Court Opinion

ID: 9554094
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 19:41:34.365428+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:32:59.604913
License: Public Domain

Steffen, J.,
with whom Mowbray, J., agrees,
dissenting:
Setting aside my concerns about the social value of the exclusionary rule and its efficacy in protecting Fourth Amendment *559interests, I suggest that there are sound reasons for affirming the judgments entered by the district court.
In balancing the right of the appellants to enjoy freedom from unreasonable searches and seizures, even in their criminal enterprise, and the right of the deputies to take reasonable measures to protect themselves from unknown persons who could pose a threat to their safety, the lower court determined that the arresting officers were entitled to the benefit of the doubt. I agree. As the expanding criminal community becomes progressively more active, resourceful, and violent, other courts are providing the law enforcement community with a correspondingly greater latitude in protecting itself. It seems to me that the preservation of a quality society justifies such a dispensation, and I firmly believe that we should follow suit.
The United States Supreme Court has recently declared that “[a] ‘protective sweep’ is a quick and limited search of the premises, incident to an arrest and conducted to protect the safety of police officers and others.” Maryland v. Buie, 110 S.Ct. 1093, 1094 (1990). Under the ruling in Buie, and officer is only required to have a reasonable belief that the area swept harbors an individual posing a danger to the officer and others. Id. at 1095. Moreover, no one factor is determinative of what is “reasonable.” In Buie, the Supreme Court employed a balancing test, “balancing the intrusion on the individual’s Fourth Amendment interests against its promotion of legitimate governmental interests.” Id. at 1096.
The trend in the United States Circuit Courts appeared to be consistent with the more relaxed standard eventually enunciated by the Buie court. In United States v. Escobar, 805 F.2d 68 (2nd Cir. 1986), the court held that:
Law enforcement officers may conduct a security check — a quick and limited pass through the premises to check for third persons — without a warrant when making an arrest on private premises when they reasonably fear that other persons are lurking within who may pose a threat to their safety or are likely to destroy evidence. . . . [Emphasis added.]
Id. at 71. The 5th Circuit, upholding a sweep search after the defendant had been arrested outside a motel room believed to belong to a friend of the defendant, held that:
Arresting officers have a right to conduct a quick and cursory check of the arrestee’s lodging immediately subsequent to arrest — even if the arrest is made near the door but outside the lodging — where they have reasonable grounds to believe that there are other persons present inside who might present a security risk. [Emphasis supplied.]
*560United States v. Merritt, 882 F.2d 916 (5th Cir. 1989). Finally, in United States v. Standridge, 810 F.2d 1034 (11th Cir. 1987), the court validated a sweep occurring after officers had arrested an armed bank robber, reasoning:
Every arrest must be presumed to present a risk of danger to the arresting officer. [Citation omitted.] Where necessary, police arresting a suspect may conduct a protective sweep of the area to check for other persons who might pose a threat to the safety of the officers of the public. [Citations omitted, emphasis added.]
Id. at 1037.
Indeed, in our own jurisdiction, we upheld a sweep search occurring after the arrest of an armed robbery suspect who was found, unarmed, outside his residence. We there held:
It would have been shoddy and even hazardous police investigation for the officers not to have secured the premises in order to determine whether or not fugitives or armed persons were present.
Johnson v. State, 97 Nev. 621, 624, 637 P.2d 1209, 1211 (1981).
Turning now to the facts of the case before us, deputies of the Carson City Sheriff’s Department (CCSD) arrested appellant Hayes at his residence pursuant to a warrant for possession of stolen property. Earlier the same year, CCSD deputies had encountered resistance from Hayes in seizing an automobile in his possession. Prior to executing the warrant in the instant case, the arresting deputies met to discuss plans for accomplishing the arrest. Although Deputy Kugler did not discuss the possibility of Hayes being armed or other persons being present at the arrest scene, one deputy did mention Hayes’ association with a felon by the name of Don Cisco and related an incident when Hayes had ordered Cisco from his property at gun point.
