. 530, 482 A.2d 300 (1984), cert. denied, 469 U.S. 1192, 105 S.Ct. 967, 83 L.Ed.2d 971 (1985). There the police sought the weapon used in a triple murder. The court relied in part on 1 W.R. LaFave, Search & Seizure § 3.7, at 709 (1978).  `Where the object of the search is a weapon used in the crime ... the inference that the items are at the offender's residence is especially compelling, at least in those cases where the perpetrator is unaware that the victim has been able to identify him to the police.' Couture, 482 A.2d at 309 (ellipsis in original). [3] In the case now before us Stewart would obviously be unable to identify Ward. Mills was also cited with approval in Commonwealth v. Cinelli, 389 Mass. 197, 449 N.E.2d 1207, cert. denied, 464 U.S. 860, 104 S.Ct. 186, 78 L.Ed.2d 165 (1983). The court found compelling the inference that the ammunition, which could not be traced to the robbery and which could be used in a future robbery, was at Cinelli's residence. 449 N.E.2d at 1216. In the instant matter the warrant included ammunition, and ammunition was found in Ward's car. Mills applied the reasoning of Lucarz, 430 F.2d 1051, a case involving the search for the fruits of theft, to the search for a knife. Other courts have similarly relied upon Lucarz as support for the search of a residence for evidence other than fruits of the crime. See United States v. Pheaster, 544 F.2d 353, 372-73 (9th Cir.1976) (search for articles evidencing kidnapping and extortion), cert. denied, 429 U.S. 1099, 97 S.Ct. 1118, 51 L.Ed.2d 546 (1977); State v. Kalai, 56 Haw. 366, 537 P.2d 8, 12-13 (1975) (reasonable to infer that shotgun used in murder would be found at defendant's residence). See also State v. Poree, 406 So.2d 546, 547-48 (La. 1981) (The items soughta handgun, clothing, money, and a money bagare objects which one might expect to find at a person's residence.); Bollinger v. State, 556 P.2d 1035, 1039 (Okla.Crim.App.1976) ([A]t the least, a probability existed that the property sought [that included a revolver used in an assault with intent to kill] was indeed at the residence of the defendant.). In United States v. Jones, 994 F.2d 1051 (3d Cir.1993), a robbery prosecution, the court reversed a trial court's ruling suppressing evidence for lack of nexus. The Third Circuit said that the firearms used in the robbery are a type of evidence likely to be kept in a suspect's residence. Id. at 1056. Nevertheless, because of two additional facts, the court concluded that it did not have to decide whether in every case the fact that a suspect committed a crime involving cash and/or a gun automatically provides a magistrate with enough information to approve a search of a suspect's home. Id. [4] United States v. Steeves, 525 F.2d 33 (8th Cir.1975), concerned a prosecution for possession of rifles by a convicted felon. That evidence had been observed while FBI agents were executing a search warrant issued in the investigation of a bank robbery in which a handgun had been used. The robbery had occurred on June 22, but the warrant was not obtained until September 17. Although the court recognized that there was little reason to believe that any of the bank's money ... would still be in the home, the same could not be said of the revolver. Id. at 38. The court said that apart from [the defendant's] prior felony record possession of the pistol was not unlawful in itself or particularly incriminating. Moreover, people who own pistols generally keep them at home or on their persons. Id. Steeves was relied upon in State v. Gathercole, 553 N.W.2d 569 (Iowa 1996), a robbery prosecution, for the proposition that it is reasonable to believe that guns will be kept on the subject's person or in his residence. Id. at 574. Bastida v. Henderson, 487 F.2d 860 (5th Cir.1973), reversed the issuance of a writ of habeas corpus by a federal district court sought by a Louisiana prisoner who had been convicted of a street robbery in which an automatic pistol had been used. The weapon was seen by an informant on April 8, 1972, in the possession of the prisoner, but the warrant had not been applied for until April 17. Id. at 861-62. The Supreme Court of Louisiana sustained Bastida's conviction, stating simply that there was a reasonable inference from the affidavit, and probable cause to issue the warrant to search defendant's house for automatic weapons used in the robbery. State v. Bastida, 271 So.2d 854, 856 (La.1973). The federal district court concluded that there was probable cause as of April 8 but that the information had become stale. Bastida v. Henderson, 487 F.2d at 863. The Fifth Circuit held that, after the informant had seen the weapons, [a] very likely place to find them ... would either be on the persons of the assailants or about the premises where they lived. Id. Blount v. State, 511 A.2d 1030 (Del.1986), concerned a murder prosecution in which the handgun used to kill the victim was seized from the defendant's residence under a search warrant. The appellate court sustained the search by applying the following reasoning: `Concrete firsthand evidence that the items sought are in the place to be searched is not always required in a search warrant.... The question is whether one would normally expect to find those items at that place.... If so, then that inference will suffice to allow the valid issuance of a search warrant for that place.... We think it clear that [the defendant's] residence would be a logical place to search for the weapon and clothing used in the crime.' Id. at 1033 (quoting Hooks v. State, 416 A.2d 189, 203 (Del.1980) (ellipses in original)). The court also said that a reasonable magistrate could have concluded that the proximity of the defendant's residence to the crime