Court Opinion

ID: 9523863
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 02:47:49.340184+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:08:21.972365
License: Public Domain

SULLIVAN, Judge,
dissenting.
The crucial factor leading to the majority's affirmance is its statement that during the patdown for weapons, "Officer Wallace felt an object in, Parker's shorts that he immediately determined was cocaine." Op. at 995 (emphasis supplied). In my view, the officer could not have determined it to be cocaine until he removed the plastic bag from Parker's pocket and saw that it contained cocaine powder, as opposed to crack cocaine which was the case in Minnesota v. Dickerson (1993) 508 U.S. 366, 113 S.Ct. 2130, 124 L.Ed.2d 384. The "plain feel" test would seem more difficult to be met here, than in Dickerson. In Dickerson, the officer stated that the small lump felt in Dickerson's pocket "slid and it felt to be a lump of crack cocaine in cellophane". 508 U.S. at 369, 113 S.Ct. at 2133. Yet the United States Supreme Court agreed with the Minnesota Supreme Court and held that the discovery of the cocaine exceeded the permissible bounds of the pat-down search. Our case involved powder cocaine and was therefore even less susceptible to immediate identification by feel. In my estimation the result in Dickerson dictates reversal in this case.
There is yet another aspect to the denial of the motion to suppress which leads me to dissent. The "plain feel" doctrine adopted in this state from Dickerson is admittedly an extension of the "plain view" doctrine. We have previously noted that in order to be admissible under a "plain view" theory, the discovery of the contraband must be inadvertent. See Wood v. State (1992) Ind.App., 592 N.E.2d 740, 742. Clearly, Officer Wallace's discovery of cocaine was not inadvertent, during a weapons patdown. When Parker and his companion were stopped by the police, Officer Swarm immediately stated that he was "conducting a narcotics investigation." Op. at 995. The informant had advised police that Parker would be carrying cocaine and would be selling the cocaine at the liquor store. It was clear, therefore, that the purpose in making the patdown was to ascertain the presence of cocaine.
Even if the patdown was being conducted for the officers' safety as well as for purposes of the narcotics investigation, the fact remains that when Officer Wallace felt the object, later discovered to be cocaine in powder form, he immediately knew it was not a weapon. Nevertheless, his search for cocaine persisted and he removed the packet from Parker's pocket.
*1001I believe the facts and the holdings of Dickerson, supra, and C.D.T. v. State (1995) Ind.App., 653 N.E.2d 1041 are more closely analogous to the case before us and dictate reversal of the trial court's ruling upon the motion to suppress. In this respect I believe that Bratcher v. State (1996) Ind.App., 661 N.E.2d 828, relied upon by the majority, was wrongly decided and I would decline to follow it.