Court Opinion

ID: 9670796
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 03:26:20.250488+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:16:06.557385
License: Public Domain

*185PETERSON, Judge
(concurring specially).
I concur with the majority decision that the bag of marijuana is admissible because it would inevitably have been discovered in a search incident to arrest, but I do not agree that the bag was properly seized under the plain view exception to the warrant requirement.
As the majority opinion states, all that is necessary for application of the “plain view” doctrine is that the officer have probable cause to believe the item is of an incriminating nature. Arizona v. Hicks, 480 U.S. 321, 326, 107 S.Ct. 1149, 1153, 94 L.Ed.2d 347 (1987). Also, an officer may rely on trained intuition and observations drawn from experience to form suspicions that may escape the untrained person. State v. Skoog, 351 N.W.2d 380, 381 (Minn.App.1984). However, a reasonable suspicion is not sufficient. Hicks, 480 U.S. at 326, 107 S.Ct. at 1153.
To reach its conclusion that the bag was in plain view, the majority relies only on events up to the time Magaard asked Lembke to give him the bag. I do not agree that seeing the top of a regular plastic bag, which has many legitimate uses, protruding from a jacket pocket (without seeing the contents of the bag) constitutes probable cause. The fact that the jacket was worn by a speeding driver late at night does not make it more likely that the bag held marijuana rather than a legitimate substance. When Magaard asked Lembke to give him the bag, Lembke had not failed the field sobriety test and had not taken a preliminary breath test. An objective view of the circumstances at that time does not support the conclusion that Magaard had anything more than a reasonable suspicion that there was marijuana in the bag.