Court Opinion

ID: 9562230
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 18:24:09.675246+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:17:15.460762
License: Public Domain

McAllister, J.,
concurring.
This ease turns on the simple question of whether the events occurring in the vicinity of 13th Avenue *17and Going Streets during the early morning hours of March 2, 1967, constituted probable cause to believe that a crime had been committed and that the defendant had participated in the commission of it. If the officers had probable cause to arrest Cloman they could, as an incident to the arrest, search his vehicle.
The existence of probable cause is demonstrated by a brief review of the facts. At about four o’clock in the morning of March second the Portland Police Department was informed by an anonymous telephone call that some tires were being unloaded from a truck into a garage attached to a house at 1311 NE Going Street. Police officers in the area were asked by radio to investigate and Officer Conner apparently was the first to arrive at the scene. As he approached he saw a truck and automobile parked near the garage. The ear was a light blue or light-colored Cadillac sedan. Both vehicles were driven away as he approached. When the officer attempted to stop the car the driver of the truck drove in the center of the street between the police car and the pursued ear in an apparent effort to obstruct the officer. When Officer Conner succeeded in stopping the car the driver of the truck parked it on the street and fled, apparently on foot. After stopping the car Officer Conner questioned the three occupants, one of whom was the defendant Leonard Cloman. Officer Conner gave the driver a citation for driving without a driver’s license and for operating a vehicle without a valid registration and then allowed the car and the occupants to move on.
After questioning the occupants of the car Officer Conner returned to the garage at 1311 NE Going Street. Another officer had reached the garage by the time Conner returned and they discovered inside the *18garage a substantial quantity of copper wire in rolls, estimated at the trial from 8,000 to 10,000 pounds of wire. A photograph of the inside of the garage admitted at the trial shows at least 50 spools, rolls, and coils of wire and many more rolls on the bottom of the pile which cannot be counted. Many of the rolls were wrapped in paper and there were at least three large wooden spools holding large amounts of insulated wire.
Cloman was arrested by Officers Daggett and Lindholm at about 4:40 o’clock, a.m. They had also responded to the four o’clock broadcast by going to the intersection of 13th and Going, but they saw no truck or anything to warrant investigation by them and had resumed their patrol. Later they acquired the following additional information about the incident at 13th and Going from a police broadcast — that a large quantity of copper wire had been found in the garage and that a light blue or light-colored Cadillac sedan which was stopped as it was leaving the scene was occupied by Samuel Brown, Thomas Handy, and Leonard Cloman. Office Daggett knew Cloman by sight and knew that he and the other two occupants of the car were known wire thieves.
Shortly after they received the foregoing supplemental information by police radio Officers Dagget and Lindholm saw a light-colored Cadillac sedan about a mile from the 13th and Going Street intersection. The officers stopped' the car to see if the occupant was' one of the men who had been stopped earlier in the morning in- a light-colored Cadillac by Officer Conner, at; 13th and Going Streets.
' The Standard by' which to' test the existence of probable cause is' well stated in Draper v. United *19States, 358 US 307, 79 S Ct 329, 3 L ed 2d 327, 332, as follows: . '
“ ‘In dealing with probable cause, ■. . . as the very name' implies, we' deal with probabilities. These are not technical; they are the factual and practical considerations of everyday life on which reasonable and prudent men, not legal technicians, act.’ Brinegar v. United States, supra (338 US at 175). Probable cause exists where ‘the facts and circumstances within [thé arresting officers’] knowledge and of which’ they had reasonably trustworthy information [are] 'sufficient in themselves to warrant a man of reasonable caution in the belief that’ an offense has been or is being committed, Carroll v. United States,, 267 US 132, 162, 69 L ed 543, 555, 45 S Ct 280, 39 ALR 790.”
"When Officer Daggett arrested Cloman he knew that a quantity of copper wire had been unloaded under cover of darkness into a private garage at 1311 NE G-oing Street; that Leonard Cloman, a known wire thief, was at the scene with two other known wire thieves and had attempted to leave as a police officer approached in a marked police vehicle. In my view Officer Daggett could reasonably conclude from the foregoing information that the wire found in the garage had been stolen and that Cloman had participated in the crime. Officer Daggett testified that he arrested Cloman because “he was connected with this large accumulation of wire.” He testified further:
“Q. Officer Daggett, you testified that you didn’t know that a crime had been committed at the time you searched the car, or the car was searched. Did you believe at that time that a crime had been committed?
“A. "Well, in my opinion I felt reasonably sure that there no doubt in fact had been a crime.
*20“Q. What crime?
“A. Well, I would assume it would have been burglary with this large accumulation of wire, this new wire that this information was broadcast about.”
As to the search, Officer Dagget also testified:
“If I might explain, your Honor, the search was not incidental as such to the arrest for after hours. We were searching the vehicle after having received this information regarding the wire and the subject seen leaving. That was the basis for the search.”
Because I believe Officer Daggett had probable cause to arrest Cloman I join with the majority in affirming the judgment.