Court Opinion

ID: 9755772
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 20:49:51.91188+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:28:11.044858
License: Public Domain

O’HERN, J.,
dissenting.
“Certain fundamental propositions bear restatement at the outset. The Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution requires the approval of an impartial judicial officer based on probable cause before most searches may be undertaken. E.g., Chambers v. Maroney, 399 U.S. 42, 51, 90 S.Ct. 1975, 1981, 26 L.Ed.2d 419, 428, reh. den., 400 U.S. 856, 91 S.Ct. 23, 27 L.Ed.2d 94 (1970). The same holds true for Article 1, paragraph 7 of the New Jersey Constitution. State v. Ercolano, 79 N.J. 25, 41-42 [397 A.2d 1062] (1979), and cases cited therein. The warrant requirement of these provisions may be dispensed with in only a few narrowly circumscribed exceptions. The prima facie invalidity of any warrantless search is overcome only if that search falls within one of the specific exceptions created by the United States Supreme Court. Ercolano, supra, 79 N.J. at 42 [397 A.2d 1062], Where, as here, the State seeks to validate a warrantless search, it bears the burden of bringing it within one of those exceptions. State v. Sims, 75 N.J. 337, 352 [382 A.2d 638] (1978).” [State v. Esteves, 93 N.J. 498, 503, 461 A.2d 1128 (1983) (quoting State v. Patino, 83 N.J. 1, 7, 414 A.2d 1327 (1980)).]
“The problem with this case is that the search fits neatly into no category, although arguably fitting into several.” Ibid.
In analyzing the validity of warrantless searches and here a warrantless entry, “the strands of constitutional exceptions to the Fourth Amendment must be kept untangled.” State v. Welsh, 84 N.J. 346, 354, 419 A.2d 1123 (1980). The Court strains to fit this case into one of the specific exceptions created by the United States Supreme Court. The Appellate Division correctly concluded that the case simply does not fit into any of the recognized exceptions. I add only these observations.
Only recently we had occasion to consider a case, State v. Lewis, 116 N.J. 477, 561 A.2d 1153 (1989), almost identical in context except that the controlled buy was made by an undercover agent of the police rather than by a law-enforcement officer. In that case we reemphasized the heavy burden that must be overcome to justify a warrantless entry into a home:
*120“As the United States Supreme Court has acknowledged, ‘physical entry of the home is the chief evil against which the wording of the Fourth Amendment is directed.’ United States v. United States Dist. Court, 407 U.S. 297, 313 [92 S.Ct. 2125, 2134] 32 L.Ed.2d 752, 764 (1972). Accordingly, it is well established that ‘searches and seizures inside a home without a warrant are presumptively unreasonable,’ Payton v. New York, 445 U.S. 573, 586 [100 S.Ct. 1371, 1380] 63 L.Ed.2d 639, 651 (1980), and hence ‘prohibited by the Fourth Amendment, absent probable cause and exigent circumstances.’ Welsh v. Wisconsin, 466 U.S. 740, 749 [104 S.Ct. 2091, 2097] 80 L.Ed.2d 732, 743 (1984).” [Id. at 483, 561 A.2d 1153 (quoting State v. Hutchins, 116 N.J. 457, 463, 561 A.2d 1142 (1989)).]
We reviewed in Hutchins, supra, 116 N.J. 457, 561 A.2d 1142, the companion case of Lewis, the limited number of situations that have been categorized as exigent circumstances sufficient to overcome the warrant requirement. Among them are the hot pursuit of a fleeing armed felon, which is inapplicable here; the avoidance of serious injury to police officers or others; and the potential destruction of evidence. Id. at 464, 561 A.2d 1142.
In Hutchins, we set forth criteria for testing the validity of warrantless home entries in drug cases on the basis of exigent circumstances as drawn from the Third Circuit’s decision in United States v. Rubin, 474 F.2d 262, cert. denied sub nom., Agran v. United States, 414 U.S. 833, 94 S.Ct. 173, 38 L.Ed.2d 68 (1973):
“(1) the degree of urgency involved and the amount of time necessary to obtain a warrant; (2) reasonable belief that the contraband is about to be removed; (3) the possibility of danger to police officers guarding the site of the contraband while a search warrant is sought; (4) information indicating the possessors of the contraband are aware that the police are on their trail, and (5) the ready destructibility of the contraband and the knowledge ‘that efforts to dispose of narcotics and to, escape are characteristic behavior of persons engaged in the narcotics traffic.’” [116 N.J. at 465-66, 561 A.2d 1142 (quoting Rubin, supra, 474 F.2d at 268-69) (citations omitted).]
