Court Opinion

ID: 9685550
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 14:46:41.01206+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:18:07.609863
License: Public Domain

*193Corrigan, P.J.
(concurring). I concur in the majority’s conclusion that the defendant received the effective assistance of counsel. I write separately to highlight additional facts and provide some alternative analysis.
Pursuant to People v Ginther, 390 Mich 436; 212 NW2d 922 (1973), the court conducted a hearing on remand concerning defendant’s claim of ineffective assistance of counsel. After evaluating the testimony of four witnesses, the court denied defendant’s motion. In reviewing a claim of ineffective assistance, we apply a highly deferential standard so as to avoid second-guessing counsel’s conduct. Further, we measure counsel’s behavior under prevailing professional norms to determine whether it was reasonable under all the circumstances. Tollett v Henderson, 411 US 258; 93 S Ct 1602; 36 L Ed 2d 235 (1973). In re Oakland Co Prosecutor, 191 Mich App 113; 477 NW2d 455 (1991). Applying Tollett standards, the court’s findings were proper.
Defendant did not overcome the presumption that his lawyer’s advice fell within the range of reasonable competence. The testimony at the Ginther hearing revealed that the Kalamazoo County prosecutor does not engage in the form of guilty plea negotiation known as charge bargaining. The prosecutor does, however, engage in sentence bargaining. Prosecutors make their best offers at the preliminary examination; any unaccepted offer is immediately withdrawn. As the case progresses, the plea offers become increasingly less generous. At the time of preliminary examination in Kalamazoo County, defense counsel must evaluate the client’s case and determine whether to risk filing motions and trying the case or whether to recommend the most favorable plea agreement the client is ever likely to receive.
In this case, at the time of the preliminary *194examination, after negotiations with defense counsel, the prosecutor agreed to recommend probation and to remain silent regarding incarceration, the best possible offer that defendant could have obtained on the pending weapons charge. The court on remand stated that the offer would have signaled the court that the people had no interest in a jail sentence. Realistically, defendant otherwise faced the prospect of a six-month jail term. The record before us shows that gang violence was on the upswing in Kalamazoo, and a defendant connected with gang activity who was caught with a gun on school premises typically would receive a six-month jail term. Although defendant denied membership in a gang, his alleged motive for carrying the gun to school was to protect himself from a gang that had been harassing him. A sentencing court could well decide, on these and additional proofs, that a six-month sentence was in order.
Counsel talked with defendant about potential issues relating to the search and the defendant’s admission that he owned the seized weapon. Counsel believed that the township’s investigative procedures and seizure of. the weapon were proper. Defendant testified that in response to his question about the legality of the search, counsel had advised him that the search was legal.1
*195The court credited defense counsel’s testimony that the defendant’s primary interest was avoiding jail. The court found that the case presented Fourth and Fifth Amendment issues that any first-year law student might identify. Against those issues, counsel had to weigh a guaranteed sentence of probation without incarceration.
The tenor of the court’s reasoning at the hearing strongly suggests that it would have found the search legal and the interrogation noncustodial if counsel had filed motions in defendant’s behalf. Thus, defendant would in all likelihood have served a six-month jail term before his appeal could have been heard. Even so, he might not have prevailed on appeal. A competent defense attorney may certainly counsel his client that although he may ultimately prevail on a "good issue,” the client could very well have served his entire jail term before the appeal can be heard.
If the client’s primary interest is in avoiding incarceration, a competent lawyer may safely counsel the client to plead guilty and be sentenced to probation rather than urge that client to file pretrial motions where the outcome is not at all clear. Such representation does not run afoul of the Sixth Amendment.
The circuit court also considered whether, but for counsel’s failure to identify those issues, the case would have resulted in dismissal. I adopt and endorse the court’s reasoning. In my view, the constitutional issues were not obviously likely to have resulted in the case being dismissed.
I. MIRANDA ISSUE
The question whether defendant was subjected *196to custodial interrogation and Miranda2 warnings were required is certainly not free from doubt. The triggering mechanism for the duty to furnish Miranda warnings is custody, not focus. People v Hill, 429 Mich 382; 415 NW2d 193 (1987). The duty to give Miranda warnings attaches when a defendant is in custody or otherwise deprived of freedom of action in any significant way. Miranda, supra. The obligation does not extend to general "on the scene” questioning as to facts surrounding the crime.
