Court Opinion

ID: 9665789
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 00:57:13.8689+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:15:19.043228
License: Public Domain

Williams, J.
(dissenting). At issue in this case is a matter of procedure. The question is whether it was reversible error that the trial court refused a motion to quash and a motion to suppress evidence on the grounds of failure to show at the preliminary examination probable cause for either search and seizure or arrest. Actually, as shown at the trial, there was probable cause for both the arrest and the search and seizure.
I
Acting upon an informant’s tip that three men were transporting narcotics from Detroit to Grand Rapids in a certain make and model car, the Grand Rapids police established a surveillance point in a rest stop along Interstate 96. Sighting the car described by the informant, the police followed it to a point where it exited and then forced it to the curb by swerving in front of the car. After ordering the occupants out of the car under gunpoint, the police searched the car finding four packets of heroin and *578a search of defendant’s person produced four methadone pills and a kit for administering injections.
At the preliminary examination, the defendant moved to quash the information for lack of probable cause to make the arrest and also moved to suppress the evidence of the search. The prosecution sought to introduce the narcotics into evidence on the basis of the proviso of Article 1, § 11 of the Michigan constitution1 which states that Article 1, § ll’s reasonable search requirements do not bar from evidence in any criminal proceeding any narcotics seized by a police officer outside the curtilage of any dwelling house. The judge ruled in favor of the prosecution and allowed the narcotics into evidence. This evidence established that a crime had been committed and probable cause for believing that defendant committed it.
Defendant renewed his motions at trial. A hearing was held at trial outside the presence of the jury after voir dire but prior to the submission of any proofs, on defendant’s renewed motions to suppress the .evidence of the search and to quash the information for lack of probable cause to make the arrest. At this hearing the prosecutor brought forth testimonial evidence which clearly established the reliability of the informant’s tip with specificity and particularity. Officer Freeman testified that the informant not only described the make, body style and color of the vehicle to be used to transport the “drug heroin,” but also described some damage to the front *579end of the ear and gave the license number, that the informant identified the three men eventually arrested, stated the purpose of their trip and gave approximate departure and arrival times, that he worked with the informant for at least five years and had utilized his information to effect several arrests and convictions for narcotic offenses and armed robberies and that he had personally arrested the defendant some six years previous for trafficking in heroin and was familiar with his association with the other two men. The trial judge denied defendant’s motions to suppress the evidence of the search and to quash the information which defendant renewed a second time at the close of the proofs. Defendant was convicted of unlawful possession of narcotics. From a denial of these motions and the subsequent conviction defendant appealed.
The Court of Appeals affirmed the conviction ruling that the arresting officers had probable cause to arrest the defendant without a warrant and that the search was incident to a lawful arrest. The Court pointed out that the information provided the arresting officers by a reliable informant gave them reason to believe that the defendant had committed and was committing a felony offense.
Relying on the rule stated in People v. Miller (1928), 245 Mich 115, 118 and reaffirmed in People v. Zeigler (1960), 358 Mich 355 and People v. Kaigler (1962), 368 Mich 281, the defendant contended on appeal that the reliability of the informant must be proven with evidence introduced at the preliminary examination and that it is improper to use amplifying testimony later taken at trial to show that the informant was reliable so that the arresting officers had reasonable grounds to make the arrest and *580the search incident to the arrest. Defendant points out that at the preliminary examination the only evidence about the reliability of the informant was a reference to the fact that the arresting officers had received an anonymous tip. Miller, supra, held that anonymous information does not meet the test of giving an arresting officer reasonable grounds for making a warrantless search.
The issues on appeal are narrow ones. No one questions that due to the informant’s tip the police officers had reasonable grounds to arrest defendant without a warrant.2 For the same grounds no one doubts the constitutional validity of the search. What is in question is the procedure the prosecutor used at the preliminary examination. First, how does the Miller-Zeigler-Kaigler rule requiring the prosecutor to introduce evidence at the preliminary examination showing the reliability of the informant apply in this case? Second, could the prosecutor rely on Article 1, § 11’s proviso to introduce into evidence the narcotics seized from an automobile in 1968 when People v. Pennington (1970), 383 Mich 611, invalidated that proviso in 1970? Third, must the prosecutor show the validity of the arrest at preliminary examination exclusive of testimony produced at the subsequent trial?
*581II
The purpose of a preliminary examination is set forth in People v. Podolski (1952), 332 Mich 508, 518 as follows:
“The examination cannot he said to be a trial, but it is an investigation to decide whether a crime has been committed and whether there is probable cause to believe the accused is guilty. McCurdy v. New York Life Ins. Co. [1897], 115 Mich 20, 22.”
In the instant case, the narcotics introduced into evidence under the proviso of Article 1, § 11 together with the testimony describing the search indicated the existence of a crime and defendant’s probable connection with it. In Miller, Zeigler and Kaigler the proviso of Article 1, § 11 was not in issue. Those cases dealt with the question of whether the search was reasonable so that the evidence obtained by the search could be introduced into evidence. In none was the question of the validity of arrest or the necessity of showing probable cause therefor at the preliminary examination in issue. The reasonableness of the search had to be determined from the facts presented at the preliminary examination and could not include amplifying testimony later given at trial. These cases do not apply to the instant case where the proviso of Article 1, § 11, if then valid, eliminated the need to show the reasonableness of the search. Thus, it was not necessary for the prosecutor to show the reliability of the informant at the preliminary examination to introduce the narcotics which established the commission of a crime and probable cause to believe defendant committed it.
III
The validity of the proviso of Article 1, § 11 was in question following the decision of the United *582States Supreme Court in Mapp v. Ohio (1961), 367 US 643 (81 S Ct 1684, 6 L Ed 2d 1081, 84 ALR2d 933) in which the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution was made applicable to the states by incorporating it into the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. However, the proviso was not declared invalid in Michigan until our Court. decided Pennington (383 Mich 611) in 1970. At the time of the instant case in 1968 the Court of Appeals had directly passed on the validity of the proviso in three cases ruling that it was applicable and valid until declared invalid by our Court. People v. Monroe (1966), 3 Mich App 165; People v. Vanlandingham (1967) , 6 Mich App 128 and People v. Dillion (1967), 7 Mich App 256. Our Court twice had the opportunity to declare the proviso invalid but in both cases avoided the issue and decided the cases on other grounds. In re Winkle (1964), 372 Mich 292; People v. Blessing (1966), 378 Mich 51. Thus, in the light of the state of the law as it existed in 1968, a prosecutor should have been able to rely on the proviso of Article 1, § 11. To find otherwise would require of a prosecutor that he possess the gift of prophecy.
Despite this history we might be persuaded to apply Pennington retroactively to Mapp in those situations where the defendant’s Fourth Amendment rights were violated in some manner. But that situation did not occur in this case. Here, the arrest and the search incident to the arrest were valid by post-Pennington standards. The policy behind Mapp was that by excluding the evidence obtained in an unreasonable search the incentive for violating the reasonable search requirements of the Fourth Amendment would be eliminated. This policy has no application to the instant case. The defendant’s rights were in no way jeopardized by the search and *583the police acted in a lawful manner. Nor can we see how the defendant was harmed in any other way. Possibly, defendant could claim that he was denied the opportunity of being confronted with the name of the informant and the particulars of the information at the preliminary examination. But there is no reason to believe that such information in advance of trial would have helped defendant any more than it did at trial which resulted in his conviction. Moreover, the prosecution need not release the name of the informant but only need prove the reliability of the informant.3 Nor was the informant a res gestae witness who had to be produced at the preliminary examination.
IV
The question remains whether it was necessary to show probable cause for the arrest at the preliminary examination. As indicated above, neither Miller, Zeigler nor Kaigler are in point, because there the question related to the unlawful search not to an arrest. Certainly, where the arrest actually was valid and where the evidence showed a crime and probable cause, there is no reversible error in the procedure. See also Frisbie v. Collins (1952), 342 US 519 (72 S Ct 509, 96 L Ed 541), which upheld the trial court’s ruling “that the state court had power to try respondent ‘regardless of how presence was procured.’” (P 520.)
V
In conclusion we affirm the Court of Appeals. "We find that there is no reversible error in a pre-Pennington case where the prosecution procedurally re*584lied on the proviso of Article 1, § 11 at the preliminary examination to introduce the narcotics which established the commission of a crime and prohable cause to believe defendant committed it and waited until trial to introduce testimonial evidence which showed that the arrest and search were valid by post-Pennington standards.

