Forfeiture of $176,598, In re, Docket No. 93248

• Citation: 443 Mich. 261,505 N.W.2d 201
• Decision Date: 17 August 1993
• Docket Number: No. 1,M,Docket No. 93248,1
• Parties: In re FORFEITURE OF $176,598. PEOPLE of the State of Michigan, ex rel., WAYNE COUNTY PROSECUTOR, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. $176,598 U.S. CURRENCY, Miscellaneous Records, Three (3) Firearms, One (1) Safe and Miscellaneous Items of Jewelry, Defendants-Appellees; and Nathaniel Wilson, Claimant-Appellee. arch Term. Calendar
• Court: Supreme Court of Michigan

Page 201

505 N.W.2d 201

443 Mich. 261

In re FORFEITURE OF $176,598 PEOPLE of the State of Michigan, ex rel., WAYNE COUNTY PROSECUTOR, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. $176,598 U.S. CURRENCY, Miscellaneous Records, Three (3) Firearms, One (1) Safe and Miscellaneous Items of Jewelry, Defendants-Appellees and Nathaniel Wilson, Claimant-Appellee.

Docket No. 93248, March Term.

Calendar No. 1.

Supreme Court of Michigan.

Argued March 2, 1993.

Decided Aug. 17, 1993.

John D. O'Hair, Pros. [443 Mich. 262] Atty., County of Wayne, Timothy A. Baughman, Chief of Research, Training and Appeals, Mary Sue Czarnecki, Asst. Pros. Atty., Detroit, for plaintiff-appellant.

Ben M. Gonek, Detroit, for claimant-appellee.

OPINION

MALLETT, Justice.

We must determine whether the Court of Appeals erroneously reversed a trial court's denial of a forfeiture claimant's motion for summary disposition. Because the police officers' entry of the claimant's residence was constitutional pursuant to the exigent circumstances exception to the warrant requirement, we reverse and remand to the Court of Appeals for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.

I

On December 17, 1986, two Detroit police officers responded to an activated residential security alarm on Corbett Street. Upon their arrival, the officers checked the residence and its perimeter for signs of forced entry. A light was on inside the home. A small casement window was broken, and security bars previously located inside the window were pushed away. On the ground outside the window, the officers found a lug wrench, a bar, and a stocking cap. The officers radioed for a back-up police unit. When the additional police officers arrived, they boosted the original officers through the broken casement window and into the home.

Two of the officers searched the home for intruders. On the main floor level, the officers entered what appeared to be a den in which clothes were strewn about the room. A trunk was in the middle of the room. The officers failed to find any intruders and consequently released the back-up unit.

The officers then searched the home for information that would assist them in identifying its owner. One of the officers found a telephone bill belonging to Bessie Wilson, a relative of claimant, and called the telephone numbers listed on the bill. The other officer found an envelope with "$4,000" written on it. The envelope contained forty one-hundred dollar bills. The officers then found a brown paper bag on the trunk in the den; "$10,000" and a name were written on the bag, which, in fact, contained a large sum of money. In the trunk were two large bags of money, one of which was a shopping bag that had torn from the weight of the cash. The officers immediately contacted the police unit that had just left the home. Unable to contact the owner of the residence or otherwise satisfactorily secure the premises, the officers removed the money from the home. ¹

The police transported the money to the Ninth Precinct station, where an inspector directed the officers to take the cash to the property room at police headquarters. After being counted in the property room, the money was taken to an inspector's office. The police placed the money in a cardboard box, set the box in a closet, and closed the closet door. A controlled-substance-trained-canine was released in the room. After sniffing around the room for a short period of time, the "drug dog" moved quickly to the closet where the money was located. After the closet door was opened, the dog began carrying bundles of the money to its trainer, indicating that the money had been in proximity to controlled substances.

The claimant, Nathaniel Wilson, asserted ownership of the seized cash, and the Wayne County prosecutor filed a petition for civil forfeiture pursuant to M.C.L. § 333.7501 et seq.; M.S.A. § 14.15(7501) et seq. The claimant moved for summary disposition pursuant to MCR 2.116(C)(8) ² and (10), ³ and the prosecution answered and filed an amended petition. ⁴ The trial court denied the claimant's motion for summary disposition. Following testimony from several witnesses, including the claimant, ⁵ the trial court concluded that the claimant was a drug trafficker and ultimately entered a forfeiture order. In an unpublished per curiam opinion, the Court of Appeals reversed, vacated the forfeiture order, and held that the claimant's motion for summary disposition should have been granted because of the illegal search of claimant's residence. This Court granted the state's application for leave to appeal. 440 Mich. 889, 487 N.W.2d 762 (1992).