Courts are less willing to find custodial circumstances where interrogation occurs in familiar or neutral surroundings. Thus, interrogation in a suspect’s home is usually viewed as noncustodial. Beckwith v United States, 425 US 341; 96 S Ct 1612; 48 L Ed 2d 1 (1976). As the Court recognized in Minnesota v Murphy, 465 US 420, 433; 104 S Ct 1136; 79 L Ed 2d 409 (1984), a suspect in familiar surroundings does not face the same pressures as a suspect in the police-dominated atmosphere of the station house:
Custodial arrest is said to convey to the suspect a message that he has no choice but to submit to the officer’s will and to confess. . . . Many of the psychological ploys discussed in Miranda capitalize on the suspect’s unfamiliarity with the officers and the environment. . . . [T]he coercion inherent in custodial interrogation derives in large measure from an interrogator’s insinuations that the interrogation will continue until a confession is obtained.
The comparatively nonthreatening character of this detention would justify a holding that the defendant was not in custody. See also Berkemer v *197McCarty, 468 US 420; 104 S Ct 3138; 82 L Ed 2d 317 (1984). It is not obvious that a student who is called to the school principal’s office, frisked for weapons, and briefly questioned cannot be questioned without Miranda warnings. The officer here told defendant that he was investigating a weapons offense. Upon defendant’s inquiry, "What weapon?” the officer showed defendant the gun. Defendant immediately blurted out that he owned the gun. Just as in Berkemer, the detention was brief, no trickery was used to elicit a confession, and the atmosphere was not "police-dominated.” 468 US 438, n 27.
Moreover, the defendant was never formally arrested. He was permitted to leave the principal’s office and go about his business. Defendant was not deprived of his freedom of movement to the degree associated with a formal arrest. New York v Quarles, 467 US 649; 104 S Ct 2626; 81 L Ed 2d 550 (1984). It is not obvious that the officer had a duty to furnish Miranda warnings.
II. SEARCH IN THE HIGH SCHOOL PARKING LOT
The more serious issue, the Fourth Amendment issue, is not easy to resolve. I cannot conclude, however, that defendant was likely to have obtained a dismissal on the search and seizure issue.
A. STANDING
As a preliminary matter, defendant may well lack any standing to object to the search of his mother’s car and the seizure of the weapon therein. He was not present in the car when it was searched. A passenger who is not present lacks standing to object to a later search of the car. People v Jackson, 71 Mich App 487; 247 NW2d *198382 (1976). Nor does a nonowner ordinarily have standing to challenge a search, unless he pleads and proves some expectation of privacy in the vehicle. People v Nelson, unpublished opinion per curiam of the Court of Appeals, decided August 13, 1992 (Docket No. 139042), rev’d on other grounds 443 Mich 626; 505 NW2d 266 (1993).
Defendant might attempt to assert standing because the car searched was the family car. In my view, he could not prevail on this bare assertion. Instead, he must plead and prove his own expectation of privacy in the vehicle. The vehicle searched belonged to his mother. On the day in question, she had loaned it not to defendant, but to his sister. If a vehicle is repeatedly used by a family member, standing may be established. See, e.g., State v Johnson, 598 SW2d 123 (Mo, 1980); State v Morrill, 197 Conn 507; 498 A2d 76 (1985); People v Johnson, 114 Ill 2d 170; 499 NE2d 1355 (1986). In Johnson, the Illinois court concluded that the defendant lacked standing because he could not prove his continuous use of and right of access to the family car.
Under these standards, the standing issue is certainly litigable. I question whether defendant could meet his burden of proof. See, generally, 4 Lafave, Search and Seizure (2d ed), § 11.3(E), pp 322-341.
B. QUANTUM OF CAUSE FOR VEHICLE SEARCH IN SCHOOL PARKING LOT
Assuming defendant has standing, the search question is further complicated because defendant brought a gun onto school property. The situation presented is certainly among the most exigent imaginable. The immediate danger far exceeds that presented in most types of anonymous in*199former cases. Further, neither the student who was the source of the anonymous tip nor the principal was an informant from the criminal milieu. To the extent they are still relevant, ordinary Aguilar-Spinelli3 standards would not apply either to the principal or to the anonymous student informer. See People v Powell, 201 Mich App 516; 506 NW2d 894 (1993), and cases cited therein. In any event, the officer testified that the principal had a one hundred percent track record of past accuracy in reporting the presence of guns in school.
In Illinois v Gates, 462 US 213; 103 S Ct 2317; 76 L Ed 2d 527 (1983), the United States Supreme Court reaffirmed the use of the totality of the circumstances test for probable cause and rejected the two-pronged Aguilar-Spinelli test as excessively technical. Assuming that the Gates test applies in these circumstances, the question whether the totality of the circumstances establishes probable cause to search is certainly not free from doubt.
