Court Opinion

ID: 9567573
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 19:55:49.034622+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T10:00:41.290928
License: Public Domain

THORNTON, J.,
dissenting.
I am unable to agree with the majority that the entry by the officers into Room 310 was unlawful under all the facts and circumstances shown here.
The record is silent as to whether the officers asked permission to enter the room or whether the occupant consented to their entry. The trial judge made no clear finding on this point. In the absence of some evidence that their entry was forcible, or was *254resisted or objected to in some manner, I would hold that the entry was lawful.
Prior to going to the room, the facts and circumstances of which Sgt. Englert had reasonably trustworthy information were sufficient to warrant a man of reasonable caution in the belief that (a) some occupant of Room 310 was in possession of marihuana, and (b) some occupant or occupants were apparently about to receive a shipment of drugs. On the basis of this, I believe Sgt. Englert was reasonably entitled to conclude “in light of his experience that criminal activity may be afoot” (Terry v. Ohio, 392 US 1, 30, 88 S Ct 1868, 20 L Ed 2d 889 (1968)), and that further investigation was warranted.
Secondly, I would hold that under the exigent circumstances shown here the officer was not required to (a) locate and interrogate the chambermaid and telephone operator, or (b) obtain a search warrant, before he could go to Room 310 to investigate.
Probable cause to arrest need not be shown before an officer can undertake a preliminary inquiry as to an alleged crime. Terry v. Ohio, supra at 21-22.① The evidence required to make the inquiry need not be of the same degree of conclusiveness as that required for an arrest or a search.② Going to a room to inquire is not an arrest.
*255The strength of the information that the officer requires to engage in questioning is necessarily much less than it would be to arrest and search. People v. King, 175 Cal App2d 386, 346 P2d 235 (1959).
The information furnished Sgt. Englert by the citizen informant, the motel manager, was of course hearsay. However, the manager corroborated his information by showing Englert the contents of the ash tray, including the cigarette butt. The officer examined it and found it in fact to contain marihuana. The information provided by the maid and the telephone operator to their supervisor, the night manager, purported to be their first-hand observations, not mere rumors. They reported it to their supervisor, who in turn reported it to the police. The requirement of reliability set forth in Aguilar v. Texas, 378 US 108, 84 S Ct 1509, 12 L Ed 2d 723 (1964), was met.
In State v. Riner, 6 Or App 72, 485 P2d 1234, Sup Ct review denied (1971), the police had received a report from an unreliable source that the defendant, a nonresident of Oregon, was a narcotics user, and another report from a reliable source that defendant had a gun in his vehicle. Based upon these reports the police, without a warrant, stopped defendant as he was driving his vehicle away from the motel where he was staying. After the defendant failed to produce a valid driver’s license, the police placed him under arrest for driving without a valid license. Drugs were discovered on defendant’s person while he was being booked in at the local jail. In affirming this conviction this court did not mention the necessity for any verification of the reports from citizen informants.
In State v. Poteet, 9 Or App 231, 495 P2d 783, Sup *256Ct review denied (1972), the police had been dispatched to a Klamath Falls hotel to investigate a report from hotel personnel that a man was on the roof. The record does not disclose who reported this fact to the police. When the officers arrived at the hotel they began to question the desk clerk but were interrupted by one Ivan Lutz. Lutz told the officers that he had been drinking with the defendant the previous afternoon and that the defendant told him he was going to “ ‘rob’ the Comer Store”; that later in the afternoon the defendant had asked him if he could borrow either sheets or a bedspread to make a rope to go down through the skylight into the Corner Store; and that just before the police were called he had gone into defendant’s room, found the room empty and the window out onto the roof of the Corner Store open.
Based on the foregoing information the police went up to the defendant’s room in the hotel and arrested him as he was crawling through the window into his room. We held that the police officers had probable cause to arrest the defendant for the burglary of the Corner Store at the time that he entered his room from the adjoining roof top.
In State v. Hoover, 219 Or 288, 347 P2d 69, 89 ALR2d 695 (1959), probable cause to arrest was held to be established solely on the report of a pedestrian that the defendant had threatened him with a gun.
In State v. Murphy, 3 Or App 82, 471 P2d 863 (1970), a woman informed the police that she had arranged to purchase marihuana from the defendant. The police were waiting for the defendant when he arrived at her apartment to consummate the sale. Marihuana was found in a search of the defendant. This court held that the information provided by the *257woman established probable canse for the search. No mention was made in either of these opinions of any verification of the reports or that the police had prior information as to the reliability of the informant. Similarly no mention was made in either Riner or Poteet of any verification of the reports, or that the police had prior information as to the reliability of the informer.
As we pointed ont in State v. Poteet, supra, 9 Or App at 237:
“A ‘citizen-informer,’ by rejecting the cloak of anonymity enjoyed by a ‘police informant,’ may expect to be called to testify after an arrest, and may be exposing himself to an action for malicions prosecution if he makes unfounded charges. We find that the reliability of Mr. Lutz was sufficiently established when he disclosed his identity and gave a detailed report of the facts within his personal knowledge which led him to believe that a burglary of the Corner Store by the defendant was in progress.”
I believe that the information furnished Englert by the motel manager, together with his own inspection and verification of the physical evidence shown him, although not sufficient to constitute probable cause for arrest, or to search the room or its occupants, nevertheless did constitute a basis for reasonable suspicion that one or more occupants of Room 310 were involved in at least a marihuana violation, and possibly in illicit narcotics traffic. It seems to me that all of this information taken together authorized Englert to go to Room 310 and make appropriate inquiry concerning this suspicious activity. Certainly what transpired after the arrival of defendant and his companions authorized the search of defendant *258and Ms subsequent arrest. Defendant’s quick motion in revealing Mmself as the carrier of the narcotics added to the probable cause already accumulated. State v. Williams, 253 Or 613, 456 P2d 497 (1969); State v. Jacobs, 11 Or App 218, 501 P2d 353, Sup Ct review denied (1972); State v. Jones, 9 Or App 629, 498 P2d 390 (1972).
I would reverse and remand.

 As the Supreme Court more recently observed in Adams v. Williams, 407 US 143, 145, 92 S Ct 1921, 32 L Ed 2d 612 (1972):
“* * * The Fourth Amendment does not require a policeman who lacks the precise level of information necessary for probable cause to arrest to simply shrug his shoulders and allow a crime to occur or a criminal to escape. On the contrary, Terry [Terry v. Ohio] recognizes that it may be the essence of good police work to adopt an intermediate response

 See, for example, State v. Devine, 9 Or App 424, 496 P2d 51, Sup Ct review denied (1972).