Court Opinion

ID: 9745028
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 22:29:12.949367+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:24:54.912510
License: Public Domain

*1591GAUT, J., Dissenting.
I dissent. I agree with the majority opinion that federal constitutional standards, as expressed in Chimel v. California (1969) 395 U.S. 752, 763 [23 L.Ed.2d 685, 89 S.Ct. 2034], govern appellate review of search and seizure issues. Furthermore, I agree a deferential standard of review applies to the trial court’s ruling on a motion to suppress evidence. (People v. Ayala (2000) 23 Cal.4th 225, 255 [96 Cal.Rptr.2d 682, 1 P.3d 3].) I depart from the majority holding to the extent it concludes substantial evidence supports the trial court’s ruling denying defendant’s motion to suppress the evidence seized from under the motel mattress on the grounds it was within her immediate control at the time of her arrest.
The Fourth Amendment bars the admission of evidence seized during an unlawful search. A search is limited in scope to the area within the suspect’s “ ‘immediate control’—construing that phrase to mean the area from within which he might gain possession of a weapon or destructible evidence.” (Chimel v. California, supra, 395 U.S. at pp. 762-763.) In deciding “whether a warrantless search incident to an arrest exceeded constitutional bounds, a court must ask; was the area in question, at the time it was searched, conceivably accessible to the arrestee—assuming that he was neither ‘an acrobat [nor] a Houdini’?” (United States v. Lyons (D.C. Cir. 1983) 227 U.S. App. D.C. 284 [706 F.2d 321, 330], fn. omitted, citing United States v. Mapp (2d Cir. 1973) 476 F.2d 67, 80.) The factors constituting “immediate control” include: (1) whether the suspect was armed; (2) whether the suspect was handcuffed or otherwise restrained; (3) whether another person might assist the suspect; (4) the accessibility of the area searched; and (5) the police’s physical control over the situation, including numbers of officers at the scene. (Lyons, supra, 706 F.2d at p. 330.)
Here defendant was not armed or suspected to be armed. She was handcuffed, guarded by three sheriff’s deputies, and hardly likely to be helped by her distressed child. Furthermore, the area where the black pouch was discovered, tucked under the mattress, was not accessible to a handcuffed person unless defendant could have lifted the mattress using her cuffed hands and grabbed the pouch with her teeth.
The present case is factually almost identical to United States v. Blue (2d Cir. 1996) 78 F.3d 56, in which federal agents raided an apartment, handcuffed Blue in a prone position on the floor and then performed a security search. During the search, the agents lifted a mattress and discovered a *1592machine gun and ammunition clip. (Id. at p. 58.) The appellate court reversed the trial court’s determination the area was within the immediate reach of a codefendant because the suspects were handcuffed and at least two feet away from the bed and guarded by several agents. The court concluded: “Given the small size of the one-room apartment and the fact that [defendants] were secured during the entire time in question, there was no possibility that either one of them could reach deep into the interior of the bed without being stopped by Agent Fernandez or one of the other agents.” (Id. at p. 60; see also United States v. Cueto (5th Cir. 1980) 611 F.2d 1056; United States v. Bonitz (10th Cir. 1987) 826 F.2d 954; Lyons, supra, 760 F.2d at p. 330.)
The present case is not factually similar to People v. Summers (1999) 73 Cal.App.4th 288 [86 Cal.Rptr.2d 388]. In that case, police served Summers, who lived in a small trailer, with an arrest warrant. Accompanied by Summers’s female companion, the police awoke him as he slept. Summers identified himself, stood up, put on his pants, and was handcuffed by one officer while the other kept an eye on the woman and watched for the possible return of another absent male occupant of the trailer. One officer escorted Summers toward the door while the other patted down the bed where he had been sleeping. As the officer moved the pillow, he saw a sawed-off shotgun between the mattress and the headboard. When the shotgun was first observed, Summers was roughly 10 feet away.
In deciding the seizure of the gun was lawful, the Summers court commented: “When discovered, the gun was within the immediate area of the still-being-removed arrestee, there was a female present who was not previously known to the officers, and there was another male roommate somewhere nearby whose presence away from the immediate premises had not yet been confirmed. ...[]□... This was not a cold arrest scene with a long-gone suspect. He was still being removed from the cramped premises; one roommate was present and free of police control, and another was unaccounted for when the weapon was chanced upon. This was a fluid situation in close quarters; and a court could properly find, as we do, that the circumstances . justified reasonable precautions for the safety of everyone involved. . . . The warrantless seizure of the weapon a few minutes later while the premises were still under the lawful control of the officers was . . . lawful.” (Summers, supra, 73 Cal.App.4th at pp. 290-291.)
*1593The same justifications did not exist here. Only one adult, the handcuffed defendant, was present. She could not reach the hidden contraband. There is no evidence the distraught child posed a threat to anyone. No gun was involved. Simply put, there were no circumstances justifying “reasonable precautions for the safety of everyone involved.” The evidence of the seized contraband should have been suppressed.
Appellant’s petition for review by the Supreme Court was denied October 12, 2005.