When the officers arrived at Hayes’ residence, they noticed the presence of several vehicles in the vicinity. They also found a shotgun in the front yard of the premises. Approaching the residence with weapons drawn, the officers rapped on the front door. The door was opened by Hayes, who promptly attempted to retreat back inside the house, but then complied with the order of a deputy to step outside. Hayes was immediately arrested, handcuffed, and taken into custody. At that time, Hayes turned towards the house and started yelling the name “Dawn” (so spelled because subsequent events revealed the presence of Hayes’ girlfriend and co-appellant, Dawn Richmond). In response, two deputies took cover next to the front door because of their stated belief that Hayes was calling for Don Cisco. *561According to the testimony of record, the deputies then entered the residence to secure the premises for their own safety and that of their fellow officers. They quickly scanned the rooms for the presence of third persons. Dawn Richmond was discovered in a back room. During this process, the officers also observed a gun (which proved to be loaded) and contraband in plain view.
After observing the aforementioned evidence of criminal activity, the officers secured the residence and left to obtain a search warrant. In the subsequent search, officers seized contraband in the form of marijuana and methamphetamine, weapons, evidence of drug sales and other evidence indicative of an illicit drug operation. In short, the efforts of the officers produced the most cogent evidence of appellants’ guilt, together with evidence (loaded weapons) of at least the potential for violent behavior by appellants.
In analyzing the reasonableness of the officers’ actions, it is also important to note that the record evidence reflects that prior to the events in question, Hayes had not only been the subject of a criminal investigation for possession of stolen property which resulted in the necessity for physical restraint, but the arresting officers had also been informed that Hayes previously had been arrested for battery. Moreover, at least two of the deputies were aware of the prior incident when Hayes had threateningly shoved a shotgun up the nose of a person he thought to be a snitch. In addition, the CCSD was aware that certain of Hayes’ associates were felons with a history of violence. Armed with this background information, the deputies approached Hayes’ residence with caution and immediately noted numerous vehicles belonging to unknown parties, and a shotgun in the front yard.
Given the circumstances in which the deputies found themselves, I suggest that their decision to perform a sweep search was both eminently reasonable and entirely justified under the case authorities cited above. As the authority cited by the majority declares:
Even if the crime for which the arrest was made is not that serious, a protective search elsewhere in the premises may be warranted because the police suspect others therein are engaged in much more serious conduct, or have good reason to conclude that there are weapons in the premises. [Emphasis added.]
2 LaFave, Search and Seizure § 6.4(c), p. 649.1 suggest that the combination of factors mentioned above — the criminal background of Hayes and his associates, the presence of vehicles indicating a likely prospect of other persons in the residence, the *562shotgun, Hayes’ elusive behavior and his yell to a person named Don (Dawn) — should have led a reasonably cautious and prudent police officer to conduct a protective sweep search.
The majority rejects the State’s position that the deputies formed a reasonable concern for their safety when Hayes shouted back to the house. Instead, they accept the reasoning of the 9th Circuit when it said “[i]t is not unreasonable for an individual to call into his house to his friends or relatives that he is being taken away.” United States v. Basurto, 497 F.2d 781, 790 (9th Cir. 1974). However, the extent to which the 9th Circuit would defer to its ruling in Basurto as a continuing basis for relief is, at the very least, problematical. In the later case of United States v. Gardner, 627 F.2d 906 (9th Cir. 1980), the court widened its scope of permissible warrantless searches upon a showing of “specific and articulable facts which, taken together with the rational inferences from those facts, [would] reasonably warrant [the warrantless] intrusion.” Id. at 910.
Unfortunately, without benefit of the insights gained by the trial judge as the trier of fact in this case, the majority has viewed the cold record and concluded that notwithstanding the judgment of the arresting deputies to the contrary, the officers could not have reasonably believed themselves to be in danger.1 The majority has simply drawn all factual inferences against the deputies concerning the complex of factors existing at the arrest scene upon which the deputies based their judgement. The testimony of the arresting officers has been improperly re-weighed on appeal and found incredible, or this court has substituted its own dispas*563sionate analysis of the potential for danger to a set of circumstances that, in my view, must have given the deputies on the scene ample reason for caution. As we observed in Johnson, I would observe here, that it would have been shoddy and hazardous investigative methodology to have failed to perform an investigative sweep.
