Court Opinion

ID: 9692076
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 15:39:40.28327+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:19:30.582643
License: Public Domain

SCHILLER, J.,
dissenting:
¶ 1 Because I believe that the police in this case had no reasonable or articulable basis for suspecting that Appellant’s mother was involved in criminal activity, and because in stopping her the police created the exigent circumstances on which they relied to conduct a warrantless search, I respectfully dissent.
¶ 2 The majority distinguishes our Supreme Court’s holding in Commonwealth v. Melendez, 544 Pa. 323, 676 A.2d 226 (1996), arguing that, in this case, the police acted permissibly in stopping Appellant’s mother.. I disagree. In this case, neither the information provided by the anonymous confidential informant nor the police’s own surveillance at the scene linked the woman, later identified as Appellant’s mother, to suspected criminal activity. The information provided by the anonymous confidential informant related solely to the activities of Appellant at this particular location. Moreover, while the woman was seen exiting a suspected “stash house” with a white plastic bag “similar” to that carried into the residence by Appellant, there was no evidence that this bag contained controlled substances. As the Supreme Court recognized in Melendez, merely leaving the scene of suspected criminal activity, without more, does not provide police with justification to perform even a limited Terry7 stop.
¶ 3 I also disagree with the majority’s conclusion that the police had exigent circumstances following the stop of Appellant’s mother to search the residence. Instead of following the woman to see where she went and/or continuing their surveillance of the residence until the search warrant was procured, the police stopped her in full view of the persons inside the house thereby “blowing their cover”. Again, there was no imperative need for police intervention at the time of the stop and, as our Supreme Court stated in Melendez, “[I]f the concern was that police activity might have been witnessed by a *121person remaining in the house who might begin to destroy evidence, such a possibility is of no legal consequence, for police may not create their own exigencies, which they then use as justification for exclusion from normal warrant requirements.” 544 Pa. at 332, 676 A.2d at 230.
¶ 4 I would therefore find that the stop and, therefore, the search of the residence were illegal, and the items seized as a result thereof should have been suppressed.

. Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 88 S.Ct. 1868, 20 L.Ed.2d 889 (1968).