Court Opinion

ID: 9732798
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 16:36:10.145009+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:23:34.095419
License: Public Domain

DOYLE, Justice
(dissenting).
As stated in the majority opinion, the defendant Rigsbee was arrested by officers of the Watertown Police Department on information that “ ‘Mr. Rigsbee had marijuana or a controlled substance in his vehicle and he normally went to the Club 20 between 6:20 and 7:00, and * * * that he had been selling marijuana out there.’ ” Upon this meager information, it is contended that probable cause existed for the arrest of the defendant.
In dealing with probable cause based partially on an informant’s tip, the United States Supreme Court has said:
“The informer’s report must first be measured against Aguilar’s standards so that its probative value can be assessed. If the tip is found inadequate under Aguilar, the other allegations which corroborate the information contained in the hearsay report should then be considered.” Spinelli v. United States, 1969, 393 U.S. 410, 415, 89 S.Ct. 584, 588, 21 L.Ed.2d 637, 643.1
In Aguilar v. Texas, 1964, 378 U.S. 108, 84 S.Ct. 1509, 12 L.Ed.2d 723, an informant’s tip used to secure a search warrant was measured against the following test:
“[T]he magistrate must be informed of some of the underlying circumstances from which the informant con-*369eluded that the narcotics were where he claimed they were, and some of the underlying circumstances from which the officer concluded that the informant * * * was ‘credible’ or his information ‘reliable.’ ” 378 U.S. at 114, 84 S.Ct. at 1514, 12 L.Ed.2d at 729. (emphasis supplied)
The second Aguilar criterion, as noted in the majority opinion, is not in question here. Defendant concedes the reliability of the informant, and absent such a concession I would reach the same result. This informant had been used before and had been instrumental in several arrests and convictions. Cf. McCray v. Illinois, 1967, 386 U.S. 300, 87 S.Ct. 1056, 18 L.Ed.2d 62; Walker v. Nelson, 1972, 9 Cir., 468 F.2d 451.
However, just as surely as this tip passes one of Aguilar’s tests, it fails the other. The record is totally void of any “underlying circumstances” that would tell a magistrate or this court why the informant believed defendant had the marijuana. This is a reasonable requirement and it is one this court should not be willing to forsake for the expediencies of law enforcement. The Fourth Amendment favors the use of a warrant and the standard of probable cause to “assure that the judgment of a disinterested judicial officer will interpose itself between the police and the citizenry.” Spinelli v. United States, 1969, 393 U.S. 410, 419, 89 S.Ct. 584, 591, 21 L.Ed.2d 637, 645. When, because of the practicalities of law enforcement, an arrest is made without a warrant, a court acting after the fact must be able to. determine whether probable cause existed. If there was probable cause, the arrest will be upheld. If probable cause did not. exist, the arrest becomes a nullity. In either case, the constitutional protections guaranteed the citizenry are left intact. The decision to arrest may be made by the police, but the determination of probable cause still belongs to the courts.
When, however, an informant relates only that a crime will be committed and does not tell how he reached this conclusion, the courts are precluded from performing their constitutional duty — the determination of probable cause. Informants, regardless of their reliability, are capable of drawing unjustified conclusions. Personal observation would obviously be enough to *370affirm the informant’s conclusion, but I am presented with none of the “underlying circumstances” available to the informant in this case. I am unable to determine whether the informant was basing his conclusion on probable cause, and I refuse to delegate that function to a non-judicial officer. The informant’s tip must be held inadequate.
Finding the tip insufficient, I must now follow the instructions of Spinelli v. United States, supra, to determine whether the insufficient tip can be teamed with any independent corroboration to reach the sum of probable cause. The only other facts at hand are Officer Durham’s knowledge of defendant’s record and the informant’s assertion that Rigsbee would be traveling to a certain place at a certain time.
The state cites United States v. Harris, 1971, 403 U.S. 573, 91 S.Ct. 2075, 29 L.Ed.2d 723, for the proposition that knowledge of a previous record can cure a tip not meeting the first Aguilar test. I do not read Harris in this manner. Harris’ conviction had been reversed in the court of appeals because “there was no substantial basis for believing that the tip was truthful.” 403 U.S. at 579, 91 S.Ct. at 2080, 29 L.Ed.2d at 731. Harris centered on this issue. The question was whether the informant could be believed, a basic requirement of Aguilar. The United States Supreme Court merely held that when an informer’s tip is deficient in the truth department, the policeman’s knowledge of the defendant’s record, while perhaps not sufficient, is certainly relevant to the believability of the tip. In Harris v. United States, supra, the tip was found sufficient under Aguilar.2
The case at hand, however, is entirely different. The truthfulness of the informant is not in doubt, it is the wisdom of his conclusion that is questioned here. The fact that Officer Durham knew about defendant’s previous record really says *371nothing about whether the informant had probable cause to believe Rigsbee possessed a controlled substance — the other branch of the Aguilar test.
Independent corroboration may, however, be used in another manner. Draper v. United States, 1959, 358 U.S. 307, 79 S.Ct. 329, 3 L.Ed.2d 327, is the classic example of this. There the additional information given the police by the informant was so detailed that although the basis for the informant’s conclusion was missing, the sheer weight and detail of those extra facts gave the police probable cause to arrest once the facts were confirmed by police observation.
