Court Opinion

ID: 9761860
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 01:57:15.261639+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:29:27.167458
License: Public Domain

Olly Neal, Judge, dissenting. This criminal appeal is taken from a judgment of conviction based on appellant’s conditional guilty plea to possession of a controlled substance with intent to deliver. Mr. Ramage argues on appeal that the trial court erred in denying his pretrial motion to suppress certain physical evidence. I agree that the evidence should have been suppressed and would reverse his conviction. At the hearing on appellant’s motion to suppress, Michael L. Coleman, the police officer who arrested appellant, testified that he stopped a car appellant was driving on July 10, 1996, in a high crime area in Pine Bluff because “the little plate bulb that illuminates the license plate was out.” Appellant could not produce a driver’s license, and the car he was driving bore a fictitious license plate. Mr. Ramage was allowed to go to the passenger side of the car to look for his registration and insurance documents in the glove box while the officer “attempted to assist him” by searching the driver’s side. When Officer Coleman flipped the driver-side sun visor down, a package of cigarettes and a box of matches fell onto the seat. He admitted that he picked up both items “to see if anything out of the ordinary was there” and testified that the box did not sound like it contained matches when he shook it. The officer then opened the box, found rock cocaine inside, and placed appellant under arrest. In addition to being charged with possession with intent, appellant was ultimately cited for his failure to produce a driver’s license and received a warning ticket for the burned out “registration light.” Contrary to the majority decision, we should not validate Officer Coleman’s alleged “inadvertent discovery” of contraband by declaring that it occurred during a lawful search, incident to appellant’s arrest. The arresting officer did not have probable cause to arrest Mr. Ramage when he found the incriminating evidence; he was in the process of determining whether Ramage possessed the very documents that would have completely exonerated Ramage of any criminal liability. The search also preceded officer Coleman’s discovery of any circumstance or evidence that would have given him authority to impound Ramage’s car, thereby obfuscating any claim that the search was a valid inventory search. The record is completely devoid of any testimony or other real evidence as to whether Ramage was able to produce proof of insurance and registration at trial. We cannot reasonably rely upon the “inevitable discovery” doctrine, because it is apparent that, but for the officer’s belated decision to arrest appellant or to impound his vehicle, neither a search incident to the arrest nor an inventory search could have been lawfully performed; the officer simply was in no position to “discover” any contraband without violating appellant’s Fourth Amendment rights. As a final note, appellant’s standing to raise the Fourth Amendment violation at issue is not properly before us; the State never once raised that issue at trial. Our supreme court specifically stated in Pulaski County v. Carriage Creek Imp. Dist. No. 639, 319 Ark. 12, 888 S.W. 2d 652 (1994): [W]e are unaware of any authority in this Court holding that lack of standing deprives a trial court of jurisdiction. (Citation omitted). If the issue were one of jurisdiction of the subject matter, we would address it despite the' fact that it was not raised before the Trial Court. As it is not such an issue, we decline to address it for the first time on appeal. This case was cited with approval in Arkansas Game & Fish Comm’n v. Murders, 327 Ark. 426, 938 S.W.2d 854 (1997), where the supreme court, once again, declined to discuss the issue of standing where it was not raised at trial. Furthermore, our supreme court addressed the State’s argument that standing is a jurisdictional issue in State v. Houpt, 302 Ark. 188, 788 S.W.2d 239 (1990). In Houpt, an interlocutory appeal by the State from a trial court’s order of suppression, the supreme court, in framing the issue on appeal, stated: The State asserts that it should be permitted to raise appellee’s lack of standing for the first time on appeal because appellee’s standing is a jurisdictional, or a “quasi-jurisdictional,” requirement. We reject the State’s argument. Id. at 189. Notwithstanding the fact that a criminal defendant who moves to suppress evidence bears the burden of establishing that he has standing to contest an illegal search (which was duly recognized by the Houpt court), the supreme court concluded: [T]he state’s proof apparently fell short [on the issue of probable cause to search] and it now seeks to try this same fourth amendment issue by using a different theory. In line with this court’s long standing rule that precludes appellants from raising new issues on appeal, we reject the state’s request to allow it to do so here. Id. at 191. This rule is also applicable to any non-appealing party who attempts to advance arguments for the first time on appeal. See Dempsey v. Merchant’s Nat’l Bank, 292 Ark. 207, 729 S.W.2d 150 (1987); Stoutt v. Ridgway, 9 Ark. App. 315, 658 S.W.2d 420 (1983); and Hendricks Adm’r v. Burton, 1 Ark. App. 159, 613 S.W.2d 609 (1981). It is fundamental that when a matter can readily be clarified by the trial court if a timely objection is made, failure to object prevents a party from raising the issue on appeal. Heard v. State, 212 Ark. 140, 612 S.W.2d 312 (1981). In McCoy v. State, 325 Ark. 155, 925 S.W.2d 391 (1993), Rankin v. State, 57 Ark. App. 125, 942 S.W.2d 867 (1997), and each of the other cases relied on by the majority, the issue of standing was clearly addressed by the trial court and the record was developed by each party on the issue of whether the appellant owned or held any possessory interest in the subject property. In each of those cases, it was necessary for the trial court to decide squarely whether or not the appellant had a sufficient expectation of privacy to justify his Fourth Amendment challenge to an allegedly illegal search. The present case, of course, is clearly distinguishable because no one raised the issue of appellant’s expectation of privacy or standing to challenge the search at trial. As it did in Houpt, supra, the State now attempts to circumvent the appellant’s Fourth Amendment rights by arguing a different basis for denial of appellant’s motion for suppression than it did at trial. The trial court never had an opportunity to consider the matter. It is so clear in our case law that it requires no further citation of authority that our appellate courts do not and should not consider issues which the parties have not submitted to the trial court for resolution. Our supreme court specifically stated in Rains v. State, 329 Ark. 607, 953 S.W.2d 48 (1997): It is the opportunity of the trial court to first hear and address the parties’ arguments that is of importance in determining whether the argument has been preserved for appeal. This pronouncement is consistent with the historical “established rule” the court of appeals noted in Phillips v. State, 266 Ark. 883, 890, 587 S.W.2d 83, 87 (Ark. App. 1979). There, the court unequivocally stated: IN]o party ought to be allowed to assign as error on appeal a ruling by the trial court that might have been corrected in the first instance by timely objection or inquiry. (Emphasis added.) Here, if the State believed appellant’s lack of standing was a bar to the admissibility of the testimony he offered in support of his motion to suppress, the State should have either entered a proper objection or made a proper inquiry as to whether appellant had any ownership interest in the automobile he was driving. For these reasons, I respectfully dissent. Griffen, J., joins this dissent.