Court Opinion

ID: 9553477
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 19:30:11.767147+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:31:12.915818
License: Public Domain

CLABORNE, Judge,
specially concurring.
I concur in the result reached by the majority because this seems to be the federal rule. See Hatfield, et al. However, the logic of extending a search incident to arrest to a locked glove compartment in order to protect the safety of police officers and the integrity of evidence from an arrestee who is handcuffed in the back of a police car twenty-five feet from his own vehicle and not in possession of the key to unlock the glove compartment escapes me.
Also, I must agree with the majority only because I believe that this court should not *33be the one to extend the protection of the Arizona Constitution, art. 2, § 8, to give greater protection to privacy interests in automobiles than is given under the United States Constitution’s fourth amendment. This should be left up to the Arizona Supreme Court.
Although State v. Calabrese, 157 Ariz. 189, 191, 755 P.2d 1177, 1179 (App.1988), pointed out that “any further extension of our own constitution [Arizona Constitution, art. 2, § 8] to limit or circumscribe the standards set forth in United States v. Robinson [414 U.S. 218, 94 S.Ct. 467, 38 L.Ed.2d 427 (1973) ] is a matter left for the Arizona Supreme Court”, I do not necessarily agree. The Arizona Court of Appeals frequently decides violations of the Arizona Constitution, and I see no reason to defer in this case in spite of what appears to be the federal rule.
However I write to register my discontent with an exception to the warrant requirement which in this case, defies logic, common sense or justification. The police arrested Hanna for two traffic violations, handcuffed him, and placed him in the back seat of a police car which was located twenty-five feet behind Hanna’s vehicle. The police then conducted a warrantless search of Hanna’s vehicle, found nothing, and attempted to search a locked glove compartment. They went back to the patrol car to obtain the key to the locked glove compartment and then returned to conduct the warrantless search. The reason for the warrant requirement is well-stated in Trupiano v. United States, 334 U.S. 699, 705, 68 S.Ct. 1229, 1232, 92 L.Ed. 1663 (1948):
[The] rule [that] rests upon the desirability of having magistrates rather than police officers determine when searches and seizures are permissible and what limitations should be placed on such activities. In their understandable zeal to ferret out crime and in the excitement of the capture of a suspected person, officers are less likely to possess the detachment and neutrality with which the constitutional rights of the suspect must be viewed.
Furthermore, the requirement that the police obtain a warrant helps “prevent hindsight from coloring the evaluation of the reasonableness of a search or seizure.” United States v. Martinez-Fuerte, 428 U.S. 543, 565, 96 S.Ct. 3074, 3086, 49 L.Ed.2d 1116 (1976).
It has long been held that exceptions to the general warrant requirement for a valid search must be narrowly tailored to the circumstances that justify their creation. Florida v. Royer, 460 U.S. 491, 499-500, 103 S.Ct. 1319, 1324-1325, 75 L.Ed.2d 229 (1983).
As the majority points out, the need for the exception to the warrant requirement grew from our desire to remove any weapons or evidence from that area which an arrestee might access and either resist arrest, effect an escape, or destroy evidence. Chimel v. California, 395 U.S. 752, 89 S.Ct. 2034, 23 L.Ed.2d 685 (1969).
The state of Washington recognized the failing of the Belton approach when it applied its state constitution to this issue. That supreme court said that police may search an automobile for weapons or destructible evidence during the arrest process and immediately afterward, but, “... if the officers encounter a locked container or a locked glove compartment, they may not unlock and search either container without obtaining a search warrant.” State v. Stroud, 106 Wash.2d 144, 720 P.2d 436, 441 (1986).
The Stroud court described the reason behind its holding quite clearly. They reasoned that there is a greater expectation of privacy indicated when one locks something into a container, and that the danger of the arrestee destroying or hiding evidence located within a container or grabbing a weapon from a container is minimized when that container is locked. Id. I see nothing wrong with this reasoning.
Since, to me, the federal rule as applied here lacks any practical wisdom, we can and should turn to our own state constitution.
Arizona has previously recognized a greater protection for privacy under our state constitution than exists under the fed*34eral constitution. State v. Bolt, 142 Ariz. 260, 689 P.2d 519 (1984) (“search” of home may be valid under federal constitution but not Arizona Constitution art. 2, § 8); State v. Ault, 150 Ariz. 459, 466, 724 P.2d 545, 552 (1986) (refusal to extend inevitable discovery doctrine into defendant’s home based on art. 2, § 8 of Arizona Constitution); See also, State v. Martin, 139 Ariz. 466, 475, 679 P.2d 489, 498 (1984), and State v. Hendrix, 165 Ariz. 580, 582, 799 P.2d 1354, 1356 (App.1990). As one court recently said:
A state court decision that rejects Supreme Court precedent, and opts for greater safeguards as a matter of state law, does indeed establish higher constitutional standards locally. But that is a perfectly respectable and legitimate thing to do, and does not in any sense signal a return to the Articles of Confederation. Moreover, with the federal Bill of Rights having been drawn from state constitutional antecedents, there is naturally some equivalency between charters, but no less reason for courts to enforce the respective constitutional guarantees.
Time and again in recent years, the Supreme Court as well as its individual Justices have reminded state courts not merely of their right, but also of their responsibility to interpret their own constitutions, and where in the state courts’ view those provisions afford greater safeguards than the Supreme Court would find, to make plain the state decisional ground so as to avoid unnecessary Supreme Court review.
People v. Scott, 79 N.Y.2d 477, 583 N.Y.S.2d 920, 593 N.E.2d 1328, Nos. 6, 27, 1992 WL 62774 (N.Y. April 2, 1992), KAYE, J. (concurring).
If fairness and common sense has any place in the law, then art. 2, § 8 of our state constitution should forbid this type of warrantless intrusion.