Estrada v. State
| Decision Date | 28 August 2003 |
| Docket Number | No. 08-02-00366-CR.,08-02-00366-CR. |
| Parties | Gina Marie ESTRADA, Appellant, v. The STATE of Texas, Appellee. |
| Court | Texas Court of Appeals |
Allen Moore, Law Offices of Allen Moore, Odessa, for appellant.
Tracey Bright, County Attorney, Odessa, for State.
Before Panel No. 4 BARAJAS, C.J., LARSEN, and McCLURE, JJ.
Gina Marie Estrada pleaded guilty to possession of two ounces or less of marijuana. The court sentenced her to three days in jail and ordered her to pay a $350 fine. On appeal, she argues that the trial court erred by denying her motion to suppress. We reverse and remand.
On the night in question, Estrada was house-sitting at her grandmother's house. The house is in the midst of an eight-acre area that has a fence around it. The driveway has a ranch-type gate across it. The house also has an enclosed front porch with two doors leading into it from outside.
Raymond Baladez, an Ector County deputy, responded to a complaint of loud music and "vehicles running up and down the road at a high rate of speed" near the Estrada house. Baladez testified that as he pulled up to the house, he saw two people who appeared to be juveniles running away. He found alcoholic beverages near where the juveniles had been. The gate was open. He went up to the house, identified himself, and banged on the door and a window several times, but got no response. Although he could hear voices and "footsteps of people running" inside, he did not hear any music. He had his dispatcher call the house in an attempt to make contact, but the line was busy.
Baladez then pulled his car out of the driveway and parked it on the street. While he was waiting there, he was dispatched to a nearby area where an anonymous caller had reported a disturbance involving gunshots. When he responded to that call, he could not find any evidence of a disturbance, so he returned to the Estrada house. Baladez suspected that someone at the Estrada house made the anonymous call so he or she could leave while Baladez was gone.
When Baladez returned to the Estrada house, he saw two vehicles leaving the house. He pulled the vehicles over and smelled alcohol and marijuana on the drivers. Both of the drivers were under twenty-one. They told Baladez that they had been drinking at the Estrada house. He instructed the drivers to back their cars into the driveway. At that time, the gate was closed.
Estrada testified that she heard Baladez advise one of the drivers to "tell your friend to open the door, because if she doesn't y'all are going to jail." At that point, Estrada walked out of the house and met Baladez at the gate. According to Baladez, Estrada had the strong odor of alcohol on her breath and the odor of marijuana on her clothes. He testified that at that time it would have been a "fair assumption" that Estrada and the two drivers had been smoking marijuana in the house. Nevertheless, he did not seek a search warrant then because he was "not looking for marijuana at that time." Baladez asked Estrada if there were any other people in the house. She said that there were, but she did not know how many. Baladez also asked Estrada why she did not come to the door when he knocked earlier. He testified that she stated she did not know he had been there. His report of the incident stated that when he asked Estrada why she did not answer the door "[s]he advised that they didn't want to go to jail."
According to Baladez, Estrada "opened the gate and turned around and walked back towards the residence and [he] followed her." Baladez and Estrada proceeded to walk through the open porch doors. Estrada opened the door to the house, and Baladez smelled the odor of marijuana coming out of the house. Baladez then called for back-up to assist him and to "stand by while [he] cleared the rest of the house."
The prosecutor and Baladez engaged in the following colloquy regarding what happened when Estrada opened the door to the house:
Prosecutor: Did you observe anything when she opened the door?
Baladez: Yes, I could look inside. There was off to the right, there was a kitchen table and there were several—I stepped up on the door jam [sic] and because she was—she was calling everybody out and there was people coming out. And for my safety I wanted to keep them in my sights. And I looked down and I could see in the ashtray what appeared to be roaches[,] which were used marijuana cigarettes.
Prosecutor: Okay. So after you smelled the smoke and you made the observation from the door jam [sic], then you entered the residence at that point?
Baladez: Yes.
When the trial court attempted to clarify Baladez's testimony, the following exchange occurred:
The Court: All right. I want to make sure I am clear on this. You're standing at the gate and did you say the defendant opened the gate?
Baladez: Yes.
The Court: And then you and she were walking down the sidewalk talking.
Baladez: Yes.
The Court: And she entered the residence?
Baladez: Correct.
The Court: Did you go in with her?
