Court Opinion

ID: 9533952
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 04:35:49.294036+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:29:14.184280
License: Public Domain

FRIEDLANDER, Judge,
dissenting
I respectfully dissent. I would reverse Krise’s conviction because I believe that the trial court erred in admitting the evidence found inside her purse. In my view, Tungate’s voluntary consent to search the home he shared with Krise did not obviate the warrant requirement under the circumstances presented here.
The Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution provides protections against unreasonable searches and seizures. Unless an exception to the warrant requirement applies, a warrant is required for a search to be considered reasonable under the Fourth Amendment. State v. Friedel, 714 N.E.2d 1231 (Ind.Ct.App.1999). Because it is undoubtedly reasonable for the police to conduct a search once they have been permitted to do so, a consensual search is a well-established exception to the warrant requirement. Id. A party may validly consent to a warrantless search even in the absence of probable cause or exigent circumstances. Id.
A valid consent to a search may be given by either the person whose property is to be searched or by a third party who has common authority over, or a sufficient relationship to, the premises to be searched. Illinois v. Rodriguez, 497 U.S. 177, 110 S.Ct. 2793, 111 L.Ed.2d 148 (1990); Brown v. State, 691 N.E.2d 438 (Ind.1998). But, as our supreme court cautioned in Brown:
Common authority is not to be implied from the mere property interest a third party has in the property. The authority which justifies the third-party consent rests on the mutual use of the property by persons generally having joint access or control for most purposes, so that it is reasonable to recognize that each of the co-inhabitants has the right to permit *1146the inspection in his or her own right and that the others have assumed the risk that one of their number might permit the common area to be searched.
Brown v. State, 691 N.E.2d at 443 (citations omitted) (emphasis supplied).
The determination whether valid consent to search has been given must be judged against an objective standard, ie., whether the facts available to the officer at the moment would warrant a man of reasonable caution in the belief that the consenting party had authority over the premises. Illinois v. Rodriguez, 497 U.S. 177, 110 S.Ct. 2793, 111 L.Ed.2d 148.
[I]n order to satisfy the “reasonableness” requirement of the Fourth Amendment, what is generally demanded of the many factual determinations that must regularly be made by agents of the government — whether the magistrate issuing a warrant, the police officer executing a warrant, the police officer conducting a search or seizure under one of the exceptions to the warrant requirement — is not that they always be correct, but that they always be reasonable.
Illinois v. Rodriguez, 497 U.S. at 185, 110 S.Ct. 2793.
In Myers v. State, 564 N.E.2d 287 (Ind.Ct.App.1990), this court commented on the reasonableness requirement discussed in Rodriguez:
We caution, however, as did the Supreme Court, that reasonableness indeed means reasonableness. There is no constitutional authorization to enter a premises or a car based on a grant of consent that would not “ ‘warrant a man of reasonable belief that the consenting party had authority over the” property in question. Rodriguez, supra, [497] U.S. at [188], 110 S.Ct. at 2801 (quoting Tory v. Ohio, (1968), 392 U.S. 1, 21-22, 88 S.Ct. 1868, 1880, 20 L.Ed.2d 889).
Myers v. State, 564 N.E.2d at 290.
In my view, it was not reasonable for the officers to believe that Tungate had mutual use of and joint access to Krise’s purse and the closed container within it in which the methamphetamine was found. A purse is a unique and special type of container in which a person possesses the highest expectation of privacy. See Wyoming v. Houghton, 526 U.S. 295, 119 S.Ct. 1297, 143 L.Ed.2d 408 (1999) (Breyer, J., concurring); United States v. Welch, 4 F.3d 761 (9th Cir.1993); State v. Friedel, 714 N.E.2d 1231 (Ind.Ct.App.1999).
State v. Friedel, 714 N.E.2d 1231, involved the warrantless search,of Friedel’s purse, which was found in a van that the police had stopped because it was being operated with only one headlight. After stopping the van, the police officers learned that the male driver had a number of prior charges, but no outstanding warrants. The officers then obtained the driver’s consent to search the van for drugs or guns and ordered all passengers from the van. Friedel was the only woman passenger, but the officers did not seek or receive her consent to search the purse found in the van. In determining that the warrant-less search of Friedel’s purse was unreasonable and unconstitutional, this court stated:
When the officers decided to search Friedel’s purse they knew that it was a woman’s handbag and that Friedel was the only woman in the vehicle. They also found the purse on the floor in the back seat where Friedel had been sitting. Under these circumstances, it was unreasonable for the officers to believe that [the driver] had the authority to consent to a search of the purse especially “since a purse is generally not an object for which two or more persons share common use or authority.” People v. James, 163 Ill.2d 302, 206 Ill.Dec. 190, 645 N.E.2d 195, 203 (1994).
State v. Friedel, 714 N.E.2d at 1240-41 (footnote omitted).
Brown v. State, 691 N.E.2d 438, upon which the majority relies, involved an issue similar to that presented here,3 but Brown *1147is distinguishable from this case. In Brown, the police did not search a container such as a wallet, purse, or luggage that belonged solely to the defendant. See State v. Friedel, 714 N.E.2d 1231.
The majority also relies upon Bruce v. State, 268 Ind. 180, 375 N.E.2d 1042 (1978), cert. denied, 439 U.S. 988, 99 S.Ct. 586, 58 L.Ed.2d 662. Bruce, like Brown, involved an issue similar to that presented in this case,4 but I believe that Bruce is also distinguishable. In Bruce, there was ample evidence that the wife had joint access to the dresser, closet, and jewelry box found in the parties’ shared bedroom, and it was therefore reasonable to conclude that Bruce assumed the risk that his wife would permit a search of their bedroom. Here, Krise’s purse obviously did not belong to Tungate, and there was no evidence that Tungate had mutual use of and joint access to it.
I would reverse.

. In Brown, the defendant's girlfriend invited the police to enter the home she shared with *1147the defendant, and she took the police to a bedroom where the defendant was sleeping. While in the bedroom, the police noticed a knife on a dresser and asked the girlfriend for permission to search the residence to obtain the knife. The girlfriend also provided police with a pair of driving gloves the defendant had worn the night before. The girlfriend later gave police consent to search for a ring that weis located on a cosmetic table in the bedroom she shared with the defendant. The defendant in Brown asserted that the trial court erred in admitting the gloves, knife, and ring, claiming that the girlfriend’s consent was invalid because the police could not have reasonably believed that the girlfriend had common authority over his personal effects. Our supreme court held that the issue was not whether the defendant's girlfriend had common authority over the defendant’s personal effects but, rather, whether the girlfriend had common authority over the home and specifically over the bedroom.

. In Bruce, the defendant's wife consented to a search of her and the defendant’s home. The wife then retrieved evidence, including the defendant’s clothing, shotgun shells, and keys from the couple’s bedroom, and she gave that evidence to the police. The clothing and shotgun shells were retrieved from a dresser and closet, and the keys were removed from a jewelry box. The defendant claimed that all three places, i.e., the dresser, closet, and jewelry box, were used exclusively by himself. Our supreme court determined that "the trial court was amply justified in finding that Mrs. Bruce 'generally had joint access' to all areas within her own bedroom, including appellant’s jewelry box." Bruce v. State, 375 N.E.2d at 1072.