Opinion ID: 340675
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Search and Seizure of Narcotics During Arrest

Text: 18 On July 14, 1974, acting on information supplied by a government informant, federal agents observed Chandler and Cravero, for whom arrest warrants were then outstanding, 11 and Willets arrive at a restaurant at 7:00 p. m. for a meeting with the informant. After the meeting, Chandler, Cravero, and Willets left the restaurant and drove to Cook's house. Agents followed them and placed the house under surveillance beginning at approximately 9:30 p. m. At 1:15 a. m., two agents, with arrest warrants for Chandler, Cravero, and a third man named Troise, knocked on the front door of Cook's house, identified themselves, and announced that they had arrest warrants. A short time later, Cook opened the door; and after a short exchange she shouted, Hey, you guys, the police. The agents immediately entered, without permission, saw Cravero in the living room, and arrested him. They also noticed Chandler standing in the doorway to the master bedroom within reach of a pistol. As they arrested Chandler and confiscated the pistol, they heard scuffling sounds coming from an adjacent bathroom. Cook sought to prevent the agents from entering the bathroom without a search warrant, but they announced that they had an arrest warrant for Troise, a fugitive whom they claimed to believe to be hiding in the house. Entering the bathroom with weapons drawn, 12 the agents first observed Willets leaning into the shower stall and then saw a metal tray containing a large quantity of white powder that proved to be cocaine on the shower floor in plain view and paraphernalia used in the processing and packaging of narcotics 13 on the counter next to the sink. After checking the shower stall unsuccessfully for Troise, the agents seized the cocaine and paraphernalia. 19 Cook, Chandler, Cravero, and Willets challenge this seizure 14 on the following grounds: (1) the police unreasonably delayed execution of their arrest warrants so as to use them as a pretext to search Cook's house at a time when narcotics were to be found; (2) absent exigent circumstances, the police could not execute arrest warrants at the residence of a third party not named in the warrants even if there was probable cause to believe that the subjects of the warrants were on the premises; and (3) the police conducted an improper housewide exploratory search after arresting Cravero and Chandler, there being no probable cause to believe either that (a) the third person named in the arrest warrants, Troise, was present at Cook's house, or that (b) any unknown third person posed a threat to the agents' physical safety. 20 (1) Unreasonable delay in executing the arrest warrant. 21 First, appellants complain that the police had numerous opportunities to arrest Cravero and Chandler before their arrival at Cook's house and arguably could have waited again until after they left the house. This circuit has held, however, relying on Hoffa v. United States, 385 U.S. 293, 310, 87 S.Ct. 408, 17 L.Ed.2d 374 (1966), that a suspect has no constitutional right to be arrested earlier than the police choose, since the authorities may not be forced to halt an investigation once they have probable cause to arrest but before they have evidence necessary to support a conviction. United States v. Palazzo, 488 F.2d 942, 948 (5th Cir. 1974); Koran v. United States, 469 F.2d 1071 (5th Cir. 1972) (per curiam). 15 While delaying an arrest as a pretext to apprehend a suspect when he has evidence in his possession may be constitutionally questionable, 16 we need not reach that issue since no evidence of pretext is present here. The agents justifiably refrained to protect their informant's identity from arresting Chandler and Cravero at the restaurant. They did not know appellants' destination after the group left the restaurant. Nor had the officers especial reason to expect to find cocaine in Cook's house. 17 The agents entered to execute their warrants only after realizing that Cravero suspected the informant's true role 18 and concluding that the suspects intended to remain inside indefinitely. 19 Thus, the delay was reasonable and fully justified. 22 (2) Execution of arrest warrant on premises of third party. 23 Second, appellants insist that the police could not execute their arrest warrants on Cravero and Chandler by entering Cook's residence. As the Eighth Circuit recently noted in Rice v. Wolff, 513 F.2d 1280, 1292 n. 7 (8th Cir.), aff'd sub nom. Stone v. Powell, --- U.S. ----, 96 S.Ct. 3037, 49 L.Ed.2d 1067 (1976), what requirements must be satisfied before policemen without a search warrant may conduct a search of a third person's private home for a suspect for whom they have a valid arrest warrant are unsettled. 20 All circuits that have considered the question, 21 including this one, 22 agree that at minimum there must be probable cause to believe that the suspect is within the dwelling, but whether there must be exigent circumstances as well is an open question. 23 Since no exigent circumstances are present in this case, 24 we must now address that issue. 24 The opinions of other circuits that have faced this issue do not speak with one voice. 