Court Opinion

ID: 9735369
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 18:11:00.77988+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:26:57.576761
License: Public Domain

SALSMAN, J.
I dissent.
It is argued that the officers had reasonable cause to arrest appellant, and hence search without warrant was justified as an incident to her arrest. In my opinion the record here will not support any such contention.
Where, as here, private premises have been entered, doors broken, a general search conducted, and an arrest accomplished, all without any warrant for arrest or search, the burden rests upon the prosecution to show proper justification. (Badillo v. Superior Court, 46 Cal.2d 269, 272 [294 P.2d 23].) Arrest without warrant may be made if the arresting officer has reasonable cause to believe that the person to be arrested has committed a felony. (Penal Code § 836(3); People v. Privett, 55 Cal.2d 698, 701 [12 Cal.Rptr. 874, 361 P.2d 602].) Reasonable cause to arrest this appellant must depend upon facts known to the officers at the time they entered the street level entrance leading to appellant’s room on the second floor.
This is the testimony :
(1) Officers had some information of narcotics traffic in the *645area or at appellant’s address. The nature of this alleged traffic is not described.
(2) About three weeks before appellant’s arrest, officers made a “buy” at appellant’s address.
These facts do not aid in establishing reasonable cause to arrest this appellant and search her premises. There is no testimony to connect her with any of these events, and indeed nothing to indicate that at the time they took place she resided at or was present at these premises. Moreover, demand was made by a codefendant for the names of police informants. The prosecution objected and the court sustained such objection. Later, in deciding the issue of reasonable cause to arrest this appellant the court rejected the alleged prior information and the claimed “buy” as factors supporting reasonable cause. It is clear that refusal to reveal the names of informants is fatal here and removes such prior information and the alleged “buy” from all consideration in the ease.
It cannot properly be said that demand for the names of informants was raised only by amodefendant and not by appellant and for this reason appellant may not complain. Appellant and a codefendant were jointly tried before the court without a jury. Demand for the names of informants was properly raised by the codefendant and rejected by the court. It would be too strict a requirement to impose upon this appellant that she also separately demand the names of all informants. The court had given its ruling on this question. Further demand could only incur the wrath of the judge and perhaps risk a citation for contempt of court. In my view she lost no right in her failure to pursue the matter.
(3) Two men, Thomas and Fisher, late at night, separately entered appellant’s premises. Thomas came out, carrying a brown bag, and was arrested on the street. The bag contained marijuana. A short time later Fisher appeared at appellant’s street level door. He too had a brown bag. Officers seized him at the door. He shouted “Ester, the cops, destroy.” Officers immediately rushed past Fisher and up the stairs towards appellant’s rooms. Half way up the stairs they saw appellant standing in her doorway. She slammed the door shut. The officers broke in and conducted a general search. They found marijuana. They stripped appellant’s bed and found money. They searched all rooms in the premises, breaking at least one other door in the process. After search appellant was arrested.
*646Neither the arrest of Thomas nor the arrest of Fisher may be used as justification for search of appellant’s flat. Search of premises over which the person arrested has possession or immediate control has often been declared valid. (See People v. Dixon, 46 Cal.2d 456, 458-459 [296 P.2d 557], and cases cited,) Here Thomas was arrested on the street and Fisher at the door downstairs. There is nothing in the evidence to suggest that either had any possession or control over appellant’s premises. There is no showing that Thomas and Fisher did not possess narcotics when they first entered appellant’s premises, although there is testimony that, at time of entry, they were not openly carrying brown paper bags. As to Fisher, the officers did not know he possessed marijuana at the time they entered, because he was seized and entry made almost simultaneously. At that moment as to Fisher, all the officers knew was that he had a bag.
When Fisher was seized he uttered the cry of warning previously described. Does this help to support the finding of reasonable cause to arrest this appellant? I think not. In my opinion to make entry and search lawful here, reasonable cause to arrest this appellant must exist at the very moment the premises were entered. That is to say, when the officers first crossed appellant’s threshold at the downstairs entrance, reasonable cause to arrest her must then have been present or the entry and search violated her constitutional rights. There is no showing in this record that upon entry the officers knew who was upstairs, whether one person or many. Apart from Fisher’s words, the officers had no knowledge of appellant and knew of nothing which in any way connected her with any illegal activity.
