Court Opinion

ID: 9571313
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 20:30:41.029778+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:26:58.674697
License: Public Domain

BURKE, J., Concurring and Dissenting.
I concur with the majority’s conclusion that the evidence discovered in the back yard was not obtained by *315an illegal search. I disagree, however, with the majority’s holding that the initial search in the house was unlawful and that evidence obtained by the subsequent search of Harris’ bedroom was tainted by the prior illegal search. The initial search in the house was upheld, in my opinion properly so, by both the municipal court and the superior court, and the Court of Appeal properly denied the instant petition for mandamus.
Petitioner sought to suppress, inter alia, evidence found during the initial search in the house and evidence found during another, later search of Harris’ bedroom. The municipal court and presumably the superior court, in concluding that the initial search in the house was lawful and the evidence thus found subject to seizure, relied upon the theory employed by the prosecutor, namely, that under the circumstances of this case it was reasonable for the officer to search in the house for suspects and that during the course of that search contraband observed in plain sight was subject to seizure. The prosecutor relied upon Guevara v. Superior Court, 7 Cal.App.3d 531 [86 Cal.Rptr. 657] (hg. den.), a case subsequently cited by us with approval in People v. Block, 6 Cal.3d 239, 245-246 [98 Cal.Rptr. 657, 491 P.2d 9], The majority fail to adequately distinguish Block from the instant case or to even mention Guevara. Both cases, as we shall see, support the lower courts’ conclusions.
Since petitioner was arrested in her backyard, the search in her house cannot be sustained as an incident to her arrest. (Vale v. Louisiana, 399 U.S. 30, 33-34 [26 L.Ed.2d 409, 412-413, 90 S.Ct. 1969]; Chimel v. California, 395 U.S. 752, 762-763 [23 L.Ed.2d 685, 693-694, 89 S.Ct. 2034].) However, as we noted in Block (at p. 243), “one of the ‘well-recognized exceptions’ [to the requirement of a search warrant] is . . . that ‘objects falling in the plain view of an officer who has a right to be in the position to have that view are subject to seizure and may be introduced in evidence. [Citations.]’ . . .” and a corollary of the “plain sight” rule is that “ ‘During a lawful search of premises for persons believed to be in hiding, police officers may seize contraband evidence “in plain sight.” ’ ”
In Block we concluded that the search there in question was “a lawful search” for additional suspects. In that case an officer, after arresting the defendant and five others downstairs in a house during an apparent “pot party,” went upstairs looking for possible suspects and there observed contraband in plain sight. In sustaining the search we stated (at p. 245) that the officer “had reasonable cause to believe, based upon facts available to him at the time he acted, that additional persons might be on the premises.” We noted that specified matters known to the officer indicated *316that a “pot party” was in progress involving an undetermined number of participants and that the lights illuminating the stairway and upstairs hall justified the further suspicion that other persons might be upstairs who were involved in the offense or who might pose a security risk for the arresting officers. We concluded that under the circumstances it was reasonable for the officer to act as he did and that contraband found in plain sight during the course of that search for suspects was properly seized. (See also United States v. Briddle, 436 F.2d 4, 7 [cert. den. 401 U.S. 921 (27 L.Ed.2d 824, 91 S.Ct. 910)], wherein court upheld seizure of evidence observed in plain sight during the agent’s “conceded right to conduct a quick and cursory viewing of the apartment area for the presence of other persons who might present a security risk.”)
In the instant case, as in Block, the officer had reasonable cause to believe, based upon the facts available to him at the time he acted, that additional persons might be on the premises who were involved in the offense1 or who might be a security risk. Earlier on the same afternoon that the search was made Detective Alpert went to the home of a neighbor of petitioner in response to a complaint by the neighbor concerning plants resembling marijuana that were growing in the backyard of petitioner’s home. The neighbor told Alpert that “she had seen people in the back of the yard. They appeared to be possibly pruning or keeping the plants up . . . ,” that one of the people she had seen was an Englishman,, that she had seen a female in the yard, and that “there were other people living in the house.” (Italics added.) Before the search Detective Alpert also saw in petitioner’s backyard 77 plants that on the basis of his training and experience he concluded were marijuana.
That Detective Alpert did in fact entertain a belief that others might be in the house who were involved in the offense or who might be a security risk is shown by his testimony that he “went through the house looking for possible suspects” and that he had his weapon unsnapped and uncovered although not drawn and went to the side of each bedroom and glanced in before entering.
The majority, in concluding that there was not reasonable cause for the officer to entertain that belief, indicate that the information possessed by Detective Alpert was that “two other persons had been living in the house.”2 The quoted words are misleading in that they, unlike the testi*317mony I have heretofore quoted, among other things, suggest that the others weré no longer living in the house. The majority also rely in large part upon matters relied upon by the dissent in Block, such as that the officer did not testify specifically that he was in fear of his safety and that there was no evidence of hurried movements. Such matters were not determinative in Block, nor are they determinative here.
During the search for suspects Detective Alpert observed narcotics paraphernalia, restricted dangerous drugs, and marijuana, all of which it may be inferred were in plain sight, and under Block that evidence was properly seized.
Additional support for upholding the search and seizure is furnished by Guevara v. Superior Court, supra, 7 Cal.App.3d 531. In Guevara the officers arrested the defendant in his living room for selling heroin; one officer thereafter went through an open doorway connecting the living room and kitchen and observed contraband in plain sight in the kitchen. The court, in holding that evidence was lawfully obtained, stated (at p. 535), “the officer had a.right to enter the kitchen to look for possible confederates of defendant. The informant had told the officers that defendant was living with a woman, that other persons frequented the apartment, and that a buyer from San Francisco was expected momentarily—in fact that a defendant had gone home to meet that buyer. Even if [a specified matter] was not sufficient corroboration to make [the informant] . . . ‘reliable’ . . . , it is clear that the officers had information as to other persons which it was their right, and their duty, to follow up. Having arrested defendant, it was not unreasonable for them to walk through the house to see if others were there and, if found, at least to interrogate them.”
In my opinion the initial search of the house was lawful. A second search of the bedroom occupied by Corréale, which search was made with his consent, revealed nothing that had not been discovered before. Another search was made of the bedroom occupied by Harris after he consented thereto, and additional incriminating evidence was discovered during that search. The majority Order suppression of that evidence solely on the basis that it was tainted by the initial search of the house that the majority consider to be illegal, but since the initial search was legal the evidence was not tainted.
I would deny the petition for mandamus.
McComb, J., concurred.

The offense here is cultivation of marijuana,

The majority also state that “The detective in charge admitted that he had no specific articulable information that any suspects were in the house at that moment. . . .” The record contains no such admission by the detective.