Court Opinion

ID: 9760542
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 00:59:32.451884+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:29:13.372855
License: Public Domain

Dissenting Opinion by
MURPHY, J.
I agree that if incriminating evidence is acquired by the search of a container being carried by the person who was the subject of a valid Terry frisk, “the State can sustain its burden of proof that the search was reasonable either by having the officer explain why it was necessary to conduct that search or by demonstrating from the container itself that a pat-down would not have revealed the presence or absence of a weapon.” I would, however, affirm the judgment of conviction on the ground that Petitioner’s trial counsel never argued to the Circuit Court that the evidence should be suppressed because the State failed to establish that a pat-down of the gym bag would have been a futile gesture.
The record shows that Petitioner’s trial counsel presented the following argument to the suppression hearing court:
This is a search and seizure. This is ... where an officer decides to take a leap that he thinks there is a gun in a bag and I don’t know why he’s thinking there’s a gun in the bag---- There isn’t any logic or reasonableness to him thinking that there’s a gun in the bag.
It’s a total leap for him and what [he] had is when he was walking up there, he was going to search the bag. He was going to search Mr. McDowell. He was placing Mr. McDowell in custody---- That’s an illegal arrest. When he *343searched his bag, that was an illegal search. It was a total leap—it was not a pat down. It was not a Terry search based on a reasonable suspicion. It was a flatout search and seizure and arrest without probable cause.
Had the “failure to pat-down the bag” argument been presented to the suppression hearing court, that court could have exercised its discretion to allow the State to reopen its case in order to present evidence that a pat-down would not have revealed the presence or absence of a weapon. Because that argument was presented for the first time in the Court of Special Appeals, I would affirm the judgment of conviction.
I am persuaded that petitioner’s “failure to pat-down the bag” argument actually presented a “new issue” raised for the first time on appeal, rather than an additional argument in support of a preserved appellate issue. It is clear, however, that both of Maryland’s appellate courts have discretion to “consider claims of error which have not been presented and decided by the trial court.” Squire v. State, 280 Md. 132, 134, 368 A.2d 1019, 1020 (1977). It was therefore appropriate for this Court to address the “failure to pat-down the bag” argument because (1) we did not agree with the analysis of that argument in the reported opinion of the Court of Special Appeals, and (2) a reported opinion of that Court “remains the law unless and until it is overruled[J” Deems v. W. Maryland Ry. Co., 247 Md. 95, 102, 231 A.2d 514, 518 (1967). The question is whether this Court can both (1) overrule a Court of Special Appeals’ opinion that addressed an “unpreserved” issue,1 and (2) affirm the judgment of the Circuit Court on the ground of non-preservation? In my opinion, the answer to this question is, “yes.”
*344In Crown Oil v. Glen, 320 Md. 546, 578 A.2d 1184 (1990), after concluding that a “theory [that was not argued] until the case was briefed for the Court of Special Appeals ... does not present a new issue, but it is an additional argument for [the relief requested in the Circuit Court,]” this Court stated:
Even if the ... argument were a new issue, raised for the first time on appeal, this Court has discretion under Rule 8-131(a) to consider it, and we exercise that discretion to consider the “issue” in this case.
Nor is any exercise of discretion on this Court’s part negated by the determination of the Court of Special Appeals that it would not consider the “issue,” even though expressly urged to do so. This Court may exercise discretion independently under those circumstances. We need not first conclude that there was an abuse of discretion by the Court of Special Appeals.
Id. at 561-62, 578 A.2d at 1191. In my opinion, because “[t]his Court may exercise discretion independently,” our decision to overrule the Court of Special Appeals’ opinion as to the merits of petitioner’s “failure to pat-down the bag” argument does not preclude us from exercising our discretion to nonetheless affirm the judgment of the Circuit Court on the ground that this argument was not preserved for appellate review.

. The case at bar does not appear to be one in which the Court of Special Appeals exercised its discretion to address an unpreserved issue because (1) no such exercise of discretion is discussed in that Court’s opinion, and (2) neither in its briefs nor in its response to the cert. petition has the State ever argued that the “failure to pat-down the bag” argument was not preserved for appellate review.