25 We think it clear, however, that in addition to probable cause to believe that the suspect is inside, there must be exigent circumstances to support an entry to make a warranted arrest in a third party's home. We think so because in the nature of things nothing in the process of procuring an arrest warrant for A considers or affords any protection to the entirely distinct fourth amendment right of B, into whose premises A may wander perhaps after the arrest warrant issues not to have B's premises invaded and ransacked for A without either a warrant or one of the customary excuses for its absence. As a general rule, before entering a specific place to conduct a search for objects, police officers must obtain a search warrant, Agnello v. United States, 269 U.S. 20, 32-33, 46 S.Ct. 4, 70 L.Ed. 145 (1925), which thereby insures a prior judicial determination that there is probable cause to believe that the object sought is within the place to be searched, Jones v. United States, 357 U.S. 493, 498, 78 S.Ct. 1253, 2 L.Ed.2d 1514 (1958). In contrast, no such determination need be made before an arrest warrant issues. Such a warrant requires only a judicial determination that there is probable cause to arrest a named person for a certain offense, without consideration of the place in which the arrest is to be made. 26 An arrest warrant, therefore, in and of itself imposes few or no limitations on the power of police to enter private homes in search of suspects. 25 But arbitrary invasion of the privacy of the home or dwelling is the  chief evil to which the fourth amendment is directed. 27 To prevent such invasions, the Framers interposed a search warrant requirement between private citizens and the police, reflecting a belief that, absent special circumstances, the decision whether the right to privacy should yield to a right to enter and search a particular place should rest not with the policeman, but with a disinterested judicial officer whose approval for a search could apply only to a particular place and after a showing of probable cause. 28 Only in certain carefully-defined classes of cases is a warrantless search permitted. 29 This preference for a prior judicial determination should control a contemplated entry of a third party's home, regardless of what is sought. While the ultimate objective of an arrest entry is an arrest, the arrest can only be effected if the subject is first found, and thus a search is a necessary factual prerequisite to the possible arrest. A search warrant would be required, in the normal case and absent some exception, to enter a residence to search for a stolen pet or other object seen carried into it. We are unable to see a distinction valid for fourth amendment purposes between entry to search for such an object and entry to apprehend a guest. Consequently, logic demands that the rules governing searches should apply with equal force to an arrest entry into a third party's home. If the policeman has probable cause to believe that a suspect he wishes to arrest is inside the home, he can demonstrate this to a magistrate and obtain a search warrant for the suspect. If he fails to obtain a warrant, then an arrest entry without a search warrant will be permissible only if exigent circumstances 30 or some other established exception to the warrant requirement obtains. Any other result raises the spectre of police circumvention of the search warrant requirement by using an arrest warrant as carte blanche to search any and every home in which they can claim probable cause to believe a suspect may be concealed. 31 Furthermore, a requirement of exigent circumstances will not unduly burden law enforcement officials or create additional danger, since such factors are given considerable weight in the exigent circumstances determination. 32 26 Although we thus agree with appellants that the entry was illegal, their conclusion that the subsequently seized drugs and paraphernalia must be suppressed does not follow ineluctably from the illegality of the entry. Obviously, an illegal entry does not vitiate the arrests pursuant to concededly valid arrest warrants. If the arrests here had been illegal e. g., without a warrant or probable cause then use of the fruits of those arrests would have entitled appellants to invoke the exclusionary rule. See Edwards v. Swenson, 454 F.2d 1106, 1111 (8th Cir.), cert. denied, 406 U.S. 909, 92 S.Ct. 1619, 31 L.Ed.2d 820 (1972) (citing Fifth Circuit and other cases). But the arrests, if not the entry, were proper. The arrest warrants represent judicial sanction of the deprivations of the suspects' liberties. Possession of the warrants was a completely self-validating justification for the arrests regardless of the circumstances under which the police reached the location where they served the warrants. To hold otherwise would mean that a suspected felon could claim what amounts to temporary sanctuary in the home of another and would require us to contemplate with equanimity the prospect of a section 1983 suit by him against the officers who arrested him on a valid warrant, which seems self-evidently absurd. Thus, the arrests are valid, though the method of effecting them be not. 33 27 The Supreme Court has held that items seized in warrantless searches incident to lawful arrests are admissible. Such searches are considered  reasonable in fourth amendment terms because they are necessary to protect the arresting officers' safety and prevent the concealment or destruction of evidence. See Chimel v. California, 395 U.S. 752, 762-64, 89 S.Ct. 2034, 23 L.Ed.2d 685 (1969). But the admissibility of items seized pursuant to other warrantless search exceptions, such as the plain view or hot pursuit doctrines, has turned on an extraneous valid reason for the officer's presence. Coolidge v. New Hampshire, 403 U.S. 443, 467, 91 S.Ct. 2022, 2039, 29 L.Ed.2d 564 (1971). 34 See also id. at 465-66, 91 S.Ct. 2022. Thus, we must examine the reason for the officers' presence in the place where they made the seizures because the admissibility of evidence obtained in the warrantless search depends on whether the items were seized incident to the valid arrest or merely as part of an exploratory search of the premises after the illegal entry. 28 (3) Exploratory search. 