Opinion ID: 4357626
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Search of 70 W Street, N.W.

Text: Much of the evidence found in the 70 W Street house was obtained during a search conducted on January 11, 2010. Police initially searched the basement apartment pursuant to the consent of Derrick Hill, then obtained a warrant and searched the rest of the premises. Logan moved to suppress this evidence before trial, but the motion court denied the motion and admitted the evidence on the grounds that the search was legal, finding that Mr. Hill had actual or apparent authority to consent to the search. Logan now challenges this ruling on appeal. As noted, Mr. Hill had been living in the basement of the 70 W Street house in 2009. Around early November, Ms. Williams, speaking for Logan, had asked for Mr. Hill’s front-door key, which Mr. Hill returned, though he kept his key to the back door, which provided direct access to the basement. After Mr. Hill returned the front-door key, he stopped spending the night at 70 W Street, but kept most of his belongings in the basement, including “multiple TVs, bed, the whole nine,” and was present in the house often. He would always be let into the front 22 door after knocking, and he went to the house “every day” to check on his things and would stop by to simply “chill.” In the very early morning hours of January 1, 2010, MPD detectives Joshua Branson, Norma Horne, and James Wilson went to 70 W Street to investigate the nearby shooting of Ms. Daniels and spoke to Logan. When they informed Logan that they were looking for Mr. Hill, Logan responded that Mr. Hill “did live at the house, but he was not home.” Logan invited the police inside and retrieved Ms. Williams from upstairs, at which point they told the police that “[Mr. Hill’s] room was downstairs” and showed them to the basement to allow them to look around. In the basement, the police could see through an open door that there were “extension cords just strewn about.” Since the detectives had been present for the autopsy of Mr. Bolden’s body, they were aware that electrical cords had been used in the course of the murder and transport. Detective Branson testified at the pretrial suppression hearing that it was at this point that he began to suspect that Mr. Bolden’s murder may be connected to the house. Upon their request, Logan voluntarily went with two of the detectives back to the homicide unit to answer questions about Mr. Hill. At the station, the officers arrested Logan when they discovered there was an outstanding unrelated warrant for his arrest. That same 23 day, the officers also obtained and executed a search warrant for the basement at 70 W Street, where they photographed the scene and seized a television with a missing electrical cord. On January 4, 2010, Mr. Hill talked to the police, and then went with Detective Greene to 70 W Street to retrieve some of his belongings from the basement. However, the back-door key did not work when Mr. Hill tried to open the door because of an interior latch; later that day, Mr. Hill called Mr. Adams, the owner of the home, who told him that he would remove the latch for him. On January 11, 2010, Mr. Hill returned to the house and was able to open the unlatched back door with his key. When he found one of his own jackets covered in blood, he called Detective Greene, who arrived twenty minutes later and met Mr. Hill outside. Mr. Hill let Detective Green and Detective Wilson into the house through the open back door and showed them the bloody jacket among his personal items in the basement. Mr. Hill then provided consent for the police to take the jacket as evidence and to search for other items in the basement, signing a written consent form. 24 In the course of the January 11 search of the basement, MPD officers saw blood on the wall, which they swabbed, and Detective Wilson spotted, in plain view, a bin with duct tape similar to the tape that had been found on Mr. Bolden’s body, which they seized.11 At that point, the detectives decided to obtain another search warrant for the entire house; they obtained the warrant and searched the rest of the premises the same day. Logan argues that the January 11 search of the basement was a warrantless and illegal search because Mr. Hill did not have authority to consent to it. He argues that Mr. Hill was “evicted” in the fall of 2009, at which point he stopped sleeping at the house and surrendered his front-door key, and that, while Mr. Hill retained a key to the back door, he would gain entry primarily by knocking on the front door and waiting for Logan or Ms. Williams to admit him. Logan also argues 11 The plain view doctrine provides that, “if police are lawfully in a position from which they view an object, if its incriminating character is immediately apparent, and if the officers have a lawful right of access to the object, they may seize it without a warrant.” West v. United States, 100 A.3d 1076, 1083-84 (D.C. 2014) (quoting Minnesota v. Dickerson, 508 U.S. 366, 375 (1993)). As discussed in this subsection, the facts show that the detectives were lawfully in the basement, so they were permitted to seize the duct tape, as its incriminating character was immediately apparent, given its similarity to the tape that had been found on Mr. Bolden’s body. 25 that none of the investigating officers knew exactly how Mr. Hill had gained access on January 11. These arguments are not persuasive. A warrantless search will not violate the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution if the police obtained appropriate consent to search the premises from either the defendant or a third party who “possessed common authority over or other sufficient relationship to the premises or effects sought to be inspected.” (Cleveland) Wright v. United States, 608 A.2d 763, 766 (D.C. 1992) (quoting United States v. Matlock, 415 U.S. 164, 171 (1974)). Moreover, under the doctrine of apparent authority, a consensual warrantless search is valid based on “a police officer’s reasonable belief that the person consenting to the search had the authority to do so.” (Cleveland) Wright v. United States, 717 A.2d 304, 307 (D.C. 1998); see also Illinois v. Rodriguez, 497 U.S. 177 (1990) (search based on thirdparty consent valid if officer reasonably believes third party has such authority, even if facts developed later show the contrary). 