Court Opinion

ID: 9460340
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 21:47:43.143586+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:36:34.807460
License: Public Domain

AINSWORTH, Circuit Judge
(dissenting) :
Petitioner Robert Fixel was convicted of possession of heroin in violation of Fla.Stat. 398.03. His conviction was affirmed by the Florida Court of Appeals (3d Dist.), 256 So.2d 27 (1971), and cer-tiorari was denied by the Florida Supreme Court. The Florida state courts, trial court, Court of Appeals and Supreme Court, found no constitutional infirmity in the conviction. Having exhausted state remedies Fixel brought this petition for habeas corpus, which was denied by the United States district judge below who found, as had the Florida state courts, that there was no violation of the Constitution in Fixel’s conviction.1
Now the majority opinion of a panel of this Court has decreed that Fixel’s conviction was unlawful because it was based on an alleged unlawful search and seizure of the contraband narcotics. Despite overwhelming evidence of Fixel’s guilt, and strong evidence of probable cause to effect the seizure, the majority concludes that habeas corpus must be granted and Fixel, who has been at large on bond throughout these lengthy proceedings in the state and federal courts, must go unpunished for his crime in a misapplication of the exclusionary rule.
The pertinent facts are set forth fully, because they so emphatically support af-firmance of the conviction and denial of habeas corpus. Detective Sergeant Valdes of the Sheriff’s Department at Key West, Florida, applied for a search warrant to the Florida state court on April 24, 1970, for the premises 419 United Street, front downstairs apartment. His affidavit recited in part as follows:
“I have had 419 United Street, Front apartment, downstairs, (a wooden structure), Key West, Florida under surveillance for the past 30 days. During this time I have observed known narcotic pushers and users entering and leaving the premises. I have received information from a reliable informant that at this time there is a large quantity of marihuana and narcotic drugs being kept and sold on the premises. I have from a short distance observed this informant enter the premises described herein and exit these premises by way of the front entrance. Prior to this informant entering these premises, the informant was searched and was not in possession of any type of narcotic drug or marihuana. After observing this informant exit these premises I kept the informant within my sight for a short distance. I then *486searched this informant a second time and received a matchbox of suspected marihuana described by this infox'-mant as having been purchased within these premises. A conformatory test (Duquomoise Test) conducted on the substance within the matchbox indicated the weed substance to be marihuana. This matchbox of (tested) marihuana is being introduced before the judge as further evidence in support of the affidavit. This infox’mant has within the past five months furnished information that has led to 10 narcotic arrests.”
A search warrant was issued by the court on the same date for the premises 419 United Street, front downstairs apartment.
Detective Sergeant Valdes in company with several police officers, including Sergeant Knapp of the Sheriff’s Office, then proceeded to 419 United Street to execute the warrant. On arriving at the scene they decided first to engage in additional surveillance. The property was well known to Sergeant Valdes; in fact, it was owned by his gx'andfather and Valdes had been there many times. It consisted of a six-apartment complex, •made up of two houses: 419 United Street with four apartments, a front downstairs, a back downstairs, a fx’ont upstairs and a back upstairs apartment, and 421 United Street which consisted of two apartments, one downstairs and one upstairs. The two houses were not separated by a fence but had a common pathway between them, and there was one “big” back yard in common for the use of all the tenants of the six apartments, surrounded by a chain link fence. At the corner of United Street and Du-val Street was a house 1224 Duval Street which immediately abutted the common back yard of 419 and 421 United Street. Detective Sergeant Valdes placed Sergeant Knapp in a garage at 1224 Duval Street where he could overlook the common back yard at 419 and 421 United Stx'eet. He had a good view of the yard, which was being observed at noon in clear daylight. Valdes then went to the front of 419 United Street where he maintained surveillance.
The sux'veillance of the police officers lasted about 45 minutes. During that time Detective Sergeant Valdes saw five or six people enter separately from time to time in the front downstairs apartment at 419 United Street (the one for which he held a search warrant). He also observed the defendant Fixel come out of the front of the apartment on sevex’al occasions and walk through the common pathway between the two apartment buildings toward the back yard. Fixel was then picked up by the surveillance of Sergeant Knapp who saw him on three occasions go to a place in the back yard, remove a black shaving kit from a rubbish pile under a tree and take something from it each time. Sergeant Knapp could not see what was being taken from the kit, but he would have been more naive than we should expect of a prudent policeman if he had not realized .under all of the pertinent circumstances what was occurring. The officers did not enter the property or yard at any time during the surveillance. When Valdes returned to the garage Knapp told him what he had observed. Knapp then walked around to the front of 419, thence down the common pathway into the common back yard, secured the black kit, and joined Valdes who had just entered the front downstairs apartment and executed the search warrant. The defendant Fixel was found in the apartment and arrested with three other persons. A search was made of the apartment but no contraband was found. The shaving kit was found to contain eleven packets of heroin.
