Court Opinion

ID: 9592857
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 00:17:35.934455+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:15:34.619530
License: Public Domain

HEFFERNAN, CHIEF JUSTICE
(dissenting). The majority concludes that, because the language of our constitution is similar to the United States Constitution, we are reduced to following the United States Supreme Court through every permutation it takes in its twisting and tortuous ratiocination of the application of the fourth amendment. Because I disagree with both this result and this methodology, I dissent. .
In this case, Tompkins was thought to have drugs in his car. Under the circumstances of this case, the police had probable cause for that belief. However, I disagree that probable cause, alone, suffices to allow a warrantless search of a car. Under long standing Wisconsin constitutional doctrine, if the arresting state agents were faced with exigent circumstances, their warrantless search would be constitutionally acceptable. However, there is no question that the agents here were not faced with exigent circumstances, but nevertheless proceeded to their warrant-less search. Under these circumstances, under accepted Wisconsin law, I would hold the search unreasonable and would reverse and remand for a new trial.
The defendant in this case is Henry L. Tompkins (Tompkins). Under the state’s theory of the case, Tompkins was the supplier of cocaine to Lyons, a drug dealer, with whom state undercover agents made arrangements to purchase one-half pound of cocaine. On the day of the intended deal, Lyons informed Mendez, a state undercover agent, that he was having difficulty in making contact with his source, later identified as Tompkins. On the day of the intended *143transfer, Lyons was under the constant surveillance of other state agents. After stopping at various places, apparently in an effort to locate his source, Lyons finally rendezvoused with Tompkins at a shopping mall parking lot. Lyons left the car in which he was a passenger and entered the pick-up truck driven by Tompkins. He remained in Tompkins’ truck for several minutes, returned to the car in which he had been a passenger, and went to the Holiday Inn, where he had agreed to meet Mendez to deliver the cocaine.
Upon delivery of one-quarter pound of cocaine, Mendez arrested Lyons. Lyons had explained that his source had told him that he would deliver only a one-quarter pound of cocaine at a time and that Lyons should return for the balance. There is no dispute that, at the time of the transfer to Lyons, the undelivered one-quarter pound of cocaine was either on Tompkins’ person or in Tompkins’ truck and that Lyons was told that, after the delivery of the first quarter pound to his customer, he could return for the balance.
Upon the arrest of Lyons, the agents who had been following the Tompkins’ pick-up truck were directed to arrest Tompkins. After the delivery of cocaine to Lyons in the mall parking lot, these agents saw Tompkins go to a gas station, where he went inside of the building for three or four minutes. He then drove to Egger’s Tavern. After Tompkins was in the tavern for about fifteen minutes, he was placed under arrest. Tompkins was "patted down” in the bar and then was asked to step outside. He was there handcuffed and was read., his rights pursuant to Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436 (1966).
This body search produced keys which fit the pick-up truck Tompkins had been driving. By this *144time there were five state agents at the scene in separate automobiles surrounding the driverless, parked, and locked pick-up truck. The agents, using the key, made an immediate search of the pick-up truck and found a small box, which contained one-quarter pound of cocaine in plastic bags.
Tompkins moved to suppress the evidence produced by this search. The circuit judge denied the motion, because, he concluded, the search of the truck was incident to the arrest and, in any event, the cocaine inevitably would have been discovered by lawful means. The circuit judge determined that, irrespective of the theory of the search, there was probable cause for a search of the truck.
The circuit judge found as a fact that there was ample time to obtain a warrant. Thus, the agents’ next move ought to have been to obtain one. Instead, the agents entered the car and searched it, finding the incriminating evidence. The majority upholds this warrantless search and states that mere probable cause suffices to justify this result. The majority holds that there is no requirement for exigent circumstances in a probable cause, warrantless-search situation. This holding is contrary to the spirit and plain meaning of our constitution.
The Wisconsin Constitution states:
"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects against unreasonable searches and seizures shall not be violated; and no warrant shall issue but upon probable cause_” Wis. Const, art. I, sec. 11.
"Effects” in this context is used in the sense of "movable property.” Thus, there can be no argument that the Wisconsin Constitution was not intended to *145apply to vehicle searches. Cars, houses, persons, and papers are all protected under our constitution.
This constitutional provision was not intended to prevent all searches. It was intended to prevent only "unreasonable” searches and seizures. Thus, the question is whether the search and the seizure here were "unreasonable.” The issue of under what circumstances a warrantless search of a car is to be considered "unreasonable” has generated a whole line of jurisprudence — both under the Wisconsin Constitution and under the forth amendment provision of the United States Constitution. It is on this "reasonableness” ground that car searches may be distinguished from home, person, or paper searches.
The original case which examined this question, and which established the car-related, exigent-circumstances-exception doctrine under the United States Constitution, was Carroll v. United States, 267 U.S. 132 (1925). In that case, the Supreme Court held that, where a car was moving down an open highway and was subsequently waved down and stopped by prohibition agents who had probable cause to believe the car contained bootlegged alcohol, the subsequent warrant-less search of the car was reasonable and, hence, permissible. The rationale advanced was that, under the circumstances — a moving car on an open highway — the officers could not have obtained a warrant before the car had passed. Thus, the Court held:
"[T]he guaranty of freedom from unreasonable searches and seizures ... has been construed ... as recognizing a necessary difference between a search of a store, dwelling house or other structure in respect of which a proper official warrant readily may be obtained, and a search of a ship, motor boat, wagon or automobile, for contraband *146goods, where it is not practicable to secure a warrant because the vehicle can be quickly moved out of the locality or jurisdiction in which the warrant must be sought.” Carroll, 267 U.S. at 153.
The upshot of this reasoning was a holding that, under the exigent circumstances of a moving and movable car, probable cause would justify a warrant-less automobile search. Thus, the exigent-circumstances rationale was an exception to the warrant requirement, carved out because the warrant requirement was fatally impracticable in the context of a search of an only-temporarily-stopped car. The reasoning of that case was that a car possessed special attributes which made "reasonableness” for car searches subject to a different test than that for house searches. This reasoning does not, however, eliminate constitutional protection for cars.
This court accepted the exigent-circumstances exception into Wisconsin law in many cases, among which are: Wilder v. Miller, 190 Wis. 136, 208 N.W. 865 (1926), in which this court accepted the reasoning of the Carroll Court as specifically applicable to art. I, sec. 11, of the Wisconsin Constitution — a matter especially notable in light of the fact that the analogous United States constitutional provision is never cited; State v. Leadbetter, 210 Wis. 327, 246 N.W. 443 (1933), a case in which Carroll is again explicitly accepted into Wisconsin constitutional law; and, of recent vintage, State v. Friday, 140 Wis. 2d 701, 412 N.W.2d 540 (Ct. App. 1987), a case in which the attorney general argued that, under the exigent-circumstances doctrine, the search was valid. For more than sixty years since Carroll, the exigent-circumstances doctrine has been entrenched as a proper exception to the warrant requirement under art. I, *147sec. 11, of the Wisconsin Constitution and, as recently as last year, was recognized as such by the attorney general in cases before Wisconsin appellate courts.1
