Court Opinion

ID: 9586569
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 23:12:56.089612+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:32:43.385884
License: Public Domain

Barrow, J.,
with whom Benton, J. and Coleman, J. join, dissenting.
The majority fails to distinguish between Josephs’ standing to challenge a search of an automobile in which she was riding and her standing to challenge a stop of the same automobile. A passenger in an automobile has no standing to challenge its search where he or she can assert neither a proprietary nor a possessory interest in the automobile. Rakas v. Illinois, 439 U.S. 128, 148-49 (1978). It, therefore, follows that a passenger in a stolen automobile, in which he or she has no proprietary or possessory interest, has no standing to challenge the legality of a search of the automobile. United States v. Hargrove, 647 F.2d 411, 413 (4th Cir. 1981); see also Rakas, 439 U.S. at 142 n.9. It does not, however, follow that a thief has no standing to challenge the seizure of his or her person while riding as a passenger in a stolen vehicle.
A person has “standing” to assert fourth amendment rights only if he or she is asserting the violation of his or her own rights, not those of someone else. Jones v. United States, 362 U.S. 257, *103261 (1960). A passenger or a thief who has no proprietary or possessory interest in an automobile in which he is riding and, consequently, has no “legitimate expectation of privacy in the particular areas of the automobile searched,” therefore, lacks standing to question the legality of the search of the automobile. Rakas, 439 U.S. at 148 (emphasis added). Unquestionably, this defendant had no legitimate expectation of privacy in the trunk of the automobile she was convicted of stealing. See id. at 148-49.
The question in this case, however, is whether Josephs has standing to question the legality of her detention while riding in a car which she later was convicted of having stolen. The detention may prove to be legal, depending upon whether the police reasonably suspected that the car was stolen or some other criminal conduct was underway, but the threshold issue is whether Josephs can question the reasonableness of that suspicion. The answer to this question depends on whether Josephs is asserting violation of her own fourth amendment rights or those of someone else. Rakas, 439 U.S. at 143.
An unreasonable seizure of a person violates the fourth amendment. Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 9 (1968). The fourth amendment, in addition to limiting the power of the police to search “houses, papers, and effects,” protects the “right of the people to be secure in their persons.” U.S. Const, amend. IV. The Supreme Court has always recognized “the right of every individual to the possession and control of his own person, free from all restraint or interference of others, unless by clear and unquestionable authority of law.” Terry, 392 U.S. at 9 (quoting Union Pac. Ry. v. Botsford, 141 U.S. 250, 251 (1891)). An occupant of a car stopped by the police is entitled to the same fourth amendment protection as is a person stopped on the street. See Delaware v. Prouse, 440 U.S. 648, 663 (1979) (decided after Rakas). A police stop of an automobile is a seizure of the car’s occupants. Id. at 653; Simmons v. Commonwealth, 238 Va. 200, 202, 380 S.E.2d 656, 658 (1989). This conclusion flows from an occupant’s right to be secure in his or her person, see Prouse, 440 U.S. at 654, not from an expectation of privacy in the automobile.
The four dissenting and two concurring justices in the Rakas decision expressly recognized this distinction. See 4 W. LaFave, Search and Seizure § 11.3(b), at 294-95 (2d ed. 1987). Justice White, joined by Justices Brennan, Marshall and Stevens, pointed *104out in his dissent that the “petitioners of course have standing to challenge the legality of the stop, and the evidence found may be a fruit of that stop . . . Petitioners have not argued that theory here.” Rakas, 439 U.S. at 160 n.5. Justice Powell, joined by Chief Justice Burger, observed in his concurring opinion that “[t]he petitioners do not challenge the constitutionality of the police action in stopping the automobile in which they were riding; nor do they complain of being made to get out of the vehicle.” Rakas, 439 U.S. at 150-51.