In Johnson v. United States, 333 U.S. 10 [68 S.Ct. 367, 92 L.Ed. 436], officers received information of the use of opium in a hotel room. They went to the room and stood outside the door. They smelled the smoke of burning opium and clearly recognized it as such. They did not know who was in the room. They entered, searched and arrested the person found in the room. Entry without warrant was held to violate the constitutional rights of the accused. (See also People v. Soto, 144 Cal.App.2d 294, 301 [301 P.2d 45].)
If Fisher, when arrested, had said to the officers: ‘ ‘ Thomas bought his marijuana from Ester Verrette, who lives upstairs, and she has lots more in her room, ’ ’ would this have supported entry and search? In such case Fisher would have been an informer. He is no less so because of the ambiguous nature *647of the information contained in the words he uttered when seized by the officers at the door. He was unknown to the officers, and reliance upon his information alone would not be sufficient to support entry and search. (Willson v. Superior Court, 46 Cal.2d 291, 294 [294 P.2d 36]. See also Wong Sun v. United States, 371 U.S. 471 [83 S.Ct. 407, 9 L.Ed.2d 441].)
Respondent seeks to justify breaking into appellant’s rooms on the ground that slamming the door as the officers charged up the stairs is such furtive conduct on her part as to give rise to reasonable cause for her arrest. This proposition cannot be supported. At the time appellant slammed her door shut the officers had already entered and search was under way. In Tompkins v. Superior Court, 59 Cal.2d 65 [27 Cal.Rptr. 889, 378 P.2d 113], the police arrested one Edward Nieman who possessed narcotics. Nieman lived in an apartment with Tompkins. The police, without a warrant, but with Nieman’s consent, went to search the. apartment. Tompkins appeared at the door and when informed it was the police, “made a motion with his arm to the left and slammed the door shut.” The police broke in and found narcotics. The Supreme Court held that until the police kicked the door in, there was no reasonable cause to arrest Tompkins. There, as here, the issue was whether slamming the door shut gave rise to reasonable cause to arrest. The court said: “Petitioner’s apparent motioning of someone away from the door and closing it in Inspector Martin’s face did not provide the missing elements of reasonable cause to believe that petitioner was guilty of felony. ... If refusal of permission to enter could convert mere suspicion of crime into probable cause to arrest the occupant and search his home, such suspicion alone would become the test of the right to enter, and the right to be free from unreasonable police intrusions would be vitiated by its mere assertion.” (See also People v. Cedeno, 218 Cal.App. 2d 213 [32 Cal.Rptr. 246].)
Search without warrant cannot here be justified on the ground of emergency. The statements of Fisher while at the door were made almost contemporaneously with entry by the officers. In Johnson v. United States, supra, also a narcotics case, the prosecution relied upon the same claim of urgent necessity to enter as is made here, and the court rejected it. In the Johnson case the officers had positive knowledge that whoever was in the room about to be entered possessed narcotics, yet entry and search without warrant violated the Constitution. Here the officers had no such knowledge. They *648did not know who was upstairs, or what if anything they might find upon search.
It has often been held that a search without warrant may not be supported by what it turns up. (People v. Haven, 59 Cal.2d 713, 719 [31 Cal.Rptr. 47, 381 P.2d 927]; People v. Brown, 45 Cal.2d 640, 643-645 [290 P.2d 528].) Here it is necessary to rely upon what was in fact found as a result of the search in order to make the arrest of appellant lawful, and to rely upon the arrest to support the search. This circumvention of constitutional rights has always been rejected. (See Johnson v. United States, supra.) Since in my view of this record reasonable cause to arrest this appellant and search her premises did not exist as a matter of law at the time the premises were entered, the entry violated her rights under both federal and state Constitutions. All evidence, therefore, the result of illegal search, should have been excluded. (Mapp v. Ohio, 367 U.S. 643 [81 S.Ct. 1684, 6 L.Ed.2d 1081]; People v. Cahan, 44 Cal.2d 434 [282 P.2d 905, 50 A.L.R.2d 513].)
I would reverse the judgment.
A petition for a rehearing was denied March 4, 1964. Salsman, J., was of the opinion that the petition should be granted. Appellant’s petition for a hearing by the Supreme Court was denied April 8, 1964.