Court Opinion

ID: 9452072
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 17:29:45.863519+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:33:02.894134
License: Public Domain

J. JOSEPH SMITH, Circuit Judge
(dissenting):
I dissent.
Although the search of the Olympic Arms store on November 8 may be open to question, I would not reach this point, but would reverse on the sole ground that the search on November 6 of the Sayville shed was unreasonable.
The Supreme Court has cautioned that “rights protected by the Fourth Amendment are not to be eroded by strained doctrines of the law of agency * * * ” Stoner v. State of California, 376 U.S. 483, 488, 84 S.Ct. 889, 892, 11 L.Ed.2d 856 (1964). See also Jones v. United States, 362 U.S. 257, 80 S.Ct. 725, 4 L.Ed.2d 233 (1960). And it is true that whether a search is reasonable depends largely on particular facts. But there is no reason to ignore the fact that Stein’s authority was limited, and that when he facilitated the entry of the Inspectors he was not at the same time also performing any function entrusted to him by Botsch, and for which he was given the key. I would put aside for another occasion, when the question is squarely presented, resolution of the issues tendered in Marshall v. United States, 352 F.2d 1013 (9th Cir. 1965), cert. denied 382 U.S. 1010, 86 S.Ct. 618, 15 L.Ed.2d 526 (1966); United States v. Eldridge, 302 F.2d 463 (4th Cir. 1962); and Von Eichelberger v. United States, 252 F.2d 184 (9th Cir. 1958). As the majority appears to agree, these cases are distinguishable on the ground that at the time consent was given, the owner or bailee was in lawful possession within the terms of the bailment or lease, or otherwise entitled generally to enter the premises.
It has been held that even the consent of one lawfully in possession or occupancy cannot make reasonable a search into another’s personal effects. Holzhey v. United States, 223 F.2d 823 (5th Cir. 1955); United States v. Blok, 88 U.S. App.D.C. 326, 188 F.2d 1019 (1951); Reeves v. Warden, 346 F.2d 915 (4th Cir. 1965). Contrast Rees v. Peyton, 341 F.2d 859 (4th Cir. 1965); Roberts v. United States, 332 F.2d 892 (8th Cir. *5511964), cert. denied 380 U.S. 980, 85 S.Ct. 1344, 14 L.Ed.2d 274 (1965); United States ex rel. McKenna v. Myers, 232 F.Supp. 65 (E.D.Pa. 1964), aff’d 342 F.2d 998 (3rd Cir.), cert. denied 382 U.S. 857 (1965); and Burge v. United States, 342 F.2d 408 (9th Cir.), cert. denied 382 U.S. 829, 86 S.Ct. 63, 15 L.Ed.2d 72 (1965), where the searches were in community rooms. These cases recognize that even if one’s right to entry is unlimited, consent may be ineffective to make reasonable a search.
Similarly, when the right to entry is limited, the consent is the less effective. It has long been held that where one’s right to possession or occupancy is as great as another’s, consent can be effective. Reszutek v. United States, 147 F.2d 142 (2d Cir. 1945); Stein v. United States, 166 F.2d 851 (9th Cir.), cert. denied 334 U.S. 844, 68 S.Ct. 1512, 92 L.Ed. 1768 (1948); see the cases collected in Eldridge, supra, 302 F.2d at 465, notes 3-6. In such a case consent is not usually made on behalf of the absent person. The consenting person has an independent right to permit the search. In other situations, where the consenting person has a lesser right to occupancy or possession, which might not alone permit a search on consent, it has sometimes been held that the absent person has made the consenting party his agent to consent, see Teasley v. United States, 292 F.2d 460 (9th Cir. 1961), or that he accepts the risk of effective consent, Marshall, supra, but such an agency must be clearly shown. Klee v. United States, 53 F.2d 58, 61 (9th Cir. 1931).
Since consent was here given while Stein was not engaged in receiving or paying for shipments, we are not called upon to decide either whether or not Botseh authorized Stein to consent to
searches while engaged in such activity, or whether or not Stein’s right to enter then would be sufficient to make effective his own consent, for entry, or for search, or for both. When he consented to the entry, and opened the door, he was in no different a position from the hotel clerk in Stoner, the hotel manager in Lustig v. United States, 338 U.S. 74, 69 S.Ct. 1372, 93 L.Ed. 1819 (1949) and United States v. Jeffers, 342 U.S. 48, 72 S.Ct. 93, 96 L.Ed. 59 (1951), or the landlord in Chapman v. United States, 365 U.S. 610, 81 S.Ct. 776, 5 L.Ed.2d 828 (1961). I cannot agree that the suspicion which naturally would be cast on Stein compels a different result than these eases. It neither increased his right to occupancy nor created an agency so that Stein could give Botsch’s consent. Nor can it be said that Botseh “accepted the risk,” as in Marshall, that Stein would let the Inspectors search. That, like the implied agency, is a species of the “unrealistic doctrines of ‘apparent authority’ ” condemned in Stoner. The fact that Stein, like the hotel clerk, at some time could properly enter is no reason to infer either authority to enter on an occasion such as this, or to give Botsch’s consent. And it defies reason to conclude that Botseh intended that Stein, out of his unwitting role in the fraud, could effectively consent to a search. If this search was good, any neighbor with whom a key is left so that newspapers, mail or packages may be put inside the door in a householder’s absence may authorize a general search of the house if anyone suspects that a package or letter may have contained evidence of fraud. I would not so erode the right to be free from unreasonable searches in order to sustain the conviction of this rascal. I would reverse.