Court Opinion

ID: 9680985
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 07:42:03.666647+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:17:31.722552
License: Public Domain

STOVER, Justice,
concurring.
I concur with the result in the majority opinion, as well as with the majority’s conclusion that there was probable cause sufficient to support the search warrant. In my view, the reliability of the information — provided by an unnamed informant who, from a residence, called 911 in reference to narcotics trafficking, who personally met with the offi*140cer at the residence from which the 911 call was made, who turned over to the officer a package wrapped in cellophane and tape which the informant believed contained narcotics and which field-tested positive for cocaine — is increased by the very fact that the individual, though unnamed in the warrant, presented herself2 in person to the officer and, thus, put herself in a position to be held accountable for her intervention. Her circumstance is more that of a private citizen or eyewitness type of informant, whose status does not raise the usual concerns involved in weighing the credibility of a confidential informant. See Belton v. State, 900 S.W.2d 886, 894 (Tex.App.—El Paso 1995, pet. ref d) (information from an unnamed eyewitness informant was found to be sufficiently reliable and was used in establishing probable cause for an arrest warrant); see also State v. Sailo, 910 S.W.2d 184, 188 (Tex.App.— Fort Worth 1995, pet. refd) (information from an unnamed private citizen, who stopped and described to an officer his observations of a possible drunk driver and the driver’s vehicle, was found to have increased reliability and require less corroboration to establish reasonable suspicion to justify a temporary detention). Furthermore, the informant herein advised the officer that the package was found on Barton’s property, that there were other similar packages on the property, that she had been on the property within the last twenty-four hours, and that she resided with Barton at that residence. The positive field test of the package for cocaine provided sufficient corroboration of her information to justify the issuance of the warrant. Thus, the information provided by the informant, along with the corroboration of the cocaine in the package, provided a substantial basis for the magistrate to conclude that probable cause existed under the “totality of the circumstances” test.

. The affidavit does not reveal the gender of the informant. The use of the female pronoun is for the convenience of the author of this concurrence.