It should be remembered that the doctrine of exigent circumstances is based on a belief that enforcement officials ought not be limited in their police functions by requiring a warrant when, under the circumstances, evidence would disappear or guilty persons would escape if a search could not be made immediately. It is doctrine that, under the constitu*148tional guidelines, permits a search when it is reasonable not to require a warrant. It is a legal device designed to aid law enforcement officers. Under emergency circumstances, the need for a search is "exigent,” i.e., there is a necessity for immediate action, for, if the search is not performed immediately, there will never be an opportunity to search at all. In the circumstances here, however, there was no need for an immediate search to preserve the evidence. The search as conducted here was "unreasonable.” A warrant could have been readily obtained, and the circuit judge found as a fact that it was practicable for the officer in this case to obtain a warrant and yet ensure that the drugs would not be removed. No need for the application of the exigent-circumstances doctrine arose in this case.
This long-standing, jurisprudentially sound practice of following the exigent circumstances doctrine in vehicle search cases should continue. The exigent-circumstances doctrine is clear; it has the benefit of a long line of interpretive cases in this jurisdiction; it draws a bright line; and it is consistent with the requirement that searches and seizures be "reasonable.” Further, as this court stated recently: "War-rantless searches are per se unreasonable .... There are but few exceptions to this basic tenet of constitutional law, and to come within one of them it must be shown ... that the exigencies of the situation rendered a warrantless search imperative.” State v. Wisumierski, 106 Wis. 2d 722, 737-38, 317 N.W.2d 484 (1982). See also State v. Donovan, 91 Wis. 2d 401, 408, 283 N.W.2d 431 (Ct. App. 1979).2
*149The majority, however, believes that Wisconsin should abandon the exigent-circumstances requirement. The majority believes that we should adopt the federal law currently in vogue and hold that probable cause alone should suffice to render warrantless car searches constitutional. Thus, the majority, concluding that the exigent-circumstances doctrine presently is not the applicable automobile search law under federal decision, holds that, because art. I, sec. 11, of the Wisconsin Constitution is the same as the United States Constitution, fourth amendment, "[b]ut for a few inconsequential differences in punctuation, capitalization and the use of the singular or plural form of a word,” the two constitutional provisions ought to be construed identically. Op. at 130-131. The rationale offered to support this reasoning is that, if Wisconsin’s provision and the federal provision were differently construed, confusion would be generated by the different standards. Op. at 131-132.
The majority in this case rejects the firmly established exigent-circumstances doctrine on three grounds: First, that under the United States Constitution, the exigent-circumstances doctrine is, for the moment dead; second, that, because of the similarity between the Wisconsin and the United States Constitutions, the United States Constitution automatically informs and definitively elucidates ours; and, third, that, because of the possibility for confusion should the standards differ, the standards should be identical. I find all of these reasons unpersuasive.
In the first place, as a matter of very recent history, the Supreme Court has been anything but *150clear on the issue of whether exigent circumstances are required before a warrantless car search will be upheld. Over the years, that court has issued conflicting pronouncements on whether exigent circumstances were required. Thus, in the 1970 case of Chambers v. Maroney, 399 U.S. 42 (1970), the court effectively held that exigent circumstances were no longer required, but that probable cause, standing alone, would suffice (id. at 51-52), while in the 1971 case of Coolidge v. New Hampshire, 403 U.S. 443 (1971), a plurality of the court held that, where there is probable cause but no exigent circumstances, a warrantless search may not be undertaken. Id. at 468.
However, even as the Court was debating whether exigent circumstances were required, the Court was also attenuating the question of what constituted exigent circumstances. Thus, in a series of cases, the Court held that the mere fact of a car’s inherent mobility could constitute exigent circumstances, especially where the car would have to be left unguarded before a warrant could be obtained. Cf. Cady v. Dombrowski, 413 U.S. 433 (1973).
The confusing, contradictory stance of the Supreme Court on whether exigent circumstances were required continued through the case of Cardwell v. Lewis, 417 U.S. 583 (1974). There, the Court for the first time announced a new focus: The "reduced expectation of privacy.” Under this newly struck-upon rationale for upholding theretofore illegal warrantless searches, the Court held that, while there may be an expectation of privacy to the interior, or some portion of the interior, of a car (id. at 591), there is no such expectation in the exterior of a car. Soon, however, the Court was saying that the interior deserved very little *151privacy protection either.3 California v. Carney, 471 U.S. 386 (1985).
The majority is well aware that the continued evolution of federal search-and-seizure law is affected by the composition of the United States Supreme Court at a particular time. As demonstrated above, this variability has led the United States Supreme Court to different interpretations over the course of only a few years. This, not a state court’s resort to fundamental principles of freedom and to its own intelligence, is what has created uncertainty and confusion. Therefore, in addition to disagreeing with the majority on the need to follow the will-o’-the-wisp interpretations of the United States Supreme Court, I also disagree with the majority that adhering to the well understood and soundly based exigent-circumstances exception will lead to confusion because it would require us to interpret our constitution differently than the United States Constitution. On the contrary, it seems to me that, when the decisions of the United States Supreme Court are concededly variable and unstable, this court should accept that as a reason to refuse to adopt them as precedent for this state.
*152Finally, the most compelling reason for rejecting the federal precedent in this matter is that the reasoning of these Supreme Court cases is suspect. Even the attorney general, in the oral arguments at which it urged the federal cases upon this court, conceded the reasoning of those cases "is thin,” and "thin” it is.
The cases shift in their focus from one unsatisfactory rationale to another. "Exigent circumstances” becomes attenuated to "inherent mobility,” and "inherent mobility” is overshadowed by "expectation of privacy.”4 In the process the clear constitutional mandate that "[t]he right of the people to be secure in their ... effects against unreasonable searches and seizures” is ignored. In other words, the current crop of United States cases goes far beyond stating what is reasonable or unreasonable in the context of warrant-less car searches and actually eliminates automobiles from all constitutional protections whatsoever. While this is, for the moment, apparently acceptable under the United States Constitution, it is unacceptable under the Wisconsin Constitution.
For these reasons, I would hold that the law in Wisconsin now is the same as the law in Wisconsin has been for over sixty years: That the exception to the Wisconsin constitutional mandate that a warrant *153must be obtained for a car search can apply only when the investigating agents are faced with exigent circumstances. I would reject the invitation to accept as law the "probable cause alone” modification of the exigent-circumstances exception to the warrant requirement. While this is not the case to define what the boundaries of the exigent-circumstances doctrine are (because there were no exigent circumstances here), it is the case to reaffirm that the doctrine exists. Under it, I would hold that, where, as here, the presence of five agents, each in his own car, makes that exception inapplicable, the evidence seized without a warrant should be suppressed as the result of a search unlawful under art. I, sec. 11, of the Wisconsin Constitution. We should not abandon the stability and rationality of our understandable Wisconsin decisions for the confused and fluctuating reasoning presently employed by the federal courts. Adherence to the fundamental principles of federalism explicit in the Constitutions of the United States and of this state requires state judges, in conformity with their oaths of office, to strive for decisions based on state law that will not vary with the vagaries of the United States Supreme Court.5 Under our federal system we are judges of an independent jurisprudential governmental entity. We should not react to every nuance and *154mutation emanating from Washington, D.C. I dissent because effective law enforcement could have been served just as well had the officers followed the time-honored precepts of Wisconsin constitutional law, which also protect the rights of citizens by interposing the exercise of judicial discretion before there can be a search or a seizure in non-exigent circumstances.
I am authorized to state that JUSTICES ABRA-HAMSON and BABLITCH join in this dissent.