The State of Florida does not contend that the seizure of contraband narcotics in the yard of the apartment complex was authorized by the original search warrant. But it urges that the arresting officers acted with probable cause, that the seizure was incident to the arrest, that the common yard of the six-apartment complex was not protected by the Fourth Amendment against illegal activity conducted in plain view of the *487police, and therefore that the seizure was lawful. Fixel likewise had no reasonable expectation of privacy of objects hidden in the rubbish of a common back yard, open to the use of all the tenants of the complex.
The majority opinion concedes that there was probable cause for the initial arrest of Fixel. In footnote 1 of the majority opinion we find the following statement:
“Probable cause for the initial arrest of petitioner Fixel was established. An informer told law enforcement officials that a large quantity of narcotics was being sold on these premises. Using this same informer,’ the officers conducted a controlled purchase of marijuana, although it is not stated when the purchase occurred or if it was from Fixel. Furthermore, known traffickers in narcotics had been seen entering and leaving these premises. But most importantly, the officers observed the extremely suspicious actions of petitioner making trips to the backyard of his home and concealing the shaving kit there on the day of the arrest. In light of these circumstances, we think the agents could reasonably believe that a crime had been or was being committed. Wong Sun v. United States, 371 U.S. 471, 479, 83 S.Ct. 407, 9 L.Ed.2d 441 (1963); United States v. Gonzalez-Perez, 426 F.2d 1283, 1286 (5th Cir., 1970); Johnson v. Middlebrooks, 383 F.2d 386, 387 (5th Cir., 1967).”
But there likewise was probable cause for the seizure of the heroin found in the shaving kit in the common back yard. When all of the circumstances are considered, the seizure was not unreasonable within the intendment of the Fourth Amendment. The apartment had been under surveillance for 30 days and known narcotics pushers and users had been observed entering the premises. A reliable informant stated that there was a large quantity of narcotics being kept and sold on the premises. The informant made a controlled purchase of marihuana in the premises under supervision of the police officers. Then on a surveillance of the common back yard2 of the apartment complex, immediately preceding the serving of the search warrant, the police had ample reason to believe from their own observation that a felony was being committed in their presence and to act accordingly. See Harris v. United States, 390 U.S. 234, 236, 88 S.Ct. 992, 993, 19 L.Ed.2d 1067 (1968); Walker v. Beto, 5 Cir., 1971, 437 F.2d 1018, 1019; United States v. Salvo, 5 Cir., 1971, 447 F.2d 474, 475.
It was not necessary under these circumstances for the police officers to secure a search warrant for, as the Supreme Court said in Cooper v. State of California, 386 U.S. 58, 62, 87 S.Ct. 788, 791, 17 L.Ed.2d 730 (1967):
“It is no answer to say that the police could have obtained a search warrant, for ‘ [t] he relevant test is not whether it is reasonable to procure a search warrant, but whether the search was reasonable.’ United States v. Rabinowitz, 339 U.S. 56, 66, 70 S.Ct. 430, 435, 94 L.Ed. 653.”
Probable cause exists if the facts known to the officer cause him as a prudent man to believe that an offense has been committed; however, evidence sufficient to establish guilt is not required. Henry v. United States, 361 U.S. 98, 102, 80 S.Ct. 168, 171, 4 L.Ed.2d 134 (1959). See also Beck v. State of Ohio, 379 U.S. 89, 91, 85 S.Ct. 223, 225, 13 L.Ed.2d 142 (1964); Brinegar v. United States, 338 U.S. 160, 164, 69 S.Ct. 1302, 1305, 93 L.Ed. 1879 (1949); United States v. Lipscomb, 5 Cir., 1970, 435 F.2d 795, 798 (the “prudent” man who “reasonably” believes the arrested per*488son has committed an offense); United States v. Skinner, 8 Cir., 1969, 412 F.2d 98, 101 (probable cause turns upon the facts of the particular case).3
Reasonableness is the touchstone, as the Supreme Court and this Court have often pointed out. “The Fourth Amendment does not denounce all searches and seizures, but only such as are unreasonable.” Carroll v. United States, 267 U.S. 132, 147, 45 S.Ct. 280, 283, 69 L.Ed. 543 (1925). Thus “[t]he ultimate standard set forth in the Fourth Amendment is reasonableness.” Cady v. Dombrowski, 413 U.S. 433, 439, 93 S.Ct. 2523, 2527, 37 L.Ed.2d 706 (1973). And as we said, for example, in United States v. Ragsdale, 5 Cir., 1972, 470 F.2d 24, 30:
“Reasonableness — as its more usual concomitant, probable cause — is founded not on technicalities, but on ‘factual and practical considerations of everyday life on which reasonable and prudent men, not legal technicians, act.’ ”
This is a slim case, indeed, to apply the exclusionary rule when the facts as recited so clearly show that the police had probable cause to seize the contraband narcotics. My strongly held belief is that the seizure here was reasonable under the facts and circumstances. No difficult question of law is presented. The case should have been resolved on its facts, which, as I view it, as did the several Florida state courts and the federal district judge below, required dismissal of Fixel’s petition of habeas corpus.