The proper approach to analysis of anonymous tips in a school setting appears in In re Boykin, 39 Ill 2d 617; 237 NE2d 460 (1968), where an anonymous student informant told the assistant principal that another student had a gun. The principal immediately contacted the police. Two police officers entered the school, searched the student, and seized a gun concealed on his person. The Illinois court decided that the police were not required to wait to ascertain whether the informer’s identity was unknown or the assistant principal had merely said that he was anonymous to avoid future problems:_
*200[T]hey were not required to delay until they had ascertained whether the informant was in fact anonymous or whether the assistant principal said that he was in order to avoid future difficulties in the school and the creation of a feud. (See Kent v United States, 383 US 541; 86 S Ct 1045; 16 L Ed 2d 84 [1966].) In this case, moreover, there is a complete absence of any possible element of gain to the anonymous informant from furnishing false information, and the nature of the potential danger differs from that involved in gambling and narcotics cases. (See, People v Taggart, 20 NY2d 335, 339; 283 NYS2d 1; 229 NE2d 581, 584 [1967].) The appropriate person to appraise that danger was the school official who is required to maintain discipline and to act "for the safety and supervision of the pupils in the absence of their parents and guardians.” Ill Rev Stat 1967, chap 122, par 34-84a. [39 Ill 2d 619].
Boykin was cited favorably in People v Chartrand, 73 Mich App 645, 652, n 3; 252 NW2d 569 (1977), where this Court noted that information originating from a high school student and relayed to an assistant principal and then to the police falls outside the criminal milieu (and is thus not governed by Aguilar-Spinelli standards). Applying a "totality of circumstances” test, I cannot conclude that the resolution of the search issue would have led to dismissal of the case, if traditional probable cause is the required quantum of proof.
However, in a school setting, searches may be conducted on a reduced quantum of cause. In New Jersey v T L O, 469 US 325, 343; 105 S Ct 733; 83 L Ed 2d 720 (1985), the United States Supreme Court, in a plurality opinion, recognized that a different standard governs Fourth Amendment activity in the nation’s schools. The "school search” exception has not been limited to searches of students’ persons or their lockers. Several lower *201courts have extended the T L O rationale to searches of students’ cars in parking lots. See, e.g., State v Farrer, 57 Wash App 207; 787 P2d 935 (1990); Shamberg v State, 762 P2d 488 (Alaska App, 1988); People in interest of PEA, 754 P2d 382 (Colo, 1988). In TLO, the Court reasoned that although searches must ordinarily be based upon probable cause, probable cause is not an irreducible requirement of a valid search. Instead, the plurality concluded that the fundamental command of the Fourth Amendment is that searches and seizures be reasonable. The Court employed the test adopted in Camara v Municipal Court, 387 US 523; 87 S Ct 1727; 18 L Ed 2d 930 (1967), balancing the privacy interests of school children 'with the need of teachers and administrators for freedom to maintain order in the school. Probable cause is not the controlling quantum of proof for vehicle searches in school parking lots where student safety is the paramount concern.
In the T L O case, the Supreme Court did not resolve the question of the appropriate standard where searches on school premises are conducted in conjunction with or at the behest of law enforcement agencies. T L O, supra, p 341, n 7. Under T L O, the assistant principal, acting alone, plainly could have searched defendant’s mother’s car. The police officer here seemed to be acting in exigent circumstances, not on his own initiative, but at the behest of school officials. However, the quantum of cause required for searches on school premises certainly should not shift depending on the identity of the searcher, if the police did not initiate the search. The record reflects that the assistant principal and the police officer had just fifteen minutes before the school lunch hour would begin. Because Kalamazoo Central High School has an open campus policy, at lunch time many *202juniors and seniors can leave the high school campus. At lunch time, defendant would have had easy access to the weapon. If the assistant principal and the police officer had failed to act, their omissions could have threatened the security and safety of the students committed to their temporary care. Although the intrusion into the car was significant, on balance, the need to search was even greater. The search in question in all likelihood met the Fourth Amendment’s command of reasonableness.
In any event, the resolution of this issue is not obviously in defendant’s favor. Accordingly, defense counsel did not make a serious mistake in advising his client to accept the prosecutor’s excellent plea offer and forgo further challenges.
I concur in affirming defendant’s conviction.

 The defendant testified that he discussed the merits of his search issue with counsel:
Q. Did you ask him anything about the search in the interview with him.
A. Yes. He said it was a valid search.
Q. What did you ask him?
A. I said, "Couldn’t that be considered an illegal search by the police?”
He said, no, because they had information, valid information, and that since it was on school property, that the search was legal.

 Miranda v Arizona, 384 US 436; 86 S Ct 1602; 16 L Ed 2d 694 (1966).

 Aguilar v Texas, 378 US 108; 84 S Ct 1509; 12 L Ed 723 (1964); Spinelli v United States, 393 US 410; 89 S Ct 584; 21 L Ed 2d 637 (1969).