In Lewis, supra, 116 N.J. 477, 561 A.2d 1153, while considering the possibility of dangers to police officers guarding the site of the contraband while a search warrant is sought, we found that the circumstances presented “no practical impediment to the officers’ securing the premises and maintaining surveillance until a written or telephonic warrant was procured.” Id. at 488, 561 A.2d 1153. We emphasized that we are not trying to “second-guess police officers, but rather to establish guidelines within which objective*121ly-reasonable police action can be sustained.” Ibid. Obviously the officers in this case could not have known about the Court’s 1989 decision in Lewis at the time of this search in 1987. Nonetheless, we judge searches by whether they are objectively reasonable, not whether the officers were acting in good faith. This case is simply too close to the mold of Lewis for me to find a significant distinction, and thus I believe the Appellate Division correctly resolved the exigent-circumstances issue.
I am not satisfied that “consent once removed,” ante at 115, 627 A2d at 130, resolves the issue because that concept also could have been applied in the Lewis and Hutchins cases. In both eases the police had been informed that a person inside a house was dealing drugs. In both cases the police knocked on the door and the door was opened. On learning that the people at the door were police officers Hutchins ran and Lewis tried to shut the door. In neither case did we describe the opening of the door after the prior consensual admission of a police agent as involving a consent once removed, nor did we attempt to justify the searches on the basis that the premises had become a retail store for the sale of drugs. The case of Lewis v. United States, 385 U.S. 206, 87 S.Ct. 424, 17 L.Ed.2d 312 (1966), on which the majority relies, involved only evidence obtained from two buys that had occurred in the defendant’s home on a specific invitation and not evidence seized pursuant to a warrantless entry of the home. No evidence in that case was obtained without the consent of the defendant. The equivalent in this case would be to admit in evidence the drugs originally purchased by the officer.
The majority opinion could be read as suggesting that a purchase of drugs could turn every home into a retail store for the sale of drugs and that any subsequent search and seizure could be justified under a consent-once-removed analysis. That approach would make obtaining a warrant unnecessary whenever the police or an agent have purchased drugs and the door is subsequently opened. Thus, our decision in State v. Novembrino, 105 N.J. 95, 519 A.2d 820 (1987), would become either moot or irrelevant to the *122extent that it required a warrant based on probable cause before entry into premises where a drug transaction has taken place.
Some years ago, Justice Potter Stewart said that one of the problems with Fourth Amendment jurisprudence was that the Supreme Court had been unable to establish clear lines that could guide conduct of police officers. Potter Stewart, The Road to Mapp v. Ohio and Beyond: The Origins, Development and Future of the Exclusionary Rule in Search-and-Seizure Cases, 83 Colum.L.Rev. 1365,1393 (1983). Our Court adds to that confusion in this case by its well-intentioned desire to create another exception to the warrant requirement. We might do better to emulate the Utah Supreme Court, which has attempted to simplify its search and seizure rules so that they may be more easily followed by the police and courts and at the same time provide the public with consistent and predictable protection against unreasonable searches and seizures. See State v. LaRocco, 794 P.2d 460 (1990). That court ruled:
This can be accomplished by eliminating some of the confusing exceptions to the warrant requirement * * *. * * * [WJarrantless searches will be permitted only where they satisfy their traditional justification, namely, to protect the safety of police or the public or to prevent the destruction of evidence. [/A at 469-70 (citations omitted).]
Obviously the case would be different had the police officer made the arrest when the buy was concluded and called for the backup team to enter. Avoidance of serious injury to officers is a recognized basis for an exception to the warrant requirement. To obtain a warrant in the circumstances of this case would not have increased the risk of serious injury to the police. Nor does the record suggest that the drug offenders were in any way aware of the police presence and were likely to destroy or remove the evidence. The warrantless entry to arrest for a drug offense did not meet the requirements of our decisions in Hutchins and Lewis. Therefore, I would affirm the judgment of the Appellate Division.
CLIFFORD and POLLOCK, JJ., join in this opinion.
*123For reversal and reinstatement — Chief Justice WILENTZ, and Justices HANDLER, GARIBALDI and STEIN — 4.
For affirmance — Justices CLIFFORD, POLLOCK and O’HERN — 3.