The basis of this approach is, I believe, that when the police have enough outside information, whether from the informer or otherwise, to believe that the informer knows so much about the suspect to have probable cause for his conclusion, the police also have probable cause. Here we have only Rigsbee’s previous record and the statement that Rigsbee would be traveling a certain road at a certain time. This hardly compares to the detailed description in Draper v. United States, supra; and, assuming Harris was using independent corroboration in this manner, the extra information available to the police in that case far outweighs the information present here. In United States v. Harris, supra, the informant’s tip also constituted a declaration against penal interest; the authorities had received numerous reports from various people regarding Harris’ illegal activity; and a stash of illicit whiskey had previously been seized from an abandoned house under Harris’ control.
We find the facts in this case remarkably close to Beck v. Ohio, 1964, 379 U.S. 89, 85 S.Ct. 223, 13 L.Ed.2d 142. The United States Supreme Court noted that:
“All that the trial court was told in this case was that the officers knew what the petitioner looked like and knew that he had a previous record of arrests or convictions for violations of the clearing house law. Beyond that, the arresting officer who testified said no more than that someone (he did not say who) had told him something (he did not say what) about the petitioner.”
*372The same conclusion has been reached in recent decisions of the courts of appeals. In United States v. Bursey, 1974, 5 Cir., 491 F.2d 531, an informant indicated that four specified individuals were in town to purchase marijuana. A computer printout indicated that one of them had previously crossed the border with marijuana. Furthermore, two days later a second informer indicated that three persons of the four “were staying at a local motel and intended to obtain narcotics in nearby Rio Grande City * * *.” 491 F.2d at 532. According to the Fifth Circuit, neither of these two tips “related the detail suggestive of a credible basis for the information given by the informants.” 491 F.2d at 534. I suggest that the information before us was comparable to that of Bursey.
Nor may easily available, innocent information be added to a bald assertion of wrongdoing to satisfy the requirement that an informer show an adequate basis of knowledge for his information. In United States v. Hamilton, 1974, 9 Cir., 490 F.2d 598, the court considered a situation wherein an informant pointed out a particular car on the street and asserted that it had marijuana hidden in a false compartment in the body bed. The language of the Ninth Circuit is particularly appropriate here. “In the case at bar all the government had was a statement supported by nothing that was not open and obvious to anyone. We know of no case suggesting that this is enough.” 490 F.2d at 601. In this case it could be known to anyone that the defendant went regularly to a bar using a car at about 6:30 p. m. The informer only added his tarnished assertion that the defendant carried marijuana. This indeed is exactly what was held insufficient in Hamilton and what should be held insufficient here. One should not be able to stand on the street, gain information about a stranger, add to that information an assertion that he carries contraband and have a warrant issued and sustained on that basis. Some of the details of the wrongdoing or the contraband itself must be added.
I wish to state my view that the majority opinion is not justified by the decision of the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals in United States v. Cummings, 1974, 507 F.2d 324. In Cummings the informer “stated that slot machines were being transported and gave an estimated value of this equipment. He described the *373truck by color and by rental system. He indicated the license number of the truck. And he correctly identified the driver and the destination of the truck.” 507 F.2d at 329. In the case considered herein, we know only that the defendant usually drove his car, which apparently was undescribed, to the Club 20 about 6:30 each night. No license plate number was given. There is an assertion that he carried marijuana but there is no indication of how much he-carried or the value of it.
I can only say that I find the difference in detail in the instant case and in Cummings to be substantial, and I am totally unable to reconcile myself to the majority view that the degree of detail present in the two cases is essentially the same.
Since I find the arrest to be invalid, the subsequent -search cannot be justified as incident to an arrest. See Beck v. Ohio, supra: Furthermore, any search conducted at a place and time remote from the arrest cannot be justified as incidental to the arrest. Preston v. United States, 1964, 376 U.S. 364, 84 S.Ct. 881, 11 L.Ed.2d.777. Nor can this search be justified under the probable-cause-plus exigent circumstances exception. See Chambers v. Maroney, 1970, 399 U.S. 42, 90 S.Ct. 1975, 26 L.Ed.2d 419. Since I find no probable cause existed to arrest the defendant for possession of marijuana, logic demands that I also find no basis, absent the probable cause, to believe that Rigsbee possessed marijuana for the purposes of a search.
It is urged that the defendant consented to the search at the police station when he retrieved the marijuana from his car. We have addressed this question previously in State v. Cochrane, 1970, 84 S.D. 527, 173 N.W.2d 495, where Judge Homeyer said, “A distinction is recognized between submission to apparent authority of an officer acting under a warrant and unqualified consent.” I believe the same principle applies here. It is hard to believe that when a person is apparently under arrest he would willingly aid in the production of incriminating evidence. Such “consent” is more likely to be a submission to the apparent authority of the police rather than a voluntary relinquishment of important constitutional rights. The burden is on the state to prove a waiver of constitutional rights, State v. Cochrane, supra, and that burden has not been met here.
*374For these reasons, the evidence obtained from defendant’s car should have been suppressed.

. Spinelli and Aguilar both dealt with the sufficiency of affidavits in support of issued warrants. While there were no affidavits or warrants in this case, the standards for determining probable cause are at least as stringent. Wong Sun v. United States, 371 U.S. 471, 83 S.Ct. 407, 9 L.Ed.2d 441.

. Aguilar requires “underlying circumstances from which the officer concluded that the informant * * * was ‘credible’ or his information ‘reliable.’ ” There is no requirement that these “underlying circumstances” for the officer’s conclusion be contained in the tip or even be supported by the informer’s past performance. Anything within police knowledge, I believe, that makes the tip believable, is relevant to that branch of the Aguilar test.