Court Opinion

ID: 9745498
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 23:04:45.177157+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:26:28.961433
License: Public Domain

BAKER, Chief Judge,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent from the result reached by the majority because I believe that the trial court’s search warrant was supported by probable cause. While I agree that Detective Blackwell’s sworn testimony was based on hearsay, I believe that his testimony was sufficient to support issuing the search warrant. Moreover, even assuming for the sake of the argument that probable cause did not exist, I believe that the good faith exception applies.
Detective Blackwell attested that a confidential informant had informed him that Jackson “was selling cocaine, marijuana, and crack cocaine” from a residence. Suppression Ex. A p. 4. This confidential informant had made several controlled buys for the drug task force in the past. Id. The majority purports that “the fact that the informant had made several buys in the past does not establish his credibility. Such conduct merely shows that he can follow instructions and do what he is told.” Op. p. 833. I disagree.
In daggers v. State, our Supreme Court stated that, as a general rule, uncorroborated hearsay alone cannot support a finding of probable cause to issue a search warrant. 687 N.E.2d 180, 182 (Ind.1997). However, the daggers court emphasized that hearsay exhibiting some hallmarks of reliability can suffice to support a finding of probable cause. Id. Specifically,
the trustworthiness of hearsay for purposes of proving probable cause can be established in a number of ways, including where (1) the informant has given correct information in the past; (2) independent police investigation corroborates the informant’s statements; (3) some basis for the informant’s knowledge is shown; or (4) the informant predicts conduct or activities by the suspect that are not ordinarily easily predicted. Depending on the facts, other considerations may come into play in establishing the reliability of the informant or the hearsay.

Id.

The majority concludes that the informant’s previous buys for the drug task force do not establish his credibility. I disagree with this conclusion because the *836confidential informant’s previous cooperative interactions with the drug task force provided the requisite indicia of reliability to establish trustworthiness. Phrased another way, the informant had established his reliability by forming a relationship with the police by assisting them with other successful drug buys. Moreover, the facts herein are sufficiently analogous to the four examples our Supreme Court provided in Joggers. Thus, I believe that the hearsay on which Detective Blackwell’s sworn testimony was based exhibited the requisite indicia of reliability and provided the requisite probable cause.
Even assuming for the sake of the argument that Officer Blackwell’s testimony did not provide probable cause to issue the search warrant, I disagree with the majority’s conclusion that the good faith exception does not apply. As support for its conclusion, the majority relies upon Boss, in which we held that the affiant was “ ‘so lacking in indicia of probable cause as to render official belief in its existence entirely unreasonable.’ ” Op. p. 834 (citing Boss, 649 N.E.2d at 1047). For the reasons stated above — namely, the informant’s cooperative relationship with the drug.task force — I cannot agree that Officer Blackwell’s testimony so lacked the indicia of probable cause as to render official belief in its existence entirely unreasonable. Thus, I would affirm the judgment of the trial court.