Court Opinion

ID: 9535047
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 04:45:00.771454+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:33:09.678670
License: Public Domain

BURNETT, Judge,
concurring specially.
I join the Court in upholding the district judge’s denial of Walker’s motion to suppress evidence. However, I write separately because my views on two of the issues presented do not entirely correspond with those expressed in the Court’s opinion.
I
With respect to probable cause for the search warrant, I would deem it unnecessary to employ the “totality of the circumstances” test enunciated in Illinois v. Gates, 462 U.S. 213, 103 S.Ct. 2317, 76 L.Ed.2d 527 (1983). That test prescribes a standard for reviewing a probable cause determination made in reliance upon information obtained from a confidential source. The Gates standard has superseded the former, two-pronged requirement that probable cause affidavits must establish the veracity of the confidential source and the basis of his knowledge. See Aguilar v. Texas, 378 U.S. 108, 84 S.Ct. 1509, 12 L.Ed.2d 723 (1964) and Spinelli v. United States, 393 U.S. 410, 89 S.Ct. 584, 21 L.Ed.2d 637 (1969). In the present case, I believe that both the informant’s veracity and the basis of his knowledge were demonstrated by the electronically monitored conversation between the informant and Walker and by the informant’s controlled purchase of marijuana from Walker. Consequently, even if the Aguilar-Spinelli requirements were still extant, I would hold that they had been satisfied.
My reason for making this observation is that I believe the Gates rule should be the *313last resort, not the point of departure, in evaluating the sufficiency of evidence to establish probable cause. Although Gates held the Aguilar-Spinelli requirements to be unduly rigid, those requirements identify the common-sense concerns of a magistrate who is asked to rely upon information procured from an anonymous person. I think any impartial and conscientious magistrate would want to know, “Where did this person get his information?” and “Is he likely to be telling the truth?” Those, in essence, are the Aguilar-Spinelli questions. If the magistrate is dissatisfied with the answers to these questions, then he may examine the case as a whole to determine whether his doubts are resolved by the “totality of the circumstances” as denoted in Gates. By applying the Gates test only after these common-sense questions have been considered, the magistrate can put the “totality of circumstances” into proper context and he can maintain a prudent measure of caution about relying upon information attributed to undisclosed sources.
II
Regarding the warrantless entry into Walker’s home, and the securing of the premises, I agree with the Court’s narrow reading and application of Segura v. United States, 52 U.S.L.W. 5128 (July 5, 1984). In that case, a five-member majority of the United States Supreme Court held that evidence seized under a valid search warrant was not rendered inadmissible by an earlier, illegal entry upon the premises. The Segura majority invoked a long-established “independent source” exception to the fourth amendment exclusionary rule. However, that exception — as I had understood it before Segura — meant simply that evidence obtained from a source separate and distinct from illegal activity was not tainted by the illegality and, therefore, was not subject to the exclusionary rule. See, e.g., Wong Sun v. United States, 371 U.S. 471, 487-88, 83 S.Ct. 407, 417-18, 9 L.Ed.2d 441 (1963); Silverthome Lumber Co. v. United States, 251 U.S. 385, 392, 40 S.Ct. 182, 183, 64 L.Ed. 319 (1920). I entertain some doubt whether a search under warrant can be treated as a truly separate and distinct source of evidence where an illegal entry has been made while applying for the warrant and in anticipation that the warrant will be issued. Accordingly, I believe Segura may embody a conceptual deficiency. I would not embrace it as unskeptically as do other members of the Court.
Nevertheless, Segura remains the federal law of the land, and it disposes of Walker’s fourth amendment claim. Neither party in the instant case has urged the district court or our Court to decide whether the search-and-seizure provision of the Idaho Constitution, Art. I, § 17, affords an independent basis for suppressing the evidence. However, even if the state constitutional issue had been raised, we would be bound by our Supreme Court’s recent declaration that Art. 1, § 17, “is to be construed consistently with the fourth amendment to the United States Constitution.” State v. Cow-en, 104 Idaho 649, 650, 662 P.2d 230, 231 (1983).
I respectfully question the wisdom of bonding our state constitution to the interpretive gloss spread upon its federal counterpart by the United States Supreme Court. But the fact remains that our Court is in no position to decide today whether the state exclusionary rule is affected by Segura’s treatment of the “independent source” exception to the federal rule. That determination must await a future case in which the issue has been properly raised before the Idaho Supreme Court and the federal experience under Segura can be fully analyzed.