After Rakas, other courts, perceiving the difference between a passenger’s standing to object to a search of a car in which he or she is riding and his or her standing to question the legality of his or her detention while riding in an automobile, have concluded that a passenger in an automobile has standing to object to the seizure, regardless of the passenger’s lack of proprietary or possessory interest in the vehicle. See, e.g., State v. Haworth, 106 Idaho 405, 406, 679 P.2d 1123, 1124 (1984); State v. Eis, 348 N.W.2d 224, 225 (Iowa 1984); State v. DeMasi, 419 A.2d 285, 294 (R.I. 1980), vacated, 452 U.S. 934 (1981); State v. Guzy, 139 Wis. 2d 663, _ 407 N.W.2d 548, 553, cert. denied, 484 U.S. 979 (1987); Parkhurst v. State, 628 P.2d 1369, 1374 (Wyo.), cert. denied, 454 U.S. 899 (1981). These decisions recognize that stopping a motor vehicle and detaining its occupants is a seizure of the occupants within the meaning of the fourth and fourteenth amendments. See State v. Conger, 183 Conn. 386,_, 439 A.2d 381, 384 (1981); see also Prouse, 440 U.S. at 653; Haworth, 106 Idaho at 406, 679 P.2d at 1124; Guzy, 139 Wis. 2d at-, 407 N.W.2d at 553. Although a passenger may not possess the requisite reasonable expectation of privacy in the seized vehicle, “no one has ever challenged the existence of such in regard to one’s own person.” Parkhurst, 628 P.2d at 1374; see also Eis, 348 N.W.2d at 226 (“no principled basis exists for distinguishing between the privacy rights of passengers and drivers in a moving vehicle”); DeMasi, 419 A.2d at 294 (“the occupants of a moving automobile retain a reasonable interest in personal privacy”); see 4 W. LaFave, supra, § 11.3(e), at 325 (“[Sjurely the passenger has standing to object”).
Those cases which have determined that a passenger lacks standing to contest a seizure “are founded on a broad stroke analysis of Rakas as simply holding that passengers lack standing to contest government action as to the vehicle.” People v. Jones, 125 *105Misc. 2d 91, 95-96, 477 N.Y.S.2d 975, 979 (N.Y. Sup. Ct. 1984). See, e.g., State v. Cowen, 104 Idaho 649, 651, 662 P.2d 230, 232 (1983); Haworth, 106 Idaho at 406, 679 P.2d at 1124; Meeks v. State, 692 S.W.2d 504, 510 (Tex. Crim. App. 1985); United States v. Cardona, 524 F. Supp. 45, 47 (W.D. Tex. 1981). The reasoning of these cases is unpersuasive because the cases fail to distinguish between standing to object to a search and standing to object to a seizure, which results in the search that follows.
The majority in this case distinguishes those cases recognizing a passenger’s standing to challenge the stop of an automobile because of the “occupant’s rightful presence in the vehicle.” This concept, usually embodied in the phrase “legitimately on [the] premises,” was rejected in Rakas as an appropriate measure of fourth amendment rights. Rakas, 439 U.S. at 143. The phrase has little analytical value with regard to standing. In some instances, a person’s legitimate presence in the area searched may be a factual consideration affecting one’s standing. For example, a thief, driving a car he or she has stolen, having no expectation of privacy in the automobile because of having no legitimate presence in it, has no standing to complain of the search of the stolen car. But, “illegitimate presence” does not affect a person’s standing to question the legality of police restraint of the person himself. See 4 W. LaFave, supra, § 11.3(e), at 329.
Many of the cases from other jurisdictions relied on by the majority are not helpful because they address standing to contest a search of an automobile and do not address standing to object to a police stop of the occupants of an automobile. State v. Abordo, 61 Haw. 117, 118, 596 P.2d 773, 774 (1979) (challenge to search of unoccupied Volkswagen); State v. Schad, 129 Ariz. 557, 562, 633 P.2d 366, 371 (1981), cert. denied, 455 U.S. 983 (1982) (challenge to search of automobile impounded after defendant was arrested and taken into custody for parole violation); Graham v. State, 47 Md. App. 287, 289-90, 421 A.2d 1385, 1387 (1980) (challenge to search a backpack and moped); State v. Purcell, 586 P.2d 441, 443 (Utah 1978) (challenge to warrant to search automobile); United States v. Lanford, 838 F.2d 1351, 1353 (5th Cir. 1988) (defendant lacked standing to challenge automobile search but had standing to challenge search of his person which was found to be constitutionally permissible); United States v. Erickson, 732 F.2d 788, 790 (10th Cir. 1984) (challenge to search of airplane); United States v. Obregon, 748 F.2d 1371, 1374 (10th *106Cir. 1984) (challenge to search of rented automobile); United States v. Roy, 734 F.2d 108, 110 (2d Cir. 1984) (challenge to search of automobile); United States v. Hensel, 672 F.2d 578, 579 (6th Cir.), cert. denied, 457 U.S. 1107 (1982) (challenge to search of stolen truck); Hargrove, 647 F.2d at 413 (challenge to search of stolen automobile).