12 12 See also Welch v. United States, 466 A.2d 829, 845 (D.C. 1983) (whether the individual who provided consent had common authority is “factual in nature (based as it is on concepts of mutual use and joint access)”; therefore, “we may not reverse this finding on appeal unless it is clearly erroneous”). 26 The facts credited by the motion court established that, by January 11, Detective Greene had understood from his conversations with Mr. Hill that Logan had asked Mr. Hill to move out of the house, but that Mr. Hill had been allowed to keep his belongings in the basement and went to the house almost every day to visit and check on his things. Detective Green had also understood that Mr. Hill was supposed to move his belongings out by January 1. As noted above, however, Logan had told the other detectives on January 1 that Mr. Hill did live at the house but was not home, and, as Detective Green knew, Logan had been jailed that same day. Finally, Detective Green had understood that, since January 1, Mr. Hill had been in touch with Mr. Adams, the owner of the house, and Mr. Adams had given him access to the house – including after Mr. Hill was not able to get in on January 4. Thus, when Detective Greene arrived at the house on January 11, he was aware of Mr. Hill’s history and relationship with the premises, and his understanding was that Mr. Hill was there with the permission of Mr. Adams, the owner of the house. It was clear that Mr. Hill had already been in and out of the basement that day, and the door was open. The police could therefore reasonably infer that Mr. Hill had gained entry by coordinating with Mr. Adams when he invited them into the basement, where he had found his bloody jacket. Indeed, Detective Greene testified that he had no suspicion whatsoever that Mr. Hill lacked the authority to properly consent to their entry into the basement. 27 Accordingly, we find that the trial court did not err in holding that the search of the 70 W Street basement was not unconstitutional because Mr. Hill had authority to consent to it. While Mr. Hill was no longer residing in the basement in the traditional sense of the word, as he was not staying overnight there, his relationship to Logan, Mr. Adams, and the premises was sufficient to give him authority over the basement and therefore actual authority to consent to the search.13 Yet, even assuming arguendo that Mr. Hill did not have actual authority due to the ambiguity of his status as a tenant at that point, he undoubtedly had apparent authority over the basement, as the evidence established that a police officer in Detective Greene’s position and with Detective Greene’s knowledge of 13 For instance, assuming that Mr. Hill was, by January of 2010, not a resident but a “guest” in the basement of 70 W Street, N.W., he was, by all indications, one with “substantially more authority over the premises than [an] occasional user,” and he could be “considered to be in charge of the premises.” Wayne R. LaFave, Search And Seizure: A Treatise on the Fourth Amendment § 8.5 (5th ed.). This is particularly so because Logan was incarcerated at the time, no one else was living in the basement, and Mr. Adams had allowed Mr. Hill to continue using the basement, storing his things there, and returning there frequently. Moreover, Mr. Hill was “more than a casual visitor,” as he “had the run of the [basement apartment]” and he had invited the police there. Id. He was “actually present inside the premises at the time of the giving of the consent and the consent [wa]s merely to a police entry of the premises into an area where a visitor would normally be received” – and thus the “police were entitled to assume without specific inquiry as to [his] status that one who answers their knock on the door has the authority to let them enter.” Id. 28 the situation could reasonably believe that Mr. Hill had common authority over the basement and therefore the authority to consent to the police officers’ entry and search. We note that this case is distinguishable from other cases in which courts have found that apparent authority did not exist. For instance, indication of forced entry has disallowed the police from reasonably believing the individual had consent to search.14 In the present case, the police did not need to gain entry forcibly, as Mr. Hill had already been inside the house when he discovered the blood on his jacket and then called the police and invited them in. We have also noted that an individual cannot consent to the search of a co-inhabitant’s space where it is “set aside for . . . private use.” Welch, 466 A.2d at 845 (citation omitted). Here, however, Mr. Hill only consented to the search of the basement, where he kept his belongings and found his own jacket covered in blood. The 14 Where a mother consented to a police search of a locked footlocker in her son’s room, but she did not have a key and the police had to force open the footlocker, the court held that the consenting party did not have authority to consent to the search. United States v. Block, 590 F.2d 535 (4th Cir. 1978) (cited in (Cleveland) Wright v. United States, 717 A.2d 304, 308 (D.C. 1998)); see also Harris v. United States, 738 A.2d 269, 274 n.7 (D.C. 1999) (evidence in the record supported a finding of actual or apparent authority to enter the home where the police did not enter forcibly, but were instead let into the apartment by a third party). 29 police did not attempt to search the remainder of the house, where Mr. Hill presumably lacked authority to consent (because it would likely be considered Logan’s private space), without first obtaining a warrant. We therefore discern no error in the trial court’s denial of the motion to suppress this evidence.