Court Opinion

ID: 9790473
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 01:53:30.749648+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:37:29.786608
License: Public Domain

Agid, J.
I respectfully dissent. The analysis of "voluntariness” as applied to a consent to search in Schneckloth v. Bustamante, 412 U.S. 218, 93 S. Ct. 2041, 36 L. Ed. 2d 854 (1973), is based entirely on the identical concept in the context "of determining whether in fact the confessions in issue had been 'voluntarily’ given. It is to that body of case law to which we turn for initial guidance on the meaning of 'voluntariness’ in the present [consent to search] context.” 412 U.S. at 223-24 (emphasis added; footnote omitted). While the Court adhered to the general totality-of-the-circumstances test as enunciated by the California Supreme Court, it never strayed from the analysis of voluntariness articulated in the confession cases. "As with police questioning, two competing concerns must be accommodated in determining the meaning of a 'voluntary’ consent—the legitimate need for such searches and the equally important requirement of assuring the absence of coercion.” Id. at 227 (emphasis added). The Court summarized its approach to analyzing the voluntariness of a consent to search: "In sum, there is no reason for us to depart in the area of consent searches, from the traditional definition of 'voluntariness.’ ” Id. at 229. Nowhere does the Schneckloth court deviate from the requirement that, to be involuntary, a consent search must be the product of at least some police coercion.
This approach is entirely consistent with the decision in Colorado v. Connelly, 479 U.S. 157, 107 S. Ct. 515, 93 L. Ed. 2d 473 (1986), which the majority seeks to distinguish. Noting that the concept of voluntariness, in all its elusive iterations, is based on the Due Process Clause and notions of fundamental fairness, 479 U.S. at 163, the Court held that "[a]bsent police conduct causally related to the confes*666sion, there is simply no basis for concluding that any state actor has deprived a criminal defendant of due process of law.” Id. at 164 (footnote omitted). The Connelly Court went on to specifically reject the concept the majority relies on here. Recognizing that more subtle forms of police "persuasion” have led to a greater focus in the voluntariness analysis on the defendant’s mental condition, the court nonetheless held that "this fact does not justify a conclusion that a defendant’s mental condition, by itself and apart from its relation to official coercion, should ever dispose of the inquiry into constitutional 'voluntariness.’ ” Id. at 164. After rejecting Connelly’s analysis of two cases he asserted found involuntariness on the basis of mental state alone, the Court said, "These two cases demonstrate that while mental condition is surely relevant to an individual’s susceptibility to police coercion, mere examination of the confessant’s state of mind can never conclude the due process inquiry.” Id. at 165. The Court reasoned that, without some police coercion, there is no state action on which to base a violation of the Due Process Clause. The Connelly Court summarized its holding: "We hold that coercive police activity is a necessary predicate to the finding that a confession is not 'voluntary’ within the meaning of the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.” Id. at 167.
In our case, the trial court specifically found that there was no police coercion at all associated with Sondergaard’s consent to search her purse. The definition of voluntariness for Due Process Clause purposes is the same whether the issue is a consensual search or a confession. Because both the Schneckloth and Connelly courts require at least some hint of police coercion as a prerequisite to excluding evidence, I would reverse the trial court and remand the case for trial.
Review denied at 133 Wn.2d 1030 (1998).