Opinion ID: 1273675
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: the execution of the warrant

Text: Officer Hayakawa testified that on the morning of December 9, 1971, he and several other police officers, armed with the warrant to search for marijuana, arrived at the house in which the defendant resided. He approached a rear door to the house, knocked five times and announced, Police officer, open up, we have a search warrant. While waiting approximately thirty seconds for a response, officer Hayakawa and at least one other officer heard sounds of running within. Officer Walter Ragsdale thereupon broke down the door and the officers rushed into the house, where they found at least one occupant up and about in the hallway and the other residents, including the defendant, asleep or half-awake in their rooms. Immediately the police assembled everyone in the living room. Thereafter, in the course of a particularized search of each of the bedrooms, officers Ragsdale and Hayakawa discovered in the defendant's bedroom, on a table top less than four feet from the mattress on which the defendant had been sleeping, a clear cellophane bag containing a grass-like substance resembling marijuana, a wooden matchbox, and a wallet. The officers proceeded to open the matchbox, in which they found eighty-six white tablets and a bag containing a white powder substance, and the wallet, in which they found identification cards belonging to the defendant. Upon later laboratory analysis, the grass-like substance was found to be marijuana, the pills were found to be amphetamines, and the powder was found to be cocaine. These drugs, and the identification found in the wallet, were introduced as evidence in the defendant's trial. The defendant contends that the manner in which the police gained entry to the house was unreasonable within the meaning of the Federal and State Constitutions. See Miller v. United States, 357 U.S. 301, 78 S.Ct. 1190, 2 L.Ed.2d 1332 (1958). We cannot agree. The prohibition against unreasonable searches and seizures is not violated when exigent circumstances dictate that the police must proceed forcefully and swiftly to achieve an objective which is otherwise constitutionally permissible. See Ker v. California, 374 U.S. 23, 38-41, 83 S.Ct. 1623, 10 L.Ed.2d 726 (1963). Since drugs are by their nature easily destroyed or secreted, see id., exigent circumstances justifying forced entry in searches for drugs exist when the facts show that the occupants of the suspected locale are aware of the police presence and are taking steps which the police realistically fear may lead to destruction of the contraband. See, e.g., Commonwealth v. Dial, 445 Pa. 251, 285 A.2d 125 (1971). In Dial, as in this case, the police knocked on the door to the premises to be searched, announced their identity and purpose, and waited long enough to hear sounds of running within. The court properly held that in the circumstances the police had no choice but to effect a forced entry, since the alternative might well have been the destruction of the illicit drugs for which they were searching. The defendant would have us disregard the testimony of officers Hayakawa and Ragsdale and credit his own testimony that the police never announced their identity or purpose, and that no one in the house ever attempted to destroy evidence or escape. However, the police version of the morning's events, corroborated in all substantial respects by both officers, was accepted as true by the trial judge. We cannot say that this finding was not supported by substantial evidence, see State v. Stuart, 51 Haw. 656, 466 P.2d 444 (1970), and hence we hold that exigent circumstances justified the police in executing the warrant in the manner they did in this case. Nor can we agree with the defendant that the police exceeded the proper scope of the warrant when they searched the matchbox and wallet in the defendant's room. These items were side by side with a bag containing what appeared to be marijuana, and rested in open view on the top of a table. Officers Hayakawa and Ragsdale, both veteran narcotics investigators, testified that in their experience marijuana was often secreted in just such receptacles. In view of the easy mobility of such contraband, a warrant specifying the particular premises within which it is hidden is sufficiently detailed to satisfy the constitutional requirement that a warrant particularly [describe] the place to be searched. See United States v. Wong, 470 F.2d 129 (9th Cir.1972); United States v. Combs, 468 F.2d 1390 (6th Cir.1972), cert. denied, 411 U.S. 948, 93 S.Ct. 1924, 36 L.Ed.2d 409 (1973). Moreover, such a warrant gives the officers executing it authority to search, in a reasonable manner, whatever spots within the described premises their professional experience indicates may be used as a cache. See id. Certainly a matchbox and a wallet, which are plausible repositories for marijuana and which are exposed on the top of a table, are not beyond the scrutiny of police officers executing a warrant which describes marijuana as the thing to be seized. Nor need the officers close their eyes when a search of such containers reveals illegal drugs other than marijuana. An otherwise permissible search is not rendered unlawful merely because in the course thereof one drug is discovered instead of a different drug, since there is little chance in such circumstances that a search for the latter is being used as a pretext to search for the former. See United States v. Pacelli, 470 F.2d 67 (2d Cir.1972), cert. denied, 410 U.S. 983, 93 S.Ct. 1501, 36 L.Ed.2d 178 (1973); Government of Virgin Islands v. Lopez, 459 F.2d 5 (3d Cir.1972). So long as the searching officer is in a position where he is lawfully entitled to be, the seizure of any evidence of crime is permissible. See Warden v. Hayden, 387 U.S. 294, 87 S.Ct. 1642, 18 L.Ed.2d 782 (1967). We therefore hold that the warrant in this case was lawfully executed by the police and the evidence used against the defendant at trial properly seized.