Court Opinion

ID: 9856964
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 07:08:38.246758+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:37:36.380612
License: Public Domain

Beasley, Judge,
concurring specially.
1. I concur in the ruling in Division 1 because of the law governing pat-downs or “frisks,” as established by the United States Supreme Court in Terry v. Ohio, 392 U. S. 1 (88 SC 1868, 20 LE2d 889) (1968), and such subsequent cases as Sibron v. New York, 392 U. S. 40, 62 (IV) (88 SC 1889, 20 LE2d 917) (1968); Adams v. Williams, 407 U. S. 143 (92 SC 1921, 32 LE2d 612) (1972); Pennsylvania *399v. Mimms, 434 U. S. 106, 110 (98 SC 330, 54 LE2d 331) (1977); Ybarra v. Illinois, 444 U. S. 85, 92-94 (100 SC 338, 62 LE2d 238) (1979); Michigan v. Long, 463 U. S. 1032, 1045 (III) (103 SC 3469, 77 LE2d 1201) (1983).1
In Long, the Supreme Court repeated the framework in which the validity of the challenged pat-down must be evaluated for Fourth Amendment constitutionality. “[T]he ‘(t)ouchstone of our analysis ... is always “the reasonableness in all the circumstances of the particular governmental invasion of a citizen’s personal security.” ’ ” (Citations omitted.) Long, supra, 463 U. S. at 1051. “ ‘(T)he issue is whether a reasonably prudent man in the circumstances would be warranted in the belief that his safety or that of others was in danger.’ ” (Citations omitted.) Id. at 1050.
The Court recognized in this and the earlier cases that the need for protection of police justifies protective searches when police have a reasonable belief that the suspect poses a danger, and that roadside encounters between police and suspects are especially hazardous. The belief must be based on “ ‘specific and articulable facts which, taken together with the rational inferences from those facts, reasonably warrant’ the officer in believing that the suspect is dangerous and the suspect may gain immediate control of weapons.” (Citation and footnote omitted.) Id. at 1049. A frisk must be predicated on a reasonable belief that the person to be patted down is armed and presently dangerous. Ybarra, supra at 92-94.
Assuming for the moment that Officer Williams reasonably suspected that the two men were engaged in, or were about to be engaged in, criminal activity, as he articulated, and that their behavior created a reasonable belief that one or both men were armed with some sort of weapon and thus presently dangerous, he was not authorized to reach into Newton’s pocket, retrieve Newton’s wallet, and examine its contents.
The reason the officer gave for the pat-down was that he was about to conduct the search of the automobile, to which driver Cheek had consented, and that “before I search any vehicle or turn my back on anybody that I’m involved with I pat them down for weapons *400because in my past experience I’ve found drivers and passengers of vehicles to have weapons on them — in their wallet. I got razor blades, knives, everything else out of people’s wallets, pockets, socks, underwear, and it’s my policy before I turn my back and start searching somebody’s car I pat whoever comes out of that car or who’s in the area down.” On cross-examination he further explained that he went into Newton’s back pocket and pulled out the wallet because it could have contained a weapon. He said he had gotten Derringers out of wallets before, and a wallet could contain a little knife or razor blades or “anything.”
In Sibron, the Supreme Court examined the nature and scope of a pat-down and search and pointed out that “[t]he search for weapons approved in Terry consisted solely of a limited patting of the outer clothing of the suspect for concealed objects which might be used as instruments of assault. Only when he discovered such objects did the officer in Terry place his hands in the pockets of the men he searched.” Sibron, supra, 392 U. S. at 65. Such a search must be “reasonábly limited in scope to the accomplishment of the only goal which might conceivably have justified its inception — the protection of the officer by disarming a potentially dangerous man.” Id. The search “must ... be confined in scope to an intrusion reasonably designed to discover guns, knives, clubs, or other hidden instruments for the assault of the police officer.” Terry, supra, 392 U. S. at 29. Outside of that, the sanctity of the person against unreasonable intrusions, protected by the Fourth Amendment, is violated.
In Terry, the officer felt a gun in the outer pocket of each man’s overcoat, which authorized him to reach in and remove what turned out to be revolvers. Id. at 7. In Terry, the Court was careful to note that it was not developing the limitations which the Fourth Amendment places on protective seizure and search for weapons; these would have to be developed “in the concrete factual circumstances of individual cases.” Id. at 29.
Officer Williams did not feel a weapon. He felt an object, one frequently carried by a man in his pocket, which the officer believed might contain a weapon. The Supreme Court has not extended the search-of-person authority to this degree or level, although in Long the Court approved the search of a pouch seen on the seat of a vehicle, which pouch the trial court found could have contained a weapon. Long, supra, 463 U. S. at 1036, 1050-1051. This intrusion, the Court held, “was ‘strictly circumscribed by the exigencies which justifi(ed) its initiation.’ [Cit.]” Id. at 1051. But in this case there were no circumstances which would support a reasonable belief that what the officer felt with his hand contained a weapon. True, it might, and possibly could, contain a very small but potentially lethal weapon. Nevertheless, it was an innocuous and ordinary size common men’s *401wallet without any bulge or other telltale sign, resting in a commonly located place. The limited authority to intrude beyond the outside of a person’s clothing in a frisk, when the police do not yet have probable cause, covers objects which may be weapons but not objects which possibly could contain weapons. If that were the law, then an officer could reach in and retrieve any item which felt like a container, including anybody’s wallet, because even a very small container could harbor a razor blade. The officer is authorized only to “conduct a patdown to find weapons that he reasonably believes or suspects are then in the possession of the person he has accosted.” Ybarra, supra, 444 U. S. at 93. No circumstances were present which would support a reasonable belief that an object which felt like a wallet contained a concealed weapon, such as evasive actions by defendant demonstrating a desire to keep from the officer’s knowledge a hidden weapon. Cf. Hayes v. State, supra. See Wyatt v. State, 151 Ga. App. 207, 209 (1) (a) (259 SE2d 199) (1979).
Decided July 16, 1997
David McDade, District Attorney, William H. McClain, Assistant District Attorney, for appellant.
Zell & Zell, Glenn Zell, for appellee.
The trial court in this case found that the officer had no articulable suspicion of crime, that Newton did not indicate any threat to the officer, and that Newton did not consent to a search of his person. The court concluded that “[t]he officer exceeded the scope of a Terry pat-down when he removed the wallet and looked inside it. . . . Even presuming that the officer had authority to pat down Newton during the consent search of the vehicle, that did not include the authority to go into the wallet of the defendant.” I do not agree that the undisputed facts fail to show a legitimate suspicion of crime and that they fail to justify the frisk. They do. But I agree that extricating and searching the wallet exceeded Fourth Amendment bounds.
2. As to the other divisions in the majority opinion, I concur only in the judgment.

 The state constitution is ignored by defendant in pressing his claim of rights violation. His motion to suppress invokes the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution and cursorily “similar provisions of the Georgia Constitution” and unspecified “Georgia law.” But he bypasses the nebulously mentioned state constitutional ground in pursuing his position, and the trial court did not rule on it. In consequence, neither can we. See, e.g., Hayes v. State, 202 Ga. App. 204, 207 (414 SE2d 321) (1991) (Beasley, J., concurring specially); Taylor v. State, 177 Ga. App. 624, 628 (3) (340 SE2d 263) (1986). It is notable that between 1970 and 1988, without even considering the years since then, there were more than 450 state court opinions that took state constitutions beyond the federal guarantee; more than one-third concerned criminal procedure issues. LaFave & Israel, Criminal Procedure, § 210 at 95 (2d ed. 1992).