Opinion ID: 600741
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Perea's Expectation of Privacy in the Bag

Text: 35 In general, a defendant may establish that he had a right protected by the Fourth Amendment by showing (a) that he had an expectation of privacy that society is prepared to recognize as reasonable, and (b) that he had conducted himself and dealt with the property in a way that indicated a subjective expectation of privacy. See, e.g., California v. Greenwood, 486 U.S. at 39, 108 S.Ct. at 1628; California v. Ciraolo, 476 U.S. at 211, 106 S.Ct. at 1811; Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. at 361, 88 S.Ct. at 516 (Harlan, J., concurring). One need not be the owner of the property for his privacy interest to be one that the Fourth Amendment protects, so long as he has the right to exclude others from dealing with the property. 36 Legitimation of expectations of privacy by law must have a source outside of the Fourth Amendment, either by reference to concepts of real or personal property law or to understandings that are recognized and permitted by society. One of the main rights attaching to property is the right to exclude others, see W. Blackstone, Commentaries, Book 2, ch. 1, and one who owns or lawfully possesses or controls property will in all likelihood have a legitimate expectation of privacy by virtue of this right to exclude. 37 Rakas v. Illinois, 439 U.S. at 144 n. 12, 99 S.Ct. at 431 n. 12 (emphasis added). For example, one who, with permission of the owner, is in possession of and ha[s] complete dominion and control over a residence that is not his own home, and c[an] exclude others from it, id. at 149, 99 S.Ct. at 433 (discussing Jones v. United States, 362 U.S. 257, 80 S.Ct. 725, 4 L.Ed.2d 697 (1960), overruled on other grounds, United States v. Salvucci, 448 U.S. 83, 85, 100 S.Ct. 2547, 2549, 65 L.Ed.2d 619 (1980)), can have a legally sufficient interest ... so that the Fourth Amendment protects him from unreasonable governmental intrusion into that place, Rakas v. Illinois, 439 U.S. at 142, 99 S.Ct. at 429. A person who possesses personalty belonging to another and who has the right to exclude third persons from possession of that property has an interest that is likewise protected. See, e.g., United States v. Ochs, 595 F.2d 1247, 1253 (2d Cir.), cert. denied, 444 U.S. 955, 100 S.Ct. 435, 62 L.Ed.2d 328 (1979). 38 A bailee has the right--and often the duty--to exclude others from possession of the property entrusted to him. See generally Dobie, Handbook on the Law of Bailments and Carriers § 61, at 133 (1914) (right); id. § 65, at 157-58 (duty); Story, Commentaries on the Law of Bailments § 422a, at 421 (4th ed. 1846) (right); id. § 457, at 465-66 (duty). As to everybody except the true owner of the bailed property, the bailee ha[s] the right of the owner to have and defend its custody and direct possession. Foulke v. New York Consolidated Railroad Co., 228 N.Y. 269, 275, 127 N.E. 237 (1920). And with respect to that property, the bailee, whether gratuitous or for hire, has some duty of care. See, e.g., Voorhis v. Consolidated Rail Corp., 60 N.Y.2d 878, 879, 470 N.Y.S.2d 364, 365, 458 N.E.2d 823, 823 (1983) (gratuitous bailee must avoid gross negligence; gross negligence presumed from nonreturn of property); Aronette Manufacturing Co. v. Capitol Piece Dye Works, Inc., 6 N.Y.2d 465, 468, 190 N.Y.S.2d 361, 364, 160 N.E.2d 842, 844 (1959) (bailee for mutual benefit must exercise ordinary care). Further, even if he would not be liable to the bailor, the bailee has a sufficient possessory interest to permit him to recover for the wrongful act of a third party resulting in the loss of, or injury to, the subject of the bailment. Rogers v. Atlantic, Gulf & Pacific Co., 213 N.Y. 246, 258, 107 N.E. 661 (1915). 39 Accordingly, in the Fourth Amendment context, bailees can have a sufficient interest in bailed property to give them standing to object to its seizure or search. See, e.g., United States v. Benitez-Arreguin, 973 F.2d 823, 827-28 (10th Cir.1992); Robles v. State, 510 N.E.2d 660, 663 (Ind.1987), cert. denied, 487 U.S. 1218, 108 S.Ct. 2872, 101 L.Ed.2d 907 (1988); State v. Casey, 59 N.C.App. 99, 296 S.E.2d 473, 482 (1982); State v. Grundy, 25 Wash.App. 411, 607 P.2d 1235, 1237-38 (1980), review denied, 95 Wash.2d 1008 (1981); see also United States v. Oswald, 783 F.2d 663, 666 (6th Cir.1986) (suitcase or briefcase is property of a kind in which the owner or bailee normally has a strong expectation of privacy). See generally 4 LaFave, Search and Seizure § 11.3(f), at 344 (2d ed. 1987) (person who is not the owner of the container but who possesses it by virtue of his status as bailee certainly has standing to object to illegal interference with his possessory interest). 40 In Benitez-Arreguin, the defendant was an itinerant worker who had been given a duffel-type bag to deliver to a person who was to help him get a job. The Tenth Circuit noted that [i]n general, luggage such as suitcases and footlockers is 'a common repository for one's personal effects, and therefore is inevitably associated with the expectation of privacy,'  973 F.2d at 828 (quoting Arkansas v. Sanders, 442 U.S. 753, 762, 99 S.Ct. 2586, 2592, 61 L.Ed.2d 235 (1979), overruled on other grounds, California v. Acevedo, --- U.S. ----, ---- - ----, 111 S.Ct. 1982, 1988-91, 114 L.Ed.2d 619 (1991)), and ruled that the defendant had established his possessory interest in the bag as a bailee, see Benitez-Arreguin, 973 F.2d at 828. Noting  'the general rule that a bailee in possession of personal property may recover compensation for any conversion of the article bailed or destruction of or damage to the bailed property, by another while in his possession,'  id. (quoting 8 Am.Jur.2d Bailments § 263, at 994 (1980)), the court concluded that a person transporting luggage as a bailee, or at least with the permission of the owner, has a reasonable expectation of privacy that society would recognize. 973 F.2d at 828. We agree. 