II

The Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution ⁶ and art. 1, § 11 of the Michigan Constitution of 1963 ⁷ grant individuals the right to be secure against unreasonable searches and seizures. Generally, evidence obtained in violation of the Fourth Amendment is inadmissible as substantive evidence in criminal proceedings. Mapp v. Ohio, 367 U.S. 643, 81 S.Ct. 1684, 6 L.Ed.2d 1081 (1961). ⁸ This principle, commonly referred to as the "exclusionary rule," is a cornerstone of American jurisprudence that affords individuals the most basic protection against arbitrary police conduct. ⁹ The exclusionary rule is applicable in forfeiture proceedings. One 1958 Plymouth Sedan v. Pennsylvania, 380 U.S. 693, 85 S.Ct. 1246, 14 L.Ed.2d 170 (1965).

Generally, a warrant, supported by probable cause, is required before a search is considered reasonable. Mapp v. Ohio, supra; People v. Davis, 442 Mich. 1, 10, 497 N.W.2d 910 (1993); People v. Blasius, 435 Mich. 573, 459 N.W.2d 906 (1990). The warrant requirement is "subject only to a few specifically established and well-delineated exceptions." Horton v. California, 496 U.S. 128, 133, n. 4, 110 S.Ct. 2301, 2306, n. 4, 110 L.Ed.2d 112 (1990), quoting United States v. Ross, 456 U.S. 798, 825, 102 S.Ct. 2157, 2173 72 L.Ed.2d 572 (1982); Tallman v. Dep't of Natural Resources, 421 Mich. 585, 598, 365 N.W.2d 724 (1984). The established exceptions to the warrant requirement include: (1) searches incident to a lawful arrest, (2) automobile searches, (3) plain view seizure, (4) consent, (5) stop and frisk, and (6) exigent circumstances. People v. Davis, supra 442 Mich. at 10, 497 N.W.2d 910; People v. Toohey, 438 Mich. 265, 271, n. 4, 475 N.W.2d 16 (1991). Each of these exceptions, while not requiring a warrant, still requires reasonableness and probable cause.

In People v. Blasius, supra 435 Mich. at 583, 459 N.W.2d 906, this Court noted that although "the precise contours of the exigent circumstances exception remain hazy, such an exception clearly does exist." The boundaries of the exception were "hazy" because of the manner in which the doctrine has developed. Instead of immediately recognizing the specific exigencies that justify entries without warrants, the United States Supreme Court has gradually intimated the parameters of the exception over a forty-five year period. See Johnson v. United States, 333 U.S. 10, 15, 68 S.Ct. 367, 369, 92 L.Ed. 436 (1948) (recognized that "exceptional circumstances" could justify a search without a warrant, but none existed because "[n]o suspect was fleeing or likely to take flight. The search was of permanent premises, not of a moveable vehicle. No evidence or contraband was threatened with removal or destruction"); McDonald v. United States, 335 U.S. 451, 456, 69 S.Ct. 191, 193, 93 L.Ed. 153 (1948) ("We cannot ... excuse the absence of a search warrant without a showing by those who seek exemption from the constitutional mandate that the exigencies of the situation made that course imperative"); United States v. Jeffers, 342 U.S. 48, 52, 72 S.Ct. 93, 96, 96 L.Ed. 59 (1951) (invalidated a search because there was no "imminent destruction, removal, or concealment of the property intended to be seized"); Schmerber v. California, 384 U.S. 757, 770, 86 S.Ct. 1826, 1836, 16 L.Ed.2d 908 (1966) (upheld the extraction of blood from a defendant for a blood-alcohol test because a police officer "might reasonably have believed that he was confronted with an emergency, in which the delay necessary to obtain a warrant ... threatened 'the destruction of evidence' "); Vale v. Louisiana, 399 U.S. 30, 35, 90 S.Ct. 1969, 1972, 26 L.Ed.2d 409 (1970) (found that no exigency existed because the seized narcotics were not about to be destroyed or removed from the jurisdiction).

The United States Supreme Court recently offered additional insight into the exigent circumstances exception and its parameters. In Minnesota v. Olson, 495 U.S. 91, 110 S.Ct. 1684, 109 L.Ed.2d 85 (1990), the Court acquiesced in the Minnesota Supreme Court's treatment of the exception. There, the police suspected a defendant of being the getaway car driver in a robbery and murder. The police recovered the murder weapon and arrested the murder suspect. They later surrounded the home of two women with whom the defendant was staying, telephoned the home, and insisted that the defendant come out. As the police officer was instructing the woman, he heard a male voice say, "tell them I left." The woman did so, but the police soon entered and found the defendant hiding in a closet. Id. at 94, 110 S.Ct. at 1687.

The Court remarked that the state court "applied essentially the correct legal standard" when it held that the following exigent circumstances justify an entry of a dwelling without a warrant: (1) hot pursuit of a fleeing felon, (2) imminent destruction of evidence, (3) the need to prevent a suspect's escape, and (4) the risk of danger to the police or others inside or outside the dwelling. The state court opined that in the absence of hot pursuit, there must be at least probable cause to believe that one or more of the latter three circumstances existed. ¹⁰ In assessing the risk of danger, the gravity of the crime and likelihood that the suspect is armed were deemed important considerations. ¹¹ Although a grave crime was involved the murder...