Com. v. Treadwell

• Decision Date: 10 May 1988
• Citation: 522 N.E.2d 943,402 Mass. 355
• Parties: COMMONWEALTH v. Patricia TREADWELL (and a companion case 1 ).
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

Page 943

522 N.E.2d 943

402 Mass. 355

COMMONWEALTH v. Patricia TREADWELL (and a companion case ¹).

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Middlesex.

Argued Dec. 7, 1987.

Decided May 10, 1988.

Mark W. Bennett, Asst. Dist. Atty., for Com.

Mildred J. Gibson, Lynn, for Patricia Treadwell.

James R. Rosencranz, Boston, for Michael A. Treadwell.

Before HENNESSEY, C.J., and WILKINS, LIACOS, ABRAMS, NOLAN, LYNCH and O'CONNOR, JJ.

ABRAMS, Justice.

A single justice of this court allowed the Commonwealth's request for an interlocutory appeal, see Mass.R.Crim.P. 15(b), 378 Mass. 882 (1978), from a determination that evidence obtained during a search of the apartment of the defendant, Patricia Treadwell, must be suppressed because the "warrant ... particularly and specially and specifically describe[d] an apartment located over No. 17 at 50C Memorial Road," which was not the apartment which was searched. The defendants are charged with possession of cocaine with intent to distribute. ² The defendants filed motions to suppress in the Superior Court. After hearing, the Superior Court judge allowed the motions on the ground of misidentification of the place to be searched. For the reasons stated, we conclude that the judge correctly allowed the defendants' motions to suppress. ³

We summarize the relevant facts from the affidavit that accompanied the application for the search warrant. On January 15, 1986, a reliable informant told Robert M. Spinney, Jr., of the Somerville police department that " 'he' [the informant] had observed the occupant of the 2nd-floor apartment at 50C Memorial Road [in Somerville] selling cocaine to various persons.... [The informant] described the apartment as being the front apartment on the 2nd-floor directly above No. 17 " (emphasis added). On January 17, Spinney and another officer "parked in front of 50C Memorial Road watching the front apartment on the 2nd-floor" (emphasis added). Spinney saw a person in a white jacket enter the building and, moments later, "observed through a window the door of the 2nd-floor apartment open [and] a person wearing a white jacket walk in" (emphasis added). After a few minutes, the same person left the building, entered an automobile driven by someone else, and drove away.

The police followed the automobile, "observed it to be operating erratically," and pulled it over. The backseat passenger, who had been seen entering 50C Memorial Road, was found in possession of cocaine, and arrested. After reciting the Miranda warnings, see Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966), Spinney asked the passenger about 50C Memorial Road. Spinney reported the answer in his affidavit as follows: "[The person arrested] stated that he had just purchased cocaine on [sic ] the 2nd-floor apartment at 50C Memorial Road. He stated that the apartment was above No. 17. He also stated that the apartment was the front apartment [and] his description of the location matched the description given to me by the reliable informant. He stated that on the front door was a yellow bumper sticker stating 'Make My Day.' He stated that there was no number on the door." (Emphasis added.)

Based on the foregoing information, Spinney concluded that he had probable cause to search the second-floor front apartment, "above No. 17," at 50C Memorial Road in Somerville. A District Court judge agreed and issued a warrant authorizing an immediate search of "the front apartment on the 2nd floor above apartment # 17 located at 50C Memorial Road ... having a yellow bumper sticker on it stating 'Make My Day.' " Pursuant to this warrant, the police searched Treadwell's apartment.

The configuration of the apartments on the second floor at 50C Memorial Road, Somerville, is as follows. There are three apartments on the second floor, two of which are "front" apartments facing the street. The Commonwealth concedes that Treadwell's apartment, which is a front apartment on the second floor, is not the apartment directly above apartment no. 17; Treadwell's apartment is above no. 16. Each apartment on the second floor has its own door.

