Court Opinion

ID: 9719732
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 08:01:53.214327+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:24:09.616937
License: Public Domain

*261Chief Justice CAPPY
concurring.
I join the majority opinion. I write separately only to note that our decision today should not, in any way, be interpreted to represent support for the broad proposition that passengers in a vehicle or those with something other than ownership interests in a vehicle cannot establish a legitimate expectation of privacy in the vehicle searched. Cf. Commonwealth v. Shiflet, 543 Pa. 164, 670 A.2d 128, 131 (1995); Commonwealth v. Tarbert, 517 Pa. 277, 535 A.2d 1035, 1038 (1987) (indicating that “the driver and passengers do not forfeit all reasonable expectation of privacy, and may not be subjected to unfettered governmental intrusion”); see also Wyoming v. Houghton, 526 U.S. 295, 303, 119 S.Ct. 1297, 143 L.Ed.2d 408 (1999) (noting that passengers possess the same “reduced expectation of privacy” in vehicles as drivers). Indeed, we have repeatedly indicated that the focus of the inquiry in such situations is not whether the person has a property right in the area searched, but rather, focuses on the person’s legitimate expectation of privacy in the place searched. Commonwealth v. Ardestani, 558 Pa. 191, 736 A.2d 552 (1999). Read in this light, this case stands for the limited proposition that, similar to Appellant Williams in Commonwealth v. Torres, 564 Pa. 86, 764 A.2d 532, 543 (2001), Appellant did not establish a subjective expectation of privacy in the vehicle. Thus, he is not entitled to relief on his suppression motion.
Justices NEWMAN and BAER join this concurring opinion.