Court Opinion

ID: 9792899
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 02:38:56.810929+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T08:01:35.647648
License: Public Domain

WILKINS, Justice *
(concurring in the result):
I concur in the result reached in this case but am unable to agree with the analysis by which the main opinion reaches that result.
I first must take exception to the analytical starting point of the main opinion:
The test as to the propriety of a search is whether fair and reasonable persons would judge the search to be unreasonable as constituting an unjustified invasion into a person’s right of privacy and security in his home or his property. [Citation omitted.]
*482This “reasonableness” standard, though found in numerous decisions of this Court, does not comport with the requirements of the Fourth Amendment as laid down by the United States Supreme Court. And by the very vagueness and ad hoc character of this “standard,” this Court invites abuses that may in large part be avoided by application of the appropriate constitutional standard.1
The correct starting point for the analysis of the legality of a search or seizure is the proposition that “searches outside the judicial process, without prior approval by judge or magistrate, are per se unreasonable under the Fourth Amendment — subject only to a few specifically established and well-delineated exceptions.”2 Here, the State claimed as an exception the consent of Defendant Marcella Rae Griffin.3 And the record here indeed discloses sufficient evidence to support the District Court’s determination that the peace officers did not exceed the scope of the consent given.
The main opinion’s analysis of the seizure of the green Chevrolet automobile is also, in my opinion, constitutionally infirm. I believe that the seizure and subsequent search of the Chevrolet were illegal for reasons noted infra.
As noted by the Supreme Court in Coolidge, “[t]he word ‘automobile’ is not a talisman in whose presence the Fourth Amendment fades away and disappears.”4 For the purposes of the Fourth Amendment, the seizure of the automobile here is factually indistinguishable from the seizure of the *483automobile in Coolidge, and the Supreme Court said of that seizure:
[S]urely there is nothing in this case to invoke the meaning and purpose of the rule of Carroll v. United States [267 U.S. 132 [45 S.Ct. 280, 69 L.Ed. 543] (1925)]— no alerted criminal bent on flight, no fleeting opportunity on an open highway after a hazardous chase, no contraband or stolen goods or weapons, no confederates waiting to move the evidence, not even the inconvenience of a special police detail to guard the immobilized automobile. In short, by no possible stretch of the legal imagination can this be made into a case where “it is not practicable to secure a warrant,” Carroll, supra, at 153 [45 S.Ct. at 285] and the “automobile exception,” despite its label, is simply irrelevant.5 [Citation omitted.]
Thus, I must conclude that the seizure and subsequent search of the automobile in question were illegal. However, a review of the record convinces me that the introduction of the fruits of that search and seizure — keys belonging to Detective Lab-rum — was harmless error in that there was sufficient evidence introduced which was not tainted by the illegality of the search of the automobile to support the conviction of appellants.6
In short, I believe that a proper application of Fourth Amendment principles to the issues presented by this appeal does warrant an affirmance of the judgment.
MAUGHAN, C. J., and STEWART, J., concur in the opinion of WILKINS, J.

 Wilkins, Justice, participated in this opinion prior to his resignation.

. The dangers inherent in the “reasonableness” approach are made vividly clear in the case now before us. In ruling on defendant’s motion to suppress, the District Judge made the following comments from the bench:
THE COURT: ... While you have been arguing and presenting the case of State v. Richards to the Court to support your proposition and in which is cited the State v. Cris-cola formula, I am directed to the language in the Criscoia matter which says, “The question is whether under the circumstances the search is one which fair-minded persons knowing the facts, giving due consideration to the rights and interests of the public as well as to those of the subject, would judge to be unreasonable or oppressive, an intrusion upon the latter’s rights.”
As I view the evidence so far, and I believe I’m fair-minded, to support the Supreme Court’s language, a person’s interpretation of that language would be that the vehicle which was viewed by Detective Lightfoot, whose testimony we have just heard, might very well have been used in one portion of the commission of this crime in that it would have been used to permanently deprive the owners of their property .... [Emphasis added.].
By virtue of the fact that the reasonableness standard is in reality no standard at all, trial judges are invited to apply their own immediate reaction to the search or seizure in question rather than the legal analysis required by the Fourth Amendment.

. Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347, 88 S.Ct. 507, 19 L.Ed.2d 576 (1967). The exceptions to the warrant requirement are (1) plain view, Coolidge v. New Hampshire, 403 U.S. 443, 91 S.Ct. 2022, 29 L.Ed.2d 564 (1971); (2) searches incident to arrest, Agnello v. United States, 269 U.S. 20, 46 S.Ct. 4, 70 L.Ed. 145 (1925); (3) automobile exception, Chambers v. Maroney, 399 U.S. 42, 90 S.Ct. 1975, 26 L.Ed.2d 419 (1970); (4) hot pursuit, Warden v. Hayden, 387 U.S. 294, 87 S.Ct. 1642, 18 L.Ed.2d 782 (1967); (5) emergency situations, Schmerber v. California, 384 U.S. 757, 86 S.Ct. 1826, 16 L.Ed.2d 908 (1966); (6) consent, Zap v. United States, 328 U.S. 624, 66 S.Ct. 1277, 90 L.Ed. 1477 (1946) (See, Williamson, The Supreme Court Warrant-less Searches, and Exigent Circumstances, 31 Okla.L.Rev. 110 (1978) at n. 5).

. The main opinion’s treatment of the plain view exception to the warrant requirement is not supported by any United States Supreme Court authority. The main opinion states:
There should be no question about the propositions: ... When an officer is where he has a right to be, evidence which is in plain view and reasonably believed to be evidence of a crime can properly be seized.
The plain view exception was exhaustively examined and explained in Coolidge v. New Hampshire, 403 U.S. 443, 91 S.Ct. 2022, 29 L.Ed. 2d 564 (1971). It was there pointed out that the three requirements for application of this exception are (1) the police must have “had a prior justification for an intrusion” (e. g., warrant for another object, hot pursuit), (2) the discovery of the evidence must be “inadvertent,” (3) it must be “immediately apparent to the police that they have evidence before them.” (403 U.S. at 466, 91 S.Ct. at 2038.) Thus the mere reasonable belief that the object viewed is evidence of a crime is not sufficient to invoke the plain view exception.

. 403 U.S. at 461-462, 91 S.Ct. at 2035-2036.

. Id. at 462, 91 S.Ct. at 2035-2036.

. Appellants have not attacked the legality of the search of the duffle bag on appeal and so we need not address that issue here.