Hunter v. State, No. 84-216

• Court: United States State Supreme Court of Wyoming
• Writing for the Court: Before THOMAS; ROONEY; THOMAS
• Citation: 704 P.2d 713
• Decision Date: 14 August 1985
• Docket Number: No. 84-216
• Parties: Donald P. HUNTER, Appellant (Defendant), v. The STATE of Wyoming, Appellee (Plaintiff).

Page 713

704 P.2d 713 Donald P. HUNTER, Appellant (Defendant),
v.
The STATE of Wyoming, Appellee (Plaintiff). No. 84-216. Supreme Court of Wyoming. Aug. 14, 1985.

Page 714

Leonard D. Munker, State Public Defender, Martin J. McClain, Appellate Counsel, Cheyenne and K. Leslie Delk, Asst. Public Defender, Laramie, for appellant.

A.G. McClintock, Atty. Gen., Gerald A. Stack, Deputy Atty. Gen., John W. Renneisen, Senior Asst. Atty. Gen., and Karen Maurer, Sp. Asst. Atty. Gen., for appellee.

Before THOMAS, C.J., and ROSE, ROONEY, BROWN and CARDINE, JJ.

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ROONEY, Justice.

Appellant was convicted after a trial to the court of a violation of § 6-3-403(a), W.S.1977, (June 1983 Pamphlet), and sentenced to one to three years in the Wyoming State Penitentiary.

Appellant's issues on appeal concern the warrantless search and seizure of the car and appellant's personal effects found within the car, and also the sufficiency of the evidence as to concealment.

We affirm.

FACTS

In the early morning hours of May 6, 1984 a police officer saw appellant driving a new model Cadillac Seville with Michigan license plates in the downtown area of Laramie. The officer ran a NCIC check on the car. Before the report came back, appellant flagged down the officer to inquire where he could purchase motor oil at that hour. The officer gave appellant a few suggestions, and appellant drove off. The report eventually came back that the car appellant was driving was stolen, and the officer put out an alert to watch for the vehicle. Appellant was arrested off the interstate at the summit rest area a few miles east of Laramie, and the car was impounded.

When the police lieutenant came on duty the next morning, he reviewed the report on appellant. He was told that Michigan would probably not extradite appellant, but that the sheriff's office was requested to keep appellant in custody until official notification to that effect was received. The officer then telephoned the owner of the Cadillac, Ms. Martin. He informed her of the location of the car and was in turn advised that several personal belongings of Ms. Martin had been in the car at the time it was stolen.

The officer obtained the keys to the vehicle from the sheriff's office and searched the car to see if any of Ms. Martin's things were still there. None of Ms. Martin's effects were recovered, but several containers were found, containing many items commonly used in the falsification of car titles. Prior to trial, and again at trial, appellant moved to have these items excluded from trial on the basis that either the search was illegal or the evidence had no probative value. The motions were denied, the judge ruling that appellant had no standing to object to the search of a stolen car. The items were admitted to prove knowledge that the car was stolen.

SEARCH AND SEIZURE

Appellant contends that the search of the Cadillac violated his rights, both under the United States Constitution and the Wyoming Constitution. It is recognized that warrantless searches and seizures are unreasonable per se under both the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution and Art. 1, § 4, of the Wyoming Constitution. Ortega v. State, Wyo., 669 P.2d 935 (1983). This rule is subject only to a few specifically established and well-delineated exceptions. Kish v. State, Wyo., 642 P.2d 453, 455 (1982); Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347, 88 S.Ct. 507, 514, 19 L.Ed.2d 576 (1967). The search and/or seizure of an automobile upon probable cause is one of the recognized exceptions, Ortega v. State, supra; Carroll v. United States, 267 U.S. 132, 45 S.Ct. 280, 69 L.Ed. 543, 39 A.L.R. 790 (1925).

The general rule as to the warrantless search of automobiles, for the purposes of the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, was stated in Carroll v. United States, supra. There the Court held that the warrantless search of an automobile which was stopped by police who had probable cause to believe the vehicle contained contraband was not unreasonable. In the case at bar, the police knew that the car was stolen. Clearly it was proper for the police to search and seize a vehicle which it knew to be stolen. The car itself was contraband, and it very possibly could also contain contraband, i.e., the personal belongings which were stolen along with the car.

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Appellant then argues that even if the search and seizure of the car itself were proper, the search and seizure of his belongings, in closed containers, were not proper. Appellee, in turn, argues that the search and seizure of the closed containers was proper upon any of three bases. First, that appellant consented to the search by turning over the car keys; second, that the officers were merely looking for the items which belonged to Ms. Martin, the owner of the car, and this necessitated opening the containers; and third, that the search was for the purposes of completing an inventory of a lawfully impounded car. Appellant finds fault with each of these three bases. He alleges that the consent was not voluntary because he turned over the car keys after being told that Michigan was not interested in extraditing him and that, therefore, he was to be released from custody shortly. He refers us to the testimony of the officer who searched the car wherein he stated that none of the closed containers resembled any of Ms. Martin's description of her property and that, therefore, he assumed the containers to contain the personal property of appellant. Lastly, he contends that the caretaking function of an...