One of the opinions cited by the majority demonstrates the difference between standing to object to a search and standing to object to a seizure of a person. In State v. Ribera, 183 Mont. 1, 597 P.2d 1164 (1979), the defendant and two companions were stopped in their car by the police, who conducted a search of the defendant and discovered marijuana in his coat pocket. Id. at 5, 597 P.2d at 1166. Later, after the defendant, his companions and their car were taken to the police station, the owner, who was driving the car, consented to a search of the vehicle which resulted in the police finding more marijuana. Id. The court concluded that (1) because the police were not justified in stopping the automobile, the marijuana found on the defendant’s person should have been suppressed, (2) because the defendant was only a passenger in the car, he had no standing to object to the search of the car, and (3) because the facts surrounding the owner’s consent to the search constituted an intervening event sufficient to attenuate the taint of the illegal arrest, the marijuana found in the car was admissible. Id. at 5, 597 P.2d 1168-69. In other words, the defendant had standing to complain of the illegal stop of the car in which he was riding, even though he had no standing to object to the later search of the car. The reasoning of Ribera applies to this case: Josephs has standing to object to the stop of the car in which she was riding (i.e., the seizure of her person), but has no standing to object to the search of the car.
The defendant’s guilt of larceny of the vehicle does not strip her of her constitutional privilege. The Constitution is not limited in its application only to those who are innocent. Constitutional protections extend equally to the guilty and the innocent. Kimmelman v. Morrison, 477 U.S. 365, 380 (1986). To deny the defendant the opportunity to challenge the legality of the seizure of her person solely because she stole the automobile she was in at the time of her seizure, denies her the right to assert her constitutional protection solely because of her guilt.
*107Having recognized Josephs’ standing to question the legality of the seizure of her person, I would further conclude that seizure was not justified. We previously have concluded that the police may not detain the occupants of a vehicle traveling north on Interstate 95 simply because the vehicle displays Florida license plates indicating it is a rental vehicle and the driver “cut his eyes” in the direction of the unmarked police vehicle. Taylor v. Commonwealth, 6 Va. App. 384, 389, 369 S.E.2d 423, 425 (1988) (en banc). In this case, the facts are essentially the same, except that the driver of the automobile continued to look straight ahead without averting his eyes when the trooper pulled beside him. Just as the averting of the eyes in Taylor did not give rise to a sufficiently particularized suspicion, id. at 388, 399 S.E.2d at 425, the failure to avert one’s eyes is also insufficient to justify stopping the occupants of a vehicle.1
Finally, I would conclude that the marijuana found in the car’s trunk was a “fruit of the poisonous tree.” Wong Sun v. United States, 371 U.S. 471 (1963).2 The illegal stop of the occupants was a cause-in-fact of the later discovery of the marijuana. The driver of the car did not consent to the search, and the police were required to bring a trained dog to locate the presence of the contraband. No intervening cause or event occurred to attenuate the taint of Josephs’ illegal detention.
In summary, I would conclude that the defendant has standing to question her detention while riding as a passenger in the stolen vehicle, that the detention violated her fourth amendment rights, that the marijuana was a fruit of that illegal detention, and that the marijuana was inadmissible. I would, therefore, reverse the judgment of conviction without the necessity of addressing the *108sufficiency of the evidence.

 Citing Taylor, a panel of this Court in an earlier, separate appeal entered an order reversing the conviction of the driver of the vehicle in which Josephs was a passenger. See Courtney Wilkins v. Commonwealth, Record No. 1024-87-2 (March 8, 1989).

 The facts of Wong Sun provide a near-perfect analogy to the facts of this case. In Wong Sun, the police illegally arrested Toy. Following his illegal arrest, Toy told the police Yee had been selling narcotics. The police went to Yee’s apartment, arrested Yee and seized narcotics. The Supreme Court concluded that Yee, like Toy, had been illegally arrested and his apartment illegally searched. The narcotics seized from Yee’s apartment were found to be inadmissible as against both Toy and Yee. Toy lacked standing to assert a privacy interest in Yee’s apartment. Toy, like Josephs in this case, had no expectation of privacy in the area searched. However, the heroin seized from Yee’s apartment was suppressed as a “fruit” of Toy’s illegal arrest.