The majority erroneously asserts to the contrary that Wisconsin law for over sixty years has permitted a search on probable cause alone with no showing of exigent circumstances. Four cases are pertinent to the question: Hoyer v. State, 180 Wis. 407, 193 N.W. 89 (1923); Wilder v. Miller, 190 Wis. 136, 208 N.W. 865 (1926); Wyss v. State, 192 Wis. 619, 213 N.W. 318 (1927); and State v. Leadbetter, 210 Wis. 327, 246 N.W. 443 (1933). Hoyer, of course, simply held that a warrant was required, although it was conceded that the situation was one that would have justified the issuance of a warrant. Wilder, irrespective of the language therein, involved a search of an abandoned vehicle, and this court’s opinion did not test the viability of the search had the owner moved for suppression of evidence. Wilder posed the question of deodand— the forfeiture to the state of a vehicle carrying contraband. It is noteworthy, however, that Carroll v. United States, 267 U.S. 132 (1925), is quoted as authority — a case that clearly, despite language taken out of context, requires exigent circumstances as well as probable cause. Wyss v. State, a case relied upon by the state, is equally inapposite to the assertion. The owner of licensed premises parked a vehicle loaded with contraband liquor on the licensed premises, when the conditions of the license permitted a search of the premises without consent and without a warrant. State v. Leadbetter also relies upon the Carroll rationale, i.e., "it is not practicable to secure a warrant because the vehicle can be quickly moved out of the locality or jurisdiction in which the warrant must be sought.” Leadbetter, at 329. None of the cases relied upon by the majority stand for the naked proposition that, as a matter of law, probable cause plus an automobile ipso facto justifies a search.

