Court Opinion

ID: 9751300
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 16:20:20.445617+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:26:42.486653
License: Public Domain

Concurring Opinion by
Spaeth, J.:
The majority sanctions the search of the black bag because it was abandoned and in the plain view of the police officer. Both reasons are, on the facts here, troublesome.
Our Supreme Court has stated in Commonwealth v. Platou, 455 Pa. 258, 267, 312 A.2d 29, 34 (1973), cert. denied, 417 U.S. 976 (1974), that “[pjersonal belongings ... retain their constitutional protection until their owner meaningfully abdicates control or responsibility.” Here, appellant Ettien placed a black bag in a dog house located on the premises he was visiting. I do not think a person can be said to have abandoned property that is inside a bag and has been placed in a structure on private property. The fact that Ettien was only a guest is irrelevant. Jones v. United States, 362 U.S. 257, 267 (1960). “Appellant maintained his reasonable expectation of privacy.” Platou, supra, at 267, 312 A.2d at 34.
*620The difficulty I have in applying the plain view doctrine is that the police officer was legitimately on the front of the premises only, investigating the motorist’s complaint about the Cubler child; this investigation did not lead the officer to the rear of the premises. “The [plain view] doctrine serves to supplement the prior justification — whether it be a warrant for another object, hot pursuit, search incident to lawful arrest, or some other legitimate reason for being present unconnected with a search directed against the accused.” Coolidge v. New Hampshire, 403 U.S. 443, 466 (1971).
Nonetheless, I agree that the search and seizure should be sustained. Judge Hoffman is correct that the record in this case does not reveal the reliability of the source that led to the surveillance of the Cubler home. This would be relevant, however, only if the surveillance were the sole ingredient in the determination of probable cause. If it were, the officer, in determining whether probable cause to search existed, could not legitimately rely only upon a surveillance conducted by other officers and not itself founded on probable cause. Whiteley v. Warden, 401 U.S. 560, 568 (1971). Here, however, the neighbor’s information, coupled with the officer’s personal knowledge of the surveillance, was enough “to warrant a man of reasonable caution in the belief that an offense has been or is being committed.” Commonwealth v. De Luca, 230 Pa. Superior Ct. 390, 396, 326 A.2d 463, 467 (1974).
I believe that once the officer was legitimately in the rear yard of the Cubler home, he could proceed to the dog house to seize the black bag to prevent its destruction. See Schmerber v. California, 384 U.S. 757, 770 (1966). In concluding otherwise, Judge Hoffman reads the emergency exception to the fourth amendment too restrictively, in my judgment. I would defer more than he to the sensible and reasonable police action in this case. Although there were three police officers on the scene, the officer near the dog house could have reasonably con-*621eluded that the contraband would have been destroyed in the time it took him to walk from the front of the house to the rear to alert the other officers. The officer therefore sensibly decided to open the bag. Then, recognizing that he could not make a warrantless search of the Cubler home itself, see Vale v. Louisiana, 399 U.S. 30, 84 (1970), he made a sensible distinction between a dog house and a house occupied by people, and obtained a warrant for the latter.
Therefore, although I recognize that “the perennial problem of line drawing is not easily solved,” United States v. Connolly, 479 F.2d 930, 934 (9th Cir. 1973), I join the majority in affirming the judgment of sentence.
Jacobs and Ceecone, JJ., join in this opinion.