Court Opinion

ID: 9724167
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 10:47:31.67731+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:24:56.863110
License: Public Domain

T. E. Brennan, J.
(dissenting). The defendant Turner was convicted in a bench trial on two counts, charging sale and possession of heroin.
On appeal, the Court of Appeals reversed the conviction for sale of heroin, and ordered the entry of a verdict of acquittal on that count. The Court of Appeals held that defendant acted only as a procuring agent for one Partridge, and that as the *26agent of the buyer and not the seller, defendant was not guilty of violation of MCLA 335.152; MSA 18.1122.
No appeal was taken by the people from the decision of the Court of Appeals with respect to the count for the sale of heroin. With respect to the possession charge, the Court of Appeals affirmed the conviction.
This appeal was brought to our Court by the defendant, who seeks to reverse his conviction for possession of heroin. Defendant asks reversal on the ground that his possession was that of a conduit from the seller to Partridge. But the Court of Appeals held that a procuring agent could be guilty of possession and based its ruling on Commonwealth v Harvard, 356 Mass 452; 253 NE2d 346 (1969). The Massachusetts Supreme Court there stated:
"Admittedly, the defendant was in possession of marihuana on May 17 when Zacharo handed the plastic bag containing it to the defendant who in turn passed it to Martin. The defendant argues that such fleeting, momentary contact with the drug does not constitute the possession proscribed by the statute. We disagree. At the moment the defendant received the drug he had the control and power to do with it what he willed. In this case he chose to hand it immediately to Martin rather than hold it longer, keep it himself, or otherwise deal with it. Possession ought not to depend on the duration of time elapsing after one has an object under his control.’,’
We granted leave to appeal because there is respectable authority in Michigan to the effect that fleeting, momentary contact with a contraband substance does not constitute unlawful possession. People v Ninehouse, 227 Mich 480; 198 *27NW 973 (1924), and People v Leslie, 239 Mich 334; 214 NW 128 (1927).
The facts in People v Ninehouse, 227 Mich 480, 481-482, 484 (1924), were as follows:
"Defendant was convicted of unlawfully transporting and having in his possession one pint of whisky and prosecutes review on exceptions before sentence. Defendant owned and operated a taxicab in the city of Muskegon and the night of June 21, 1923, responded to a call for a taxicab service, carried a man and a woman to where the man wanted to go, and when the man got out, the woman paid defendant $5 to take her for a ride in the country. While on the ride he claims she produced a bottle of 'moonshine whisky,’ invited him to have a drink and, he being willing, she passed the bottle and he took a drink and handed the bottle back. During the course of the ride he took several drinks, each time returning the bottle to the woman.”
There, the Court held as follows:
"In taking and drinking from and returning the bottle, was defendant guilty of unlawful possession while the bottle was in his hand and he was pouring the stuff down his gullet? We must answer, No.”
The facts in People v Leslie were similar. There, the court affirmatively instructed the jury that the defendant was guilty of the offense of having intoxicating liquors in his possession and that it was their duty to find him guilty. According to the defendant’s testimony, however, the jug of liquor belonged to one Dale Crown and was in Crown’s possession at all times except when the defendant took drinks from it. The Court held that the possession acquired while taking a drink of liquor from a bottle was not a violation of the statute, citing People v Ninehouse, and concluded that the issue should have been submitted to the jury.
*28The facts in the case before us do not fit into the mold of the Ninehouse and Leslie cases. We are not talking here about one whose possession of the prohibited substance was incidental only to the consumption or use thereof. Indeed, there is no evidence in the case before us of any use of heroin by the defendant.
In the case at bar, there was testimony from which the trial judge could have concluded beyond reasonable doubt that the defendant was in the sole and exclusive possession of the heroin for a period of several hours during which time he alone transported it from Detroit to the City of Tecumseh in Lenawee County.
The Court of Appeals held that the defendant was not guilty of sale in that he acted only as a procuring agent in the acquisition and delivery of the heroin.
There is nothing in the nature of the agency relationship which negates the possibility of possession by the agent within the meaning of the statute. The word possession is used in the statute in its commonly understood sense. People v Harper, 365 Mich 494; 113 NW2d 808 (1962).
Upon this record, unlawful possession of heroin was established. We should not extend the rule of Ninehouse and Leslie to a case in which, the possession of the prohibited substance is not merely incidental to its use or consumption.
Despite the narrow purpose for which leave was granted, the majority of the Court upon submission of the cause has concluded that the testimony established an unlawful entrapment of the defendant, thus vitiating the conviction for possession of heroin.
The law of entrapment has very old and deep roots in this jurisdiction. Some of our early cases *29have been the occasion of the expression of judicial indignation with and disapproval of official inducement to the commission of crime. The basis in logic and law for the defense of entrapment has not always been abundantly clear or consistent. Certain rules, however, surfaced. The first is that where the commission of the offense has been induced or participated in by a law enforcement officer, a private detective, or an individual employed for the purpose of ferreting out crime, such participation and purpose can be shown as affecting the credibility of the decoy.