41 In the present case, we cannot uphold the district court's rejection of the claim that Perea had a protectable privacy interest as the duffel bag's bailee. The court noted that if his testimony were to be believed, Perea was a temporary custodian, who was [a]t best ... simply hired to transport the bag from one location to another; the court stated, however, that it could not credit Perea's testimony as to either the length of time the bag had been in his custody or what he was doing with it at the time of its seizure. We are not entirely sure of the scope of this rejection. The court did not state that it found that Perea was not the custodian of the bag, and the record does not lend itself to a rejection of the proposition that he was at least its temporary custodian. At the time of the stop, Perea was the only passenger in the cab; he and Ortiz had appeared together at the door of the 61st Road building after Ortiz put the bag into the trunk and just before Perea departed in the cab with Ortiz's apparent blessing. There could be no reasonable inference that the bag had been abandoned by Ortiz; nor was there any evidence that Ortiz had appointed Flowers custodian of the bag or that he had even told her where it was to be taken. We are also unclear as to the basis for the court's rejection of Perea's description of what he was doing with [the bag] at the time of its seizure. The government presented no evidence to contradict Perea's testimony that he was taking the duffel bag to a new location; that testimony was plainly supported by the agents' observations of the events after Ortiz returned to the 61st Road building. Further, even accepting the court's rejection of Perea's testimony as to the length of time the bag had been in his custody, we cannot see that that factor has any relevance. Whatever the length of time for which Perea had previously had custody of the bag, there could be no question that he had custody of it when the cab was stopped. We conclude that the record established that Perea was a bailee of the duffel bag. 42 In rejecting Perea's claim of a privacy interest in the bag, the district court cited Rawlings v. Kentucky, 448 U.S. 98, 100 S.Ct. 2556, and United States v. McGrath, 613 F.2d 361 (2d Cir.1979), cert. denied, 446 U.S. 967, 100 S.Ct. 2946, 64 L.Ed.2d 827 (1980). Neither case stands for the proposition that a bailee such as Perea lacks a protectable privacy interest. In Rawlings, the Supreme Court held that a defendant who placed narcotics in a friend's purse did not have standing to object to the search of the purse because he did not have a legitimate expectation of privacy in the purse. See 448 U.S. at 105-06, 100 S.Ct. at 2561-62. The case thus involved the privacy expectations of the narcotics' owner who had relinquished custody, i.e., the bailor; it did not involve the privacy interests of the person in whose purse the narcotics had been placed, i.e., the bailee. In McGrath, this Court considered the search of a briefcase found next to its owner, a passenger in a van; the search was challenged both by the driver and by the owner of the van who was not present at the time the van was stopped and the briefcase seized. We held that neither the owner of the van nor the driver had standing to challenge the search of the briefcase. See 613 F.2d at 365-66. There was no showing that the briefcase had ever been out of the possession of its owner, or that it had been entrusted to any one else, or that the driver or the owner of the van had any dominion or control over the briefcase. We thus ruled that only the passenger who owned the briefcase had a protectable privacy interest in it. In sum, neither the defendant in Rawlings nor either of the defendants at issue in McGrath was a custodian of the bag that was searched. 43 As to the requirement that Perea have conducted himself and dealt with the property in such a way as to indicate a subjective expectation that his privacy would be preserved, the agents' own testimony served to prove that element. Given their descriptions of Ortiz's and Perea's repeated glancing about for surveillance, there can be no doubt that Perea and Ortiz had exhibited subjective expectations of privacy and were attempting to preserve that privacy. 44 In sum, on the facts clearly established at the suppression hearing in the present case, Perea as bailee had, at the time the cab was stopped, a protectable expectation of privacy in the duffel bag. 45 This conclusion, however, does not end the privacy-interest inquiry, for if Perea abandoned his possessory interest in the bag or consented to the search, the search did not violate his Fourth Amendment rights. See, e.g., Schneckloth v. Bustamonte, 412 U.S. at 219, 93 S.Ct. at 2044 (consent); Abel v. United States, 362 U.S. 217, 241, 80 S.Ct. 683, 698, 4 L.Ed.2d 668 (1960) (abandonment). At the suppression hearing, Perea testified that he was not even asked whether the bag was his. Agent Aryai testified that Perea had been asked whether the duffel bag was his; Aryai gave two versions of Perea's response, testifying first that Perea had said, no, that's not my bag, and testifying later that Perea had said, no, go ahead. The government does not appear to have argued that Perea consented to the search; rather, it argued that Perea had abandoned the bag. The court stated during the suppression hearing that though its view of abandonment might differ from that of the appellate court, I don't find that he abandoned. We interpret that statement as a ruling that the government had not established that Perea abandoned whatever interest he had in the bag--a ruling that, on this record, is not erroneous. If the court did not so intend its statement, however, it is free to make a ruling on this question on remand. 46 If Perea did not consent to the search and did not abandon the duffel bag, he retained his Fourth Amendment protected privacy interest in the bag, and the court was required to proceed to the question of whether there was a basis on which the warrantless search was permissible. 47