29 Although Chandler does not seek suppression of the pistol found on his person, 35 all appellants object to the drugs and paraphernalia found in plain view after the officers' charge on the bathroom. The police attempt to justify their presence in the bathroom on two grounds: that they had probable cause to believe that Troise, the third suspect named in their arrest warrants, was present in the house, and that they needed to conduct a safety search to prevent danger to the arresting officers. We need not consider their belief in Troise's presence, 36 because their bathroom entry can survive as a protective sweep to avoid threats from unknown persons. The Supreme Court in Chimel v. California, 395 U.S. 752, 763, 89 S.Ct. 2034, 23 L.Ed.2d 685 (1965), declared that although an arresting officer can search the suspect's person for weapons and evidence that could be destroyed, as well as the immediate area where the arrestee could grab a weapon, the policeman cannot routinely search other rooms absent some exception to the search warrant requirement. This circuit has recognized such an exception in a housewide search after a proper arrest for the purpose of making a cursory safety check when the circumstances (provide), at the least, probable cause to believe that a serious threat to safety (is) presented. United States v. Smith, 515 F.2d 1028, 1031, (5th Cir. 1975) (per curiam) (a serious and demonstrable potentiality for danger). 37 The heinous nature of the crimes, the lateness of the hour, the arrests of Cravero and of Chandler in possession of a loaded pistol, and the suspicious noises coming from the bathroom more than justified the agents' cursory search to secure the immediate area and to insure their own physical safety. Since the agents were properly inside the bathroom, their seizure of the cocaine and paraphernalia can be justified on two separate and independent grounds. First, the officers observed the items in plain view in a room that they had properly entered. 38 Second, they observed Willets in the process of committing the crime of possession of narcotics, which gave them grounds to arrest her and seize the items here in question since they were in an area within her control. 39 Thus, the items were properly admitted, despite the illegal entry. 30 (4) The limits of our holding. 31 Having said so much, we do not think it amiss to indicate something of what we do not hold. 32 We do not countenance the original, warrantless entry of Cook's residence, nor would we suffer admission of the fruits of an unlimited, warrantless search of her residence: matter discovered, for example, in a room remote from the scene of the arrests or as a result of ransacking bureau drawers, or the like. But being unable to find the arrests by warrant of Chandler and Cravero invalid, we are likewise unable to condemn as evidence items seized as a result of reasonable and appropriate actions taken by the police occasioned by and directly resulting from these valid arrests. 33 We do, in other words, no bold work here. Rather, we seek to lay course between the overhanging absurdity of the sporting theory of justice on the one 34 side and the menace of police irruption into residences on 35 the other. VI. Hearsay Declarations of the Previously Acquitted Co-Conspirator 36 Appellants Chandler and Willets attack as hearsay a witness' damaging account of statements made by an alleged co-conspirator who had been acquitted in an earlier trial of this conspiracy. A witness can testify to declarations made to him by a co-conspirator only if the government by independent evidence establishes a prima facie case of the existence of a conspiracy and introduces at least slight evidence to connect with the conspiracy both the declarant and the defendant against whom the statement is introduced, which requires a showing of a likelihood of an illicit association between the declarant and the defendant, United States v. Lawson,523 F.2d 804, 806 (5th Cir. 1975); Park v. Huff, 506 F.2d 849, 859 (5th Cir.) (en banc), cert. denied, 423 U.S. 824, 96 S.Ct. 38, 46 L.Ed.2d 40 (1975); see United States v. Oliva, 497 F.2d 130, 132-33 (5th Cir. 1974). Appellants, who concede that the prosecution met its initial burden, argue that an alleged co-conspirator's prior acquittal deprives the trial judge of any right to find that the government has made the requisite showing of that person's participation in the conspiracy. Other circuits have held, and we agree, that after the government has made the requisite showings, the admission of testimony under the co-conspirator exception to the hearsay rule is not rendered retroactively improper by subsequent acquittal of the alleged co-conspirator. See United States v. Jacobs, 475 F.2d 270, 284 n.28 (2d Cir.), cert. denied, 414 U.S. 821, 94 S.Ct. 116, 38 L.Ed.2d 53 (1973); Kamansuke-Yuge v. United States, 127 F.2d 683, 689 (9th Cir.), cert. denied, 317 U.S. 648, 63 S.Ct. 43, 87 L.Ed. 522 (1942). 37 We see no reason for a differing rule when acquittal occurs before the hearsay testimony is admitted. The earlier acquittal signifies that the government failed to prove the declarant a participant in the conspiracy beyond a reasonable doubt; this circumstance in no way forecloses the government, in a subsequent case, from establishing by slight or even preponderant evidence the declarant's participation. The independent slight evidence necessary to meet the threshold admissibility requirement means only that the evidence would be sufficient to support a finding by the jury that the declarant was a co-conspirator, 40 obviously not inconsistent with an earlier jury's inability to so determine beyond a reasonable doubt. 41 The problem is at bottom one of judicial estoppel. The declarant's earlier acquittal, to be sure, forecloses a redetermination of his guilt because of considerations of double jeopardy and may also properly be said to establish finally that he cannot be found beyond reasonable doubt to have been a conspirator. But it no more forecloses a determination, even by a preponderance of the evidence, 42 that he was one than a subsequent acquittal, and this is more than is required for admission of his declarations. 38