This appears to have been the majority rule in Saunders v People, 38 Mich 218, 222-223 (1878). That case is notable also for the strong pronouncements in the concurring opinion of Justice Marston and for the concurring view of Chief Justice Campbell to the effect that "the encouragement of criminals to induce them to commit crimes in order to get up a prosecution against them, is scandalous and reprehensible.”
The case of People v McCord, 76 Mich 200; 42 NW 1106 (1889) is a classic example of entrapment and one which occasioned the strongest remonstrance by the Supreme Court. There, the defendant was intoxicated and was induced or encouraged by one Flint, a private detective, to break into a building which was owned by Flint’s employers. The window was left unlocked and when the defendant and Flint entered the building, the defendant was brutally maimed while Flint was unharmed. While the opinion addresses itself to the problem of the improper use of deadly force in the apprehension of a felon, it also speaks with authority to the proposition that a person who takes active measures to persuade another to enter his premises and take his property cannot treat *30the taking as a crime. In this respect, the McCord case seems founded in the doctrine discussed in People v Liphardt, 105 Mich 80; 62 NW 1022 (1895). There, quoting from text authority, the Court points out one fundamental basis in reason for the doctrine of entrapment. It lies in the notion of consent, that is to say, that where the supposed victim of a crime has in fact connived and consented to the commission of it, the act is not in fact criminal. This is particularly true in cases of larceny or burglary and, when combined with the brutality and cowardice described in People v McCord, the conduct is truly reprehensible.
These cases might well be described as instances of true or classic entrapment. It is important to note that in such instances, the previous criminal disposition of the defendant is not a factor which mitigates against a finding of entrapment.
Indeed, the concurrence of Justice Marston in Saunders v People would suggest that the defense of entrapment in a proper case is especially available to one who lacks the normal capacity to avoid temptation.
"The mere fact that the person contemplating the commission of a crime is supposed to be an old offender can be no excuse, much less a justification for the course adopted and pursued in this case. If such were the fact, then the greater reason would seem to exist why he should not be actively assisted and encouraged in the commission of a new offense which could in no way tend to throw light upon his past iniquities, or aid in punishing him therefor, as the law does not contemplate or allow the conviction and punishment of parties on account of their general bad or criminal conduct, irrespective of their guilt or innocence of the particular offense charged and for which they are being tried. Human nature is frail enough at best, and requires no encouragement in wrong-doing. If we cannot assist another and prevent him from violating the laws of the *31land, we at least should abstain from any active efforts in the way of leading him into temptation. Desire to commit crime and opportunities for the commission thereof would seem sufficiently general and numerous, and no special efforts would seem necessary in the way of encouragement or assistance in that direction.”
But the adaptation of the doctrine of entrapment to a charge of unlawful sale or possession of contraband is not so readily or easily made. The basis of consent is generally wanting. Indeed, the crime of unlawful sale always involves a buyer and a seller. The element of inducement, encouragement, or enticement, which may be probative in a claimed entrapment to larceny, is, at best, an ambivalent standard in a case of unlawful sale.
Unlawful sales are rarely, if ever, intentionally made to persons known to be law enforcement officers. Unlawful sales are rarely, if ever, made except when the confidence of the seller has been gained by the purchaser.
The notion that a crime is the product of entrapment, where the idea for the commission of the crime is germinated in the mind of the officer—the so-called creative activity test—is peculiarly inapplicable in a prosecution for unlawful sale. To rule otherwise would be to hold that government may only proscribe the offering and not the sale. Each case would turn upon the question of whether the illegal bargain began with an offer to sell or an offer to buy.
Our decisions have been uniform in holding that inducement, encouragement, or invitation to the making of an unlawful sale does not constitute entrapment, even where misrepresentations, connivance, trickery, or subterfuge have been used to gain the confidence of the seller. People v Murphy, 93 Mich 41; 52 NW 1042 (1892); People v Curtis, 95 Mich 212; 54 NW 767 (1893); People v Rice, 103 *32Mich 350; 61 NW 540 (1894); People v Everts, 112 Mich 194; 70 NW 430 (1897); People v Lalonde, 171 Mich 286; 137 NW 74 (1912); People v McIntyre, 218 Mich 540; 188 NW 407 (1922); People v Christiansen, 220 Mich 506; 190 NW 236 (1922); and People v England, 221 Mich 607; 192 NW 612 (1923).
In the case before us, the trial judge in his findings of facts specifically determined, that the agent Partridge made only one request for heroin; that Partridge was not a knowledgeable person in the area of narcotics but that the defendant was; that the defendant knew how to use heroin and how to make a profit on the sale of drugs.
Under all the circumstances, the decision of the trial judge and the Court of Appeals should be affirmed.