State v. Giron

• Decision Date: 01 July 1997
• Docket Number: No. 960203-CA,960203-CA
• Citation: 943 P.2d 1114
• Parties: 320 Utah Adv. Rep. 31 STATE of Utah, Plaintiff and Appellant, v. Angelo GIRON, Defendant and Appellee.
• Court: Utah Court of Appeals

Page 1114

943 P.2d 1114

320 Utah Adv. Rep. 31

STATE of Utah, Plaintiff and Appellant, v. Angelo GIRON, Defendant and Appellee.

No. 960203-CA.

Court of Appeals of Utah.

July 1, 1997.

Jan Graham and Kenneth A. Bronston, Salt Lake City, for Plaintiff and Appellant.

Linda M. Jones, Salt Lake City, for Defendant and Appellee.

Before DAVIS, WILKINS and BILLINGS, JJ.

AMENDED OPINION ¹

WILKINS, Associate Presiding Judge:

The State of Utah appeals the final order of dismissal entered against it in the prosecution of Angelo Giron for unlawful possession of a controlled substance, a third degree felony, in violation of Utah Code Ann. § 58-37-8(2)(a)(i) (Supp.1996). The trial court certified that it dismissed the case with prejudice after it granted Giron's motion to suppress evidence because the suppression order rendered the prosecution unable to proceed. See State v. Troyer, 866 P.2d 528, 531 (Utah 1993). Therefore, on appeal, the State contests the trial court's order suppressing evidence. We reverse and remand.

BACKGROUND

We recite the facts in the "light most favorable to the trial court's findings from the suppression hearing." State v. Moreno, 910 P.2d 1245, 1246 (Utah.Ct.App.), cert. denied, 916 P.2d 909 (Utah 1996).

In January 1995, Officers Bench and Ruth, who were motor patrolling the west side of Salt Lake City, saw a car make an improper U-turn. The officers signaled for the car to stop, which it promptly did. Officer Bench approached the driver, Giron, and asked for his driver's license. Giron instead produced a Utah identification card.

Meanwhile, Giron's passenger got out of the car and started walking away while discarding what appeared to be narcotics. Seeing this, Officer Ruth tried to apprehend the passenger, who began to run away. Officer Ruth ran after the passenger and a struggle followed. Seeing that Officer Ruth needed help, Officer Bench told Giron to wait while he assisted Officer Ruth. Instead of waiting, however, Giron drove away, squealing his tires as he left.

After arresting and booking Giron's passenger, Officers Bench and Ruth tried to find Giron. The officers conducted a record check from Giron's identification card and discovered that Giron's driver's license had been suspended. They also learned the address of Giron's residence. As a result, approximately three hours after the original stop, the officers went to Giron's residence. Because they did not find anyone there, they left.

Shortly after leaving Giron's residence, the officers again saw him driving the same car, but with a different passenger. The officers again signaled for Giron to stop, using lights and a siren. However, this time Giron did not promptly stop. Instead, he continued driving for about another block, making two turns before he finally stopped across the street from his residence.

After Giron finally stopped, Officer Bench told him he was under arrest for disobeying the order to remain at the scene of the original stop. Giron got out of the car, and Officer Bench immediately handcuffed him and placed him in the police car. Officer Bench ran a check on Giron's car and learned it was properly registered to Giron.

Officer Bench then proceeded to impound Giron's car. As part of the impound, Officer Bench conducted an inventory search of the car. Officer Bench found cocaine under the driver's seat, a syringe between the driver's seat and the console, another syringe and a knife under the passenger seat, spoons on the back seat floor, a set of scales in a garbage bag on the back seat, and several empty plastic baggies throughout the interior of the car. After searching the vehicle, Officer Bench called for a second officer to complete the impound so that he could transport Giron to jail.

In the trial court, Giron moved to suppress the evidence found in his car, arguing that the officers had no authority to impound his car and that the inventory search was a mere pretext for an investigatory search. The State originally argued only that the search was a valid inventory search. However, after the evidentiary hearing on the motion to suppress, the trial court granted both parties leave to file memoranda. The State then argued in its supplemental memorandum that the search was a valid search incident to Giron's arrest. After the supplemental memoranda were filed, the State and Giron orally argued the merits of their arguments, including the merits of the State's search incident to arrest argument.