. The district court (Judge Eaton) in a well-reasoned opinion concluded:
“On the basis of the facts set out in the testimony we agree with the holding of the [state] trial court that probable cause existed to justify Fixel’s arrest without a warrant. It follows that the trial court did not err in denying Fixel’s motion to suppress the evidence. Under the circumstances here, the arrest and the search were substantially contemporaneous. This being so the seizure of tlie evidentiary items was not violative of tlie Fourth Amendment ahd said items were, therefore, properly admitted at petitioner’s trial.”

. Compare the following cases relative to search of common areas, which, though not precisely in point, are applicable in principle: United States v. Stroble, 6 Cir., 1970, 431 F.2d 1273; United States v. Freeman, 9 Cir., 1970, 426 F.2d 1351; Marullo v. United States, 5 Cir., 1964, 328 F.2d 361.

. The majority’s reliance on Coolidge v. New Hampshire, 403 U.S. 443, 91 S.Ct. 2022, 29 L.Ed.2d 564 (1971), is misplaced. Mr. Justice Stewart, author of the opinion, was careful to point out that Coolidge “is not a case involving contraband or stolen goods or objects dangerous in themselves.” (403 U.S. at 472.)
It should also be emphasized that the quoted language of the Coolidge opinion (403 U.S. at 468) in the majority opinion herein, is found in the Supreme Court Reporter under key numbers 23-25 and the syllabi thereunder indicate the following:
“Per Mr. Justice Stewart with three Justices concurring and one Justice concurring in the judgment.” (Mr. Justice Harlan who concurred in the judgment declined to concur in that part of the opinion quoted by the majority in the present case.)
Thus it appears that less than a majority of the Court concurred in the cited language. Nevertheless, we disagree with the majority ia the present case that there were no “exigent circumstances” to justify the seizure. The majority concludes that it is “inconceivable” that Fixel could have disposed of the contraband narcotics while the police were obtaining another search warrant, since Fixel was then under arrest. Whether Fixel could have been held without the contemporaneous seizure of the narcotics, whether he was in league with others who might make off with the contraband, and whether the police should believe as a practical matter that the contraband would remain in the kit under the tree, are all subjects of speculation, as is the majority’s view, but certainly not “inconceivable.” The officers had a duty to preserve the evidence and the taking of prompt action by them was amply justified and' reasonable under the circumstances.