Court Opinion

ID: 9568810
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 20:07:44.132837+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T11:08:49.024784
License: Public Domain

Benton, X,
dissenting.
The Commonwealth sought to prove that no warrant was required in this case because of an alleged consent. Albert Justin Lawrence contends that the evidence proved he did not consent to the search and that, even if his conduct was deemed tantamount to consent, that consent was limited to allowing the officer to view only the items Lawrence removed from his pockets. I would hold that the trial judge’s finding of consent is not supported by the evidence. I would further hold that the trial judge’s finding that Lawrence did not limit the consent is also not supported by the record. I, therefore, dissent.
“It is well settled that the burden is on the Commonwealth to establish an exception to the warrant requirement.” Walls v. Commonwealth, 2 Va. App. 639, 645, 347 S.E.2d 175, 178 (1986). “‘Consent to a search . . . must be unequivocal, specific and intelligently given . . . and it is not lightly to be inferred.” Elliotte v. Commonwealth, 7 Va. App. 234, 239, 372 S.E.2d 416, 419 (1988) (quoting Via v. Peyton, 284 F. Supp. 961, 967 (W.D. Va. 1968)). Whenever the Commonwealth alleges that a search was consensual, “the [Commonwealth] . . . bears the burden of establishing consent and this burden is heavier where the alleged consent is based on an implication.” Walls, 2 Va. App. at 645, 347 S.E.2d at 178. The determination that must be made in this case is not whether consent was voluntary, but whether consent was ever given.
Nothing in this record proved that Lawrence consented to the officer’s reach into his pocket to search. The majority opinion cites the following testimony of Officer Farmer to support the finding of consent:
I asked Lawrence ... if he was carrying any illegal narcotics or weapons. Lawrence took a step back and replied, “No.” That’s all he said was just no, very emphatically to me. ... I asked . . . Lawrence if he would mind letting me search his person for any illegal narcotics or weapons. Again Lawrence replied, “No, I *148don’t have any guns or drugs on me.” He was becoming very agitated at that point and, and moving around a lot, kept putting his hands in his pockets. As soon as he said, “No, I don’t have any guns or drugs on me,” he started pulling items out of his pockets and handing them to me.
In my judgment, this testimony fails to prove that Lawrence consented to the officer’s search of Lawrence’s pocket.
The officer testified that Lawrence began removing items from his pocket. When the officer further inquired about the contents in Lawrence’s pocket, Lawrence denied that he had anything else in his pocket. The officer testified that the following occurred:
Lawrence said, “There ain’t nothing in there,” and he tried to put his hand back into his pocket again. When he did so, I placed my hand on his wrist to keep him from going back into his pocket. I removed his hand, and when I did so I put my hand back down into his pocket and removed what I have labeled as Exhibit 1, which is approximately 38 packets.
The officer did not testify that Lawrence verbally assented to the officer’s reach into Lawrence’s pocket. Furthermore, Lawrence’s conduct did not give any objective, reasonable indication that Lawrence agreed to the offi'cer’s search of Lawrence’s pocket. Indeed, Lawrence’s conduct implicitly conveyed the message that he did not want the officer to reach into his pockets. The absence of an affirmative response and Lawrence’s own removal of items from his pocket were responses inconsistent with a finding of consent to the search. Cf. State v. Aucoin, 613 So. 2d 206, 210 (La. Ct. App. 1992) (when officer requested identification, the accused’s response that it was in the wallet that officer was holding was not a consent to search). Whenever consent is not explicitly given, “the existence of consent to search is not lightly to be inferred.” United States v. Patacchia, 602 F.2d 218, 219 (9th Cir. 1979).
In Miranda v. State, 375 S.E.2d 295 (Ga. Ct. App. 1988), the Court held that the accused did not consent to a search of her luggage when, in response to an officer’s request to search her luggage, she began to remove clothing. Id. at 296. The facts proved that after the accused removed the clothing and “stood with the clothes in her hand, the officer searched the bag himself and found cocaine.” Id. The Court stated that “[wjhile her conduct in opening her bag and removing two garments, *149an action which did not reveal any contraband, may well have signalled acquiescence, it did not show consent.” Id. at 298.
The burden of proving consent “cannot be discharged by showing no more than acquiescence to a claim of lawful authority.” Bumper v. North Carolina, 391 U.S. 543, 548-49 (1968). In the absence of an affirmative response by Lawrence, and in view of Lawrence’s preemptive conduct, the officer’s reach into Lawrence’s pocket can only be viewed as an assertion of police authority. “Conduct that is questionable or clearly indicates mere acquiescence to perceived police authority will not support a search based on the party’s alleged consent, regardless of the lack of coercion.” Evans v. State, 804 S.W.2d 730, 734 (Ark. Ct. App. 1991).
Moreover, a person may by conduct or verbal expression delimit the scope of the search to which that person consents. See Florida v. Jimeno, 500 U.S. 248, 252 (1991). The officer testified that as Lawrence removed items from his pocket and gave them to the officer, the officer returned them to Lawrence. Lawrence then returned the items to his pockets. The officer’s conduct demonstrates that he believed that Lawrence had not granted his request to reach into his pockets. No objectively reasonable person would have understood at that point that Lawrence had agreed to more than allowing the officer to see what Lawrence had chosen to show the officer. When Lawrence disclosed the contents of his pockets, the officer had no basis for reaching into Lawrence’s pocket without obtaining explicit consent to do so. Lawrence had the right to “delimit as he [chose] the scope of the search to which he consented].” Id. His conduct in this case effectively did so.