The trial court granted Giron's motion and ordered that the evidence be suppressed. Among its findings, the court found that, at the time Officer Bench searched Giron's car, "any possibility of Mr. Giron gaining access to the car for purposes of recovering a weapon, or concealing or destroying evidence had been completely eliminated by the arrest, handcuffing, and the removal of the Defendant from the area of the vehicle." The court then made the following four conclusions of law: (1) because Giron's car was parked across from his residence, "impoundment was neither authorized nor necessary"; (2) even if the impoundment was justified, the inventory search was "merely a pretext for an investigatory search for evidence"; (3) "there was no physical or temporal proximity to the arrest" after Giron had been arrested and placed in the police car, and there was "no basis to justify the search of Defendant's vehicle as a search incident to his arrest"; and (4) the search violated the Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution and article I, section 14 of the Utah Constitution, so the evidence should be suppressed.

After the trial court suppressed the evidence found in Giron's car, the State no longer had sufficient evidence to prosecute its case. Therefore, the court, following the procedure outlined in Troyer, dismissed the case with prejudice. See Troyer, 866 P.2d at 531 (requiring trial court certify that evidence suppressed substantially impaired prosecution's case in order for State to appeal). The State then filed this appeal.

ISSUES AND STANDARD OF REVIEW

On appeal, the State asserts the following three arguments to support its contention that the trial court erred in suppressing the evidence: (1) Giron's car was lawfully impounded; (2) the court erred in condemning the post-impoundment inventory search of Giron's car as "pretextual"; and (3) Giron's car was lawfully searched incident to Giron's arrest.

"The factual findings underlying a trial court's decision to grant or deny a motion to suppress evidence are reviewed under the deferential clearly-erroneous standard, [but] the legal conclusions are reviewed for correctness, with a measure of discretion given to the trial judge's application of the legal standard to the facts." Moreno, 910 P.2d at 1247; see also State v. Pena, 869 P.2d 932, 935-40 (Utah 1994).

ANALYSIS

I. Inventory Search

We first address the State's argument that the inventory search following the impoundment of Giron's car was valid. The State makes this argument by asserting the trial court erred in concluding (1) the impoundment of Giron's vehicle was not "authorized or necessary," and (2) the inventory search was "merely a pretext" for an unlawful investigatory search for evidence.

For an inventory search of a lawfully impounded vehicle to be reasonable under the Fourth Amendment, the officer conducting the search must follow standardized procedures. See Colorado v. Bertine, 479 U.S. 367, 375, 107 S.Ct. 738, 743, 93 L.Ed.2d 739 (1987) (stating police officer may impound car and conduct inventory search "so long as [officer's] discretion is exercised according to standard criteria and on the basis of something other than suspicion of evidence of criminal activity"); South Dakota v. Opperman, 428 U.S. 364, 372, 96 S.Ct. 3092, 3098-99, 49 L.Ed.2d 1000 (1976) (stating "inventories pursuant to standard police procedures are reasonable" under Fourth Amendment). The State has the burden of introducing evidence that such a standardized, reasonable procedure exists "and that the challenged police activity was essentially in conformance with that procedure." State v. Strickling, 844 P.2d 979, 987-88 (Utah.Ct.App.1992).

The trial court supported its conclusion that the inventory search was invalid by finding the search was

carried out in a manner contrary to established Salt Lake City [p]olice [p]rocedures for an inventory search in the following particulars:

(a) Inventory forms were not used.

(b) No written list of items found was made.

(c) There was no attempt to contemporaneously record what was found where.

(d) There was no attempt to involve Mr. Giron, his passenger, or others at Mr. Giron's residence in the decisions [to] impound.

Because finding (d) has not been shown to be a required standardized procedure for Salt Lake City police officers, it is irrelevant to our analysis. However, findings (a) through (c) address standardized procedures Salt Lake City police officers are required to follow in conducting an automobile inventory search.

The State argues findings (a) through (c) were clearly erroneous because Officer Russell, the officer who responded to Officer Bench's call for assistance and who conducted an inventory search after he arrived, followed these procedures. However, this argument ignores the fact that the inventory search at issue is the search conducted by Officer Bench, and that Officer Bench did not follow the necessary procedures, as outlined by the court's findings (a) through (c). Although two officers may, in some situations, work together to conduct a valid automobile inventory search, in this case it appears that the two officers conducted two searches independently of each other. Officer Bench first searched Giron's car. Officer Bench did not use any inventory forms, make a written list of the items he found, or try to contemporaneously record where he found those items. Officer Russell testified that after he arrived, he conducted a second...