Court Opinion

ID: 9527179
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 03:28:08.695935+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:25:36.710801
License: Public Domain

MADDOX, Justice
(dissenting).
I concur in all that Mr. Justice Merrill has said in his dissent, but wish to add a few additional views.
As Justice Merrill pointed out in Davis v. State, 286 Ala. 117, 237 So.2d 640 (1970), and again in his dissent, this Court was compelled to follow decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States, but he added that we did not retreat from the established propositions that only the probability, and not a prima facie showing, of criminal activity is the standard of probable cause.
The exclusionary rule, which the majority applies, was “a judicial-created, remedy designed to safeguard Fourth Amendment rights generally through its deterrent effect, * * * rather than a personal constitutional right of the party aggrieved.” (United States v. Calandra, 1974, 414 U.S. 338, 94 S.Ct. 613, 38 L.Ed.2d 561.) In Calandra, even the three dissenting justices admitted that “It is true that deterrence was a prominent consideration whether Mapp v. Ohio, 367 U.S. 643, 81 S.Ct. 1684, 6 L.Ed.2d 1081 (1961), which applied the exclusionary rule to the States, should be given retrospective effect.”
Even though Calandra involved the invocation of the exclusionary rule by Calandra in a grand jury proceeding and does not decide the question of the admissibility of illegally-seized evidence in a subsequent criminal prosecution of the search victim, such as is here involved with Horzempa, Calandra nevertheless seems to be a straw in the wind that the Supreme Court of the United States, as presently constituted, intends to re-examine the practical efficacy of the exclusionary rule in all criminal proceedings,1
As I read the “search and seizure” cases, most start out with the proposition that a warrant should be obtained in every case, if possible, but that there are many exceptions. Daniels v. State, 290 Ala. 316, 276 So.2d 441 (1973). Here, there was a *146warrant, issued by an independent magistrate. A reading of the affidavit convinces me that the officer attempted to follow meticulously the requirements of the law in stating that his informer was credible. When the affiant said that his informers had stated that “the above drugs of Marijuana and Mescaline are now in the house . . .’’it just seems to me that common sense dictates that they knew this as a result of sight, touch or smell. The majority apparently would approve this warrant if it had been said the informant had seen the drugs. I wish my brothers would not be this technical. By being so technical, they classify the police conduct here as “unreasonable”' — the word used in the Fourth Amendment to the Federal Constitution and in Article 1, Section 5 of the Alabama Constitution.
They say the magistrate lacked “probable cause.” I realize that the “search and seizure” cases of the Supreme Court of the United States in the last ten years have been rather technical and restrictive. The late Mr. Justice Black, in Whiteley v. Warden of Wyoming State Penitentiary, 401 U.S. 560, 91 S.Ct. 1031, 28 L.Ed.2d 306 (1971), [dissenting opinion] 401 U.S. at page 570, 91 S.Ct. at page 1038, noted that Whiteley represented:
“ . . .a gross and wholly indefensible miscarriage of justice calculated to make many good people believe our Court actually enjoys frustrating justice by unnecessarily turning professional criminals loose to prey upon society with impunity.”
Calandra says the exclusionary rule was a judicially made rule which was designed to deter public officials from violating Fourth Amendment rights. Is there one hint here that the conduct of the police, who took the information before a magistrate and got a warrant, acted in such a manner that their conduct should be deterred ?
I believe Calandra constitutes a chink in the armor of the “exclusionary rule” which has been applied to turn so many criminals loose. I wish my brothers would examine this case in light of Calandra. I believe they would see that suppression of the evidence here will have no deterrent effect. It will only release another convicted person.
I wish the majority would examine the police conduct here with that condemned in Mapp. I think they would see the vast distinction.
Furthermore, I went to the record of the Court of Criminal Appeals to see what evidence, if any, there was before the issuing magistrate other than that contained in the affidavit. The record indicates there was none. The record does show there was a hearing before the circuit judge on the motion to suppress which was held in the “anteroom” of the court. There is no transcription of the evidence or arguments made at that time; therefore, I cannot tell whether the issuing magistrate had other evidence than that contained in the affidavit. If the defendant claimed error in the ruling of the trial court on his motion to suppress, it would seem to be incumbent upon him to show at the hearing on the motion to suppress that there was no other competent evidence before the magistrate to support the magistrate’s issuance of the warrant.
I believe that the guilt of Horzempa was established by a fair and impartial trial. He had able counsel. I would affirm his conviction.

. At an Appellate Judges’ Seminar held in Miami Beach, Florida in January, 1974, several state judges and justices from throughout the country seemed to think that the exclusionary rule may be re-examined by the Supreme Court and modified.