"[T]he warrant requirement in our system of justice must not be bullied aside by extravagant claims of necessity.” California v. *149Carney, 471 U.S. 386, 401 (1985) (emphasis supplied), Stevens, J., dissenting.

A reduced, almost minimalist expection of privacy bodes ill for the continued health of a vigorous requirement for probable cause. This is because as soon as "reduced expectation” becomes de facto no right of privacy (which is happening even now), every inspection of a vehicle is conceptually the equivalent of a "plain view.” I hope that the majority opinion, together with the Supreme Court decisions which it follows, are not the first steps to validating a system where police automobile searches will be subject to no judicial review whatsoever. The concept of probable cause in vehicle searches, which is the sole solace and justification for the majority’s decision in the instant case, may well prove to be as evanescent as the doctrine of exigent circumstances.

As Professor LaFave noted, the Court, having relied upon search-and-seizure rationales that were each, in some measure, deficient, has recently combined these faulty rationales. 3 LaFave, Search and Seizure, sec. 7.2(b) 34 (1987) (critiquing California v. Carney, 471 U.S. 386 (1985)). Professor LaFave states, "Having expressed in the past two different vehicle search theories— mobility and diminished privacy — which were each in some respects deficient, the Court now decided simply to utilize both together.”

Upon this point, the concurrence cites extensively United States v. Riviera, 825 F.2d 152 (7th Cir. 1987), and alludes to Judge Fairchild’s role in that decision. Irrespective of the qualifications of any member of the seventh circuit panel, that court is an inferior court bound by the dictates of current United States Supreme Court cases and is not free to exercise its independent and reasonable judgment. This court, by contrast, is not so bound, ought not to be so bound, and has taken an oath to independently consider questions of Wisconsin constitutional law.