If, in fact, the deputies’ fears concerning the possible presence of the felon Cisco (life is replete with examples of yesterday’s enemies being today’s friends) had proved accurate, the equation for violence would have been complete given the quantity of contraband and loaded weapons inside Hayes’ residence. And no police officer should feel compelled to submit to the prospect of gunfire from the rear while exiting an arrest scene.
The majority emphasizes the fact that the officers were only concerned about possibilities, i.e., that a shotgun on the premises could indicate the possibility of other weapons inside the residence (there were), that the presence of numerous automobiles at the residence reflects only a possibility of other criminals inside Hayes’ house (there was a criminal participant inside), despite the fact that Hayes was known to associate with violently disposed felons, and that Hayes’ call to Dawn raised only a possibility that someone other than Dawn Richmond was being alerted. Indeed, the majority even goes so far as suggesting that it is normal for people in Nevada to own shotguns, the apparent message being that law enforcement officers should not be too concerned about the need for caution when a criminally accused who consorts with violent felons possesses such weapons.
It is not without significance that the officers in the instant case, during their swiftly conducted sweep of Hayes’ premises, observed in plain view contraband and a loaded weapon. The officers had, in fact, vindicated their concerns by what was noted during both the protective search and the subsequent, comprehensive search pursuant to the issued warrant. The officers were in the midst of a flowering criminal enterprise supported by loaded weaponry. As stated by the court in United States v. Castillo, 866 F.2d 1071, 1081 (9th Cir. 1988):
If nothing else, this discovery (cocaine, cash, and three loaded handguns) demonstrates the wisdom of this court’s admonition that “ ‘[cjourts must be careful not to use hindsight in limiting the ability of police officers to protect themselves as they carry out missions which routinely incorporate danger.’” Astorga-Torres, 682 F.2d at 1335 (quoting Coates, 495 F.2d at 165).
In Castillo, the arrest was effectuated in the open doorway to a friend’s apartment. Presumably, the officers could have simply *564left the premises with a wary eye directed to their backsides as they departed with the accused. The court, however, did not mention retreat as a necessary consideration, an option, or a preference. It did, however, observe that an arrest near an open doorway, as occurred here, presented greater prospects of danger to officers than one occurring in areas removed from open doorways. More importantly, the court also noted, as part of its analysis in reviewing a trial court’s determination that exigent circumstances existed to justify a warrantless entry into a residence, that:
The trial judge’s findings that certain facts occurred, the weight accorded to the evidence and the credibility of witnesses are reviewed under the deferential, clearly erroneous standard. . . .
Id. at 1079. Under a deferential, clearly erroneous standard, applicable here, I believe the findings of the trial judge who heard the testimony of the officers and determined it to be credible, should be sustained.
Finally, I do not consider the fact that one of the CCSD officers testified that sweep searches were standard procedure should blur this court’s vision of what actually occurred anymore than it did with the trial judge. See, e.g., Castillo, at 1079. It is clear that protective sweep searches may not be sanctioned in the name of standard operating procedure, and if the deputies had no more to offer than that, I would have no difficulty in both condemning such conduct and invalidating the search.
For the reasons noted above, I am compelled to dissent from the ruling of the majority.

 The majority, without deference to the language quoted from other cases in this dissent, merely derives comfort from the fact that the circumstances of the cited cases presented an apparent need for greater caution than the instant case. Moreover, the majority consistently depreciates the validity of the testimony of officers concerning such matters as Hayes’ known association with felons and the fact that Hayes was known to keep weapons in his place of residence. Finally, the majority wrongly concludes that I have inferred that the presence of weapons and contraband somehow justifies an otherwise unlawful search. In the latter regard, I have done nothing more than the 9th Circuit in suggesting that the presence of such items should give courts greater pause in second guessing circumstances as assessed by trained law enforcement officers. See, United States v. Castillo, 866 F.2d 1071, 1081 (9th Cir. 1988).
My major concern with the majority view is that little deference is given to the special expertise, sensibilities, and perceptions of the law enforcement officers, whose business it is to discern between alternatives under stressful and ofttimes perilous conditions. The trial judge heard the officers articulate their reasons for conducting a protective sweep, and I am convinced, as expressed elsewhere in this dissent, that the Buie standards were adequately satisfied, and that the trial judge was perceptive in finding no constitutional misconduct by the officers.