scene could have rendered immediate disposition of the weapon more imprudent than retaining it. Id. The opinion of the Delaware court does not reflect the distance between the murder site, in a park, and the defendant's residence. In Minor v. State, 334 Md. 707, 641 A.2d 214 (1994), we took judicial notice of certain facts of geography that appeared on standard street maps of the community involved. Id. at 718, 641 A.2d at 219. Standard Baltimore City street maps reflect that Darley Avenue, where Ward resided at No. 1634, is parallel to, and one block away from, Cliftview Avenue, on which the murder occurred in the 1400 block. Under the rationale of the Delaware court in Blount, the warrant-issuing judge in the case before us could have concluded that the weapon had not been disposed of. The search for evidence, including the gun used in a murder and robbery, was sustained in McClain v. State, 267 Ga. 378, 477 S.E.2d 814 (1996), cert. denied, ___ U.S.___, 117 S.Ct. 2485, 138 L.Ed.2d 993 (1997), primarily on the basis that it was reasonable to infer that the defendant returned to his residence after the shooting. 477 S.E.2d at 825. In Commonwealth v. Cefalo, 381 Mass. 319, 409 N.E.2d 719 (1980), rev'd on other grounds, Horton v. California, 496 U.S. 128, 110 S.Ct. 2301, 110 L.Ed.2d 112 (1990), the police searched for the murder weapon and bloody clothing at the defendant's hotel room. The connection was that the victim had been shot in the head, thus permitting a search for bloodstained clothing. 409 N.E.2d at 727. Davis v. State, 660 So.2d 1228 (Miss. 1995), cert. denied, 517 U.S. 1192, 116 S.Ct. 1684, 134 L.Ed.2d 785 (1996), was the appeal from a death sentence for murder committed in the course of a robbery. On the nexus issue the court said: Cash is the type of loot that criminals seek to hide in secure places like their homes. Similarly, the other items sought, clothing and guns, are also the types of evidence likely to be kept in a suspect's residence. Id. at 1239 (citations omitted). We also note the upholding of the search in United States v. Sleet, 54 F.3d 303 (7th Cir.1995). As probable cause for believing that the defendant had robbed the subject bank, the court relied on information that the defendant had been arrested and charged with robbing another bank, and in both instances the robber had vaulted the counter. Further, the defendant was an African-American male in his mid-20s, approximately five feet six inches tall and weighing' 140 pounds, a description that also applied to the robber in the crime under investigation. The nexus evidence was that the robber, upon leaving the bank, ran in the direction of an apartment complex, one-half mile away, where the defendant occupied one of the apartments. There are, of course, cases which do not agree with the approach of the decisions reviewed above. Illustrative is United States v. Charest, 602 F.2d 1015 (1st Cir.1979). The appeal was from a conviction for possession of a firearm by one previously convicted of a felony. The gun had been obtained in a search of the defendant's residence in the course of a murder investigation. The First Circuit reversed the conviction for the reasons set forth below. Common sense tells us that it is unlikely that a murderer would hide in his own home a gun used to shoot someone. If defendant shot Raimondi, as the affidavit states, one of the first things he would do would be to get rid of the gun. The handgun could easily have been disposed of permanently within a short time after the crime. It is not reasonable to infer that defendant drove from Somerset to Fall River and then casually placed a weapon which had fired more than one bullet into a man on the shelf in his bedroom closet. Ballistics is not only an accurate science, it is also well-known. We have been unable to find any case in which a search warrant was issued for a person's home on the sole basis that a handgun had been used by that person in the commission of the type of crime where the bullets used could be traced to the gun. Id. at 1017 (footnotes omitted). In 1985 the above case was distinguished by the Supreme Court of New Hampshire on the basis that Charest was suspected of shooting a known acquaintance in the presence of three witnesses, and he would therefore have expected the police to try to connect him with a gun. State v. Faragi, 127 N.H. 1, 498 A.2d 723, 727 (1985) (opinion by Souter, J.). The conflict between the Charest approach and that of the other cases reviewed above was squarely addressed by the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit in United States v. Anderson, 851 F.2d 727 (4th Cir.1988), cert. denied, 488 U.S. 1031, 109 S.Ct. 841, 102 L.Ed.2d 973 (1989). Virginia police had found an unregistered silencer for a .45 caliber handgun in the search under a warrant of the defendant's residence during the course of a murder investigation. The Fourth Circuit, speaking through Judge Murnaghan for a panel that included Judge Frank A. Kaufman of the District of Maryland, declined to decide the case on the basis of United States v. Leon, 468 U.S. 897, 104 S.Ct. 3405, 82 L.Ed.2d 677 (1984). The court found the holdings in cases including Bastida v. Henderson and United States v. Steeves, both supra, to be more persuasive than Charest and the somewhat similar holding in United States v. Lockett, 674 F.2d 843 (11th Cir.1982). Anderson, 851 F.2d at 729. The Fourth Circuit concluded: It was reasonable for the magistrate to believe that the defendant's gun and the silencer would be found in his residence. Therefore, even though the affidavit contains no facts that the weapons were located in defendant's trailer, we reject his argument that the warrant was defective. Id. (emphasis added).