Court Opinion

ID: 9448348
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-03 23:32:52.2545+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:31:23.782352
License: Public Domain

SOBELOFF, Chief Judge
(dissenting).
When an important constitutional question arises in a “sordid little case,” it is as necessary to decide it correctly as if the case were a big one, for the precedent laid down will be cited in later decisions. Moreover, in sanctioning search of a house, the rule prescribed may influence officers’ conduct in situations affecting not only the depraved but the innocent. Because I think the court’s decision widens beyond permissible limits the scope of searches incident to lawful arrest, I feel obliged to dissent.
The court’s opinion begins with an acknowledgment of the correct rule of law, but fails to apply it. There is a clear distinction between merely evidentiary materials, which may not be seized, and certain limited categories of articles which may be taken. The latter group consists of the instrumentalities and fruits of crime, weapons, and contraband, the possession of which is itself illegal. These categories have been strictly defined and should not be expanded. One example of the application of this rule is found in United States v. Lefkowitz, 285 U.S. 452, 52 S.Ct. 420 (1932), where federal prohibition agents searched an office as an incident to a lawful arrest, and seized record books, memoranda, envelopes and other papers. Mr. Justice Butler for a unanimous Supreme Court held that the seizure violated the Fourth Amendment because the “papers were wanted by the officers solely for use as evidence of crime of which respondents were accused or suspected.” 285 U.S. at 464, 52 S.Ct. at 423. The Court restated the rule, originally expressed in Boyd v. United States, 116 U.S. 616, 623-24, 6 S.Ct. 524 (1886), in the following language :
“The decisions of this court distinguish searches of one’s house, office, papers or effects merely to get evidence to convict him of crime, *97from searches such as those made to find stolen goods for return to the owner, to take property that has been forfeited to the government, to discover property concealed to avoid payment of duties for which it is liable, and from searches such as those made for the seizure of countei’feit coins, burglars’ tools, gambling paraphernalia and illicit liquor in order to prevent the commission of crime.” 285 U.S. at 465-466, 52 S.Ct. at 423.
Although in Harris v. United States, 331 U.S. 145, 67 S.Ct. 1098 (1947), the Court upheld a seizure of altered selective service cards on the ground that possession of them was itself a crime, the Court, speaking through Chief Justice Vinson, was at pains to repeat the rule in the following terms:
“This Court has frequently recognized the distinction between merely evidentiary materials, on the one hand, which may not be seized either under the authority of a search warrant or during the course of a search incident to arrest, and on the other hand, those objects which may validly be seized including the instrumentalities and means by which a crime is committed, the fruits of crime such as stolen property, weapons by which escape of the person arrested might be effected, and property the possession of which is a crime.” 331 U.S. at 154, 67 S.Ct. at 1103.
For similar expressions of this rule, see Abel v. United States, 362 U.S. 217, 237-239, 80 S.Ct. 683 (1960); United States v. Rabinowitz, 339 U.S. 56, 64 n. 6, 70 S.Ct. 430 (1950); Gouled v. United States, 255 U.S. 298, 309, 41 S.Ct. 261 (1921).
The court here views the guest check receipts which were seized by the arresting officers, not as evidentiary materials, but as “instrumentalities of the crime,” relying for this upon Marron v. United States, 275 U.S. 192, 48 S.Ct. 74 (1927). There, Mr. Justice Butler, speaking for the Court, did depart from the rule in Boyd v. United States, supra, and approved the seizure by federal prohibition agents of bills and ledger books as an incident to the arrest of the operators of a “speakeasy.” If that case still represented the law, it might lend support to the court’s conclusion.1 However, the Marron decision has been subjected to devitalizing qualifications in subsequent cases. Only four years later, in Go-Bart Importing Co. v. United States, 282 U.S. 344, 51 S.Ct. 153 (1931), an opinion also from the pen of Mr. Justice Butler emphasized that the Marrón decision was exceptional because in that case the seized materials were immediately visible to the federal agents and because there was no general rummaging in search for them. 282 U.S. at 358, 51 S.Ct. at 153. Accordingly, in Go-Bart the Supreme Court invalidated the search and seizure of record books and private papers. And the following year, in United States v. Lefkowitz, 285 U.S. 452, 52 S.Ct. 420 (1932), Mr. Justice Butler found additional reasons to limit Marrón: the crime of possessing illegal liquor was presently being carried on at the time of the arrest in the Marrón ease, and the seized records were at that very moment being used in the execution of the crime. 285 U.S. at 465, 52 S.Ct. at 420. In light of these two later cases, it is apparent that Marrón has been severely damaged, if not destroyed, as authority for a general rule that would treat records as instrumentalities of crime.
One can readily perceive the justification for. Mr. Justice Butler’s deliberate narrowing of Marrón and return to Boyd and Gouled. There is a strong public *98interest, altogether unrelated to facilitating the conviction of the arrested person, for permitting seizure of the classes of articles mentioned in the rule as stated in the Lefkowitz and Harris cases. For example, stolen property may be seized to effectuate its speedy return to the real owners. Weapons may be taken to prevent the escape of the arrested person. The purpose in seizing the instrumentality by which the crime was committed is to prevent its possible use in the commission of additional crimes. Illegally possessed property may be taken for the same reason.
None of the above reasons applies to the guest check receipts involved in the present case. It is indeed difficult to see how these papers, if the officers had not taken possession of them, could possibly be used to perpetrate further crimes. Yet this is the sole justification for seizing the instrumentalities of a crime in the face of the Fourth Amendment’s prohibitions.
In addition, I am at a loss to comprehend how these receipts are “instrumentalities of the crime” as these words are normally understood. The crime with which these defendants are charged is the transportation of a woman in interstate commerce for immoral purposes. The guest checks were introduced as documentary proof of the immoral practices of this prosecutrix and other waitresses. The checks themselves played no role in the unlawful interstate transportation. Nor is there anything illegal or immoral in possessing these receipts. Being merely records of illicit activities, and not the means by which they were done, these receipts are distinctly outside the category of items the law permits to be seined.
The pieces of paper in question were desired by the officers, and in the circumstances could be desired, solely for use as evidence, and the officers had no other possible interest in them. Although made as an incident to a lawful arrest, a search and seizure that can have no other motivation, is condemned by the law. Apparently, not even a search warrant could validly issue for such a purpose. See Harris v. United States, 331 U.S. 145, 154, 67 S.Ct. 1098 (1947); Gouled v. United States, 255 U. S. 298, 309, 41 S.Ct. 261 (1921). The law makes this restriction, not out of solicitude for culprits, but to protect innocent persons against excessive searches and seizures. Understandably, the restriction becomes irksome when the direct beneficiary is an unsavory character accused of a base crime; the temptation is strong to relax the rule’s enforcement. Yet, unless we are prepared to accord even to such a person the protection of the Fourth Amendment, it cannot be preserved for the more deserving.
For these reasons, I would reverse and remand for a new trial.

. Even if tile Marrón decision stood alone, it does not altogether fit this case, for in Marrón one feature which the Court stressed was that the conspiracy was actively in progress in the officers’ presence. Whatever the force, as a matter of logic, this circumstance may possess, it is pertinent to point out that in our case the interstate journey and the purpose for which it was undertaken had definitely ended.