Court Opinion

ID: 9845901
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 03:30:44.31457+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:16:25.444496
License: Public Domain

Shulman, Judge,
dissenting.
Under the authority of Franklin v. State, 143 Ga. App. 3 (237 SE2d 425), I must respectfully dissent from the majority opinion in this case, which affirms the denial of the motion to suppress. It should be noted that although Judge Quillian and I authored separate dissents in Franklin, each dissent opined that probable cause did not exist at the time an arrest was effected and, at least to that extent, was in agreement with the majority holding that "probable cause for an arrest [if it did exist] did not exist until the [contraband] was actually spotted...” Id., p. 4.
In the instant case a general bulletin had been issued by U. S. Customs agents to be on the lookout for a "twin engine blue and white aircraft hauling marijuana.” Some five days after being informed of the receipt of this bulletin by local authorities, the affiant, an off-duty officer in civilian clothes, observed the accused’s blue and white plane land at the Waycross-Ware County Airport. The general bulletin, coupled with the accused’s ensuing suspicious behavior (set forth in the affidavit in the majority opinion), served as the basis of the issuance of a warrant.
After diligent examination of the evidence adduced at the hearing on the motion to suppress, I am compelled to conclude that the totality of sworn circumstances before the magistrate did not support a determination that probable cause for a search existed.
The information relayed by U. S. Customs authorities is critically deficient. The aircraft was identified as a "twin engine blue and white” airplane. No further identification (e.g., manufacturer, model, *833identification number, etc.) appeared. The evidence shows a lapse of about one or two weeks between the receipt of the bulletin by local authorities and the detention and seizure of the defendant’s airplane. Even conceding that the officer was entitled to rely on the bulletin received from out-of-state law enforcement agencies (see in this regard Walker v. State, 140 Ga. App. 418 (2) (231 SE2d 386)), the information contained in the bulletin was too general and too removed in time to give rise to probable cause to believe that the accused was engaging in criminal activity when in Georgia.
The remaining circumstances recited in the affidavit and before the magistrate (the accused’s nervous and suspicious behavior coupled with flight) are less compelling than those confronting this court in Franklin, where the description of the airplane was much more specific and there was an almost continuous surveillance of the suspected airplane. In Franklin, this court found probable cause lacking in the absence of a showing that contraband was in plain view. The plain view doctrine is not involved in the instant case. Therefore, in accordance with Franklin, there could have been no probable cause for the issuance of the search warrant in the instant case, and the motion to suppress the evidence obtained as a result of the subsequent search should have been granted.
I would reverse. I am authorized to state that Presiding Judge Quillian and Judge Smith and Judge Carley join in this dissent.