Baladez: No, I was standing at the door while she was calling everybody to her.
The Court: All right. And then tell me, at what point and why you decided to enter the residence?
Baladez: Because I could smell the alcohol [sic]. There were several individuals in the residence and I didn't know if they were going to have weapons or not so I stepped in where I could see them and that's when I saw the marijuana.
Baladez walked through the residence and observed marijuana in other places. No weapons were found in the house or on the six people inside the house.
Baladez testified that it would have taken at least three hours to get a search warrant, while it would have taken less than a minute to dispose of the marijuana in the house. He believed that if he had left, the people at the house would have disposed of the marijuana. The prosecutor asked Baladez, "So based on that exigent circumstance, you entered the home in order to confiscate that marijuana before it could be destroyed, correct?" Baladez responded, "Correct."
At the conclusion of the suppression hearing, the trial court stated:
Well, the officer had evidence of minors in—having consumed alcohol when he went back to the residence. And the defendant opened the gate, so he was on the premises with her implied consent. And when he got up to the front door and saw the other people, he realized he had to—he had a situation that needed investigating. I think that there were sufficient exigent circumstances to permit his entry into the home where the marijuana was in plain view.
The court denied the motion to suppress.
In reviewing a trial court's ruling on a motion to suppress, we afford almost total deference to the trial court's findings of historical fact that the record supports, especially when those findings are based on an evaluation of credibility and demeanor. Guzman v. State, 955 S.W.2d 85, 89 (Tex.Crim.App.1997). But see Manzi v. State, 88 S.W.3d 240, 243 (Tex.Crim.App.2002) (). We afford the same amount of deference to the trial court's determination of mixed questions of law and fact, if the resolutions of those questions turn on an evaluation of credibility and demeanor. Guzman, 955 S.W.2d at 89. When the trial court does not make explicit findings of historical fact, we review the evidence in the light most favorable to the trial court's ruling. Carmouche v. State, 10 S.W.3d 323, 327-28 (Tex.Crim.App.2000). We review de novo the trial court's application of the law of search and seizure. Id.
A home is a "sacrosanct place" in search and seizure law. State v. Steelman, 16 S.W.3d 483, 488 (Tex.App.-Eastland 2000), aff'd, 93 S.W.3d 102 (Tex.Crim.App.2002); see also United States v. United States Dist. Court, 407 U.S. 297, 313, 92 S.Ct. 2125, 2134, 32 L.Ed.2d 752 (1972) (). Accordingly, searches and seizures inside a home without a warrant are presumptively unreasonable. Payton v. New York, 445 U.S. 573, 586, 100 S.Ct. 1371, 1380, 63 L.Ed.2d 639 (1980). But see Hulit v. State, 982 S.W.2d 431, 436 (Tex.Crim.App.1998) (). There is, however, an exception to the warrant requirement when exigent circumstances are present. To fit within this exception, an officer must have probable cause to search and there must be exigent circumstances that make procuring a warrant impracticable. Kirk v. Louisiana, 536 U.S. 635, 638, 122 S.Ct. 2458, 2459, 153 L.Ed.2d 599 (2002); McNairy v. State, 835 S.W.2d 101, 106 (Tex.Crim.App.1991).
Probable cause to search exists when reasonably trustworthy facts and circumstances within the knowledge of the officer on the scene would lead a person of reasonable prudence to believe that an instrumentality or evidence of a crime will be found. McNairy, 835 S.W.2d at 106. Facts that would be sufficient to establish probable cause for purposes of procuring a warrant are not necessarily sufficient to establish probable cause for a warrantless search of a home. See Aguilar v. Texas, 378 U.S. 108, 111, 84 S.Ct. 1509, 1512, 12 L.Ed.2d 723 (1964), abrogated on other grounds by Illinois v. Gates, 462 U.S. 213, 103 S.Ct. 2317, 76 L.Ed.2d 527 (1983); Johnson v. United States, 333 U.S. 10, 13-14 68 S.Ct. 367, 368-69, 92 L.Ed. 436 (1948); State v. Steelman, 93 S.W.3d 102, 110 (Tex.Crim.App.2002) (Cochran, J., concurring); Barocio v. State, 117 S.W.3d 19, 23, 2003 WL 21402504, at *3 () (plurality opinion).
Estrada argues that the facts of this case are similar to, and thus controlled...
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