The judge found as a fact that the only door bearing a bumper sticker with the words "Make My Day" is the door to Treadwell's apartment which, as already noted, is not the apartment "above number 17." The door also has a nameplate bearing the name "Treadwell." ⁴ The judge also found that the warrant specifically described and authorized a search only of the apartment directly above number 17. Accordingly, the judge excluded the evidence obtained during the search of Treadwell's apartment. ⁵

The Commonwealth does not contest the fact that a warrant must describe particularly the place to be searched. The particularity requirement is statutory, see G.L.c. 276, §§ 1, 2 (1986 ed.), as well as constitutional. See Commonwealth v. Douglas, 399 Mass. 141, 143-145, 503 N.E.2d 28 (1987). "[T]he particularity requirements of G.L.c. 276 essentially track the particularity requirements of art. 14 [of the Declaration of Rights of the Constitution of the Commonwealth] and the Fourth Amendment [to the United States Constitution]." Commonwealth v. Sheppard, 394 Mass. 381, 389, 476 N.E.2d 541 (1985). ⁶ The issue here is "whether the description is sufficient to enable the executing officer to locate and identify the premises with reasonable effort, and whether there is any reasonable probability that another premises might be mistakenly searched which is not the one intended to be searched under the search warrant." Commonwealth v. Rugaber, 369 Mass. 765, 768, 343 N.E.2d 865 (1976), quoting United States v. Sklaroff, 323 F.Supp. 296, 321 (S.D.Fla.1971).

The Commonwealth argues that the "above No. 17" language in the warrant is a minor misdescription which does not render the warrant invalid as to Treadwell's apartment. We do not agree. The affidavit contains information from two informants, both of whom specifically and unmistakably locate the apartment to be searched "directly above No. 17." Significantly, the location of the apartment is the only consistent information from both informants. ⁷ We therefore cannot treat this information as irrelevant or inadvertent.

The Commonwealth seeks to salvage the warrant by arguing that "the knowledge of officers on the scene eliminated any danger of a mistaken search of the wrong apartment." Although the Commonwealth correctly notes that the knowledge of the executing officers can be a relevant consideration in resolving noncrucial ambiguities in a warrant, see Commonwealth v. Rugaber, supra; Commonwealth v. Petrone, 17 Mass.App.Ct. 914, 455 N.E.2d 1227 (1983); Commonwealth v. Demogenes, 14 Mass.App.Ct. 577, 581, 441 N.E.2d 545 (1982), "police may not expand the warrant beyond those facts known to them." Commonwealth v. Cefalo, 381 Mass. 319, 329, 409 N.E.2d 719 (1980).

The record in this case fails to reveal that the police had knowledge of facts sufficient to overcome the ambiguity in the warrant. The affidavit does not indicate that the police knew the name of the occupant of the apartment to be searched. See note 4 supra. In addition, neither the affidavit nor the testimony at the hearing demonstrates that the police had familiarity with the floor plan of the building. They did not know which apartment was no. 17, and made no attempt to locate that apartment. Moreover, although the affidavit states that Spinney saw the man in the white coat enter "the" front apartment, that information does not contradict the informant's specific, corroborated statement that he purchased cocaine in the front apartment "above No. 17." This is not a case in which the police gained familiarity with the premises through direct observation and then inadvertently misdescribed the premises in an affidavit. The police were given specific information, recorded it accurately, and then searched a different apartment.

The present case is distinguishable from those cited by the Commonwealth in which searches conducted pursuant to arguably ambiguous warrants were upheld. In Commonwealth v. Rugaber, supra, the warrant included the proper street address of the house to be searched and a description of the exterior of the building. The description, however, matched the house next door. Because the correct street address was used, we concluded that the warrant "was not inadequate on its face." Id. 369 Mass. at 769, 343 N.E.2d 865. Further, in Rugaber, it was relevant that police officers on the scene had staked-out the correct house, knew its precise location, and could not possibly mistake it for a separate, free-standing structure. The danger of error was reduced even further because the search occurred at night when the inadvertent misdescription never became apparent. ⁸

In the present case, by contrast, the independently corroborated location of the apartment did not match the apartment searched; the police were unfamiliar with the interior floor plan of the building; their observations of the exterior of the building did not isolate with certainty which apartment or apartments the man in the white coat entered; and neither the warrant nor the affidavit indicated that the police knew the identity of the occupant of the apartment to be searched. The specificity of the apartment's location in the warrant and the location of the bumper sticker on a different apartment door created an obvious ambiguity in the description of the place to be searched. In effect, the warrant left the police with discretion to choose between the apartment directly above no. 17 and the apartment with the bumper sticker on the door, even though probable cause existed to search only one apartment. In these circumstances, we conclude that the warrant failed to describe adequately the premises to be searched, as required by G.L.c. 276, §§ 1 and 2. Thus, the judge properly allowed the motions to suppress.

Order affirmed.

NOLAN, Justice (dissenting).

I dissent. The...