 Article 1, § 11 of the 1963 Michigan constitution reads:
“The person, houses, papers and possessions of every person shall be secure from unreasonable searches and seizures. No warrant to search any place or to seize any person or things shall issue without describing them, nor without probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation. The provisions of this section shall not be construed to bar from evidence in any criminal proceeding any narcotic drug, firearm, bomb, explosive or any other dangerous weapon, seized by a peace officer outside the curtilage of any dwelling house in this state.”

 It is a well established rule that if an officer believes, and has good reason to believe, that a person has committed a felony or is committing a felony that he may arrest him without a warrant. People v. Licavoli (1928), 245 Mich 202; People v. Orlando (1943), 305 Mich 686; People v. Bommarito (1944), 309 Mich 139 and People v. Ormsby (1945), 310 Mich 291. The United States Supreme Court stated the rule for an arrest without a warrant to be whether the facts and circumstances within the knowledge of the arresting officers and of which they had reasonable trustworthy information are sufficient in themselves to warrant a man of reasonable caution in the belief that an offense has been or is being committed. Carroll v. United States (1924), 267 US 132, 162 (69 L Ed 543, 555; 45 S Ct 280, 288.

 Draper v. United States (1959), 358 US 307 (79 S Ct 329, 3 L Ed 2d 327); Aquilar v. Texas (1964), 378 US 108 (84 S Ct 1509, 12 L Ed 2d 723) and McCray v. Illinois (1967), 386 US 300 (87 S Ct 1056, 18 L Ed 2d 62).