Opinion ID: 397385
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Search of the Containers

Text: 26 The defendants further assert that the district court should have suppressed the marijuana on the ground that it was the fruit of an unlawful warrantless search of the bales by DEA agents. The district court held the search lawful because the defendants had no reasonable expectation of privacy in the bales. We agree that the search was lawful, but for the reason that the marijuana was in plain view and therefore that no warrant was required. 27 Our starting point is the general rule that a valid search requires that the authorities have obtained a warrant supported by probable cause and issued by a detached and neutral magistrate. See Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347, 357, 88 S.Ct. 507, 514, 19 L.Ed.2d 576 (1967). That rule has been recently applied by the Supreme Court in Robbins v. California, --- U.S. ----, 101 S.Ct. 2841, 69 L.Ed.2d 744 (1981), to invalidate a warrantless search of two plastic covered bundles containing marijuana and found in the luggage compartment of a station wagon, and more recently by this court in United States v. Sharpe, 660 F.2d 967 (4th Cir. 1981), to hold unlawful the search of well packaged bales of marijuana found in the back of a camper. 28 Had the containers of marijuana in this case been so well packaged that no marijuana was visible to the officers, we would follow the decisions in Robbins and Sharpe and decline to uphold the warrantless search. For, as those decisions make clear, we cannot excuse the requirement of a warrant to search the containers simply on the basis of exigent circumstances resulting from the containers' discovery on a moving vessel, what sort of containers they are, or even their suspicious odor of marijuana. We conclude, however, that a particular variation of one of the few exceptions to the warrant requirement-the plain view exception-applies in this case and that the warrantless search of the containers of marijuana conducted by the DEA agents was lawful. 29 Relying upon earlier reasoning in Arkansas v. Sanders, 442 U.S. 753, 764-65 n.13, 99 S.Ct. 2586, 2593, 61 L.Ed.2d 235 (1979), the plurality in Robbins clearly acknowledged that there was a plain view exception to the bright line rule announced concerning a container search. The exception is actually in two parts. First, if the container is open and its contents exposed, its contents can be said to be in plain view. Second, if a container proclaims its contents by its distinctive configuration or otherwise and thus allows by its outward appearance an inference to be made of its contents, those contents are similarly considered to be in plain view. --- U.S. at ---- - ----, 101 S.Ct. at 2844-2846. In either instance, an investigating authority need not obtain a warrant to search the container, the reasoning behind the exception being that a warrant under those circumstances would be superfluous. 30 The marijuana in the bales seized from the CENTAURUS was in plain view for a combination of those two reasons. As the defendants concede, some of the bales-the record is unclear on the exact number-were split open and marijuana exposed to view prior to the search, that is, the opening and sampling of the bales by DEA agents. The plain view of that marijuana, in combination with the virtually identical appearances of the other intact bales and the presence of marijuana residue on top of some of the bales noted while the bales were still on board the CENTAURUS, allowed the authorities to infer under the latter prong of the plain view exception that the bales not split open also contained marijuana. 31 Because the marijuana was in plain view, the DEA agents did not need to acquire a warrant prior to taking samples from the bales. The search was therefore valid and the motion to suppress on this ground properly denied.