Court Opinion

ID: 9467459
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 01:49:15.102901+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:40:21.298645
License: Public Domain

GEE, Circuit Judge,
concurring:
In my view there are at least two, and probably three, reasons why this “search” was valid. The first is well stated in Judge Rubin’s opinion, in which I concur.
The second is that where, as here, an undisputedly valid initial search has established the presence of contraband in a container and the container remains under un*774interrupted supervision and surveillance until delivery, a second opening of the container after delivery does not seem to me a search at all. What was in this package at the time Richards was apprehended with it was not suspected, was not believed with probable cause, but rather was known. The wrappings around it had no effect whatever to impeach that knowledge; in the circumstances of this case, they might as well have been absent or have been stamped “Grade A Indochinese Heroin.” Where certain knowledge is present, as in the well-recognized “plain view” exception, I think it exalts form over substance to follow a Chadwick1 analysis. Such an analysis is appropriate where probable cause is in play and where something remains to be discovered. Here it is true that the exact amount of heroin present was not known, but what was known was enough: that Richards stood before the agents holding contraband, and holding heroin at that — a substance illegal for private citizens to possess at any time and in any amount.
Finally, and to whatever extent it may be distinct from the second reason given above, I believe that where an initial intrusion into a container has taken place — one not prohibited by the fourth amendment— and has disclosed the presence in it of contraband, and where the container remains under surveillance, a second intrusion made by government agents who know the results of the initial search is not proscribed by the fourth amendment. United States v. McDaniel, 574 F.2d 1224 (5th Cir. 1978); United States v. Blanton, 479 F.2d 327 (5th Cir. 1973) (both involving initial inspections by airline attendants seeking to discern the ownership of misrouted or unclaimed luggage).2
For all of the above reasons, I join in affirming the judgment of the court below.

. United States v. Chadwick, 433 U.S. 1, 97 S.Ct. 2476, 53 L.Ed.2d 538 (1977).

. I recognize that the reasoning of these cases may be somewhat cast in doubt by Walter and Sanders v. U. S., 447 U.S. 649, 100 S.Ct. 2395, 65 L.Ed.2d 410 (1980); however, that result is unclear because of the want of a majority opinion and the reliance of Justice Stevens’ plurality view on the screening of the obscene films, an additional step taken by the government agents that has no analogue in the circumstances of this case.