Kain v. State

• Decision Date: 18 December 1985
• Docket Number: No. 84-1847,84-1847
• Citation: 378 N.W.2d 900
• Parties: Jack Glenn KAIN, Appellant, v. STATE of Iowa, Appellee.
• Court: Iowa Supreme Court

Page 900

378 N.W.2d 900

Jack Glenn KAIN, Appellant, v. STATE of Iowa, Appellee.

No. 84-1847.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

Dec. 18, 1985.

Charles L. Harrington, Appellate Defender, John Messina and Raymond E. Rogers, Asst. Appellate Defenders, for appellant.

Thomas J. Miller, Atty. Gen., Joseph P. Weeg, Asst. Atty. Gen., James A. Smith, Co. Atty., and Suzanne Engman, Asst. Co. Atty., for appellee.

Considered by HARRIS, P.J., and McGIVERIN, LARSON, CARTER, and WOLLE, JJ.

CARTER, Justice.

The appellant, Jack Kain (Kain), applied for postconviction relief to challenge the revocation of his probation. The district court denied postconviction relief and Kain has appealed. He contends the revocation of his probation was constitutionally infirm because it was based on evidence which had been obtained by an illegal investigatory stop of an automobile.

In 1981, Kain was convicted of second-degree burglary. He was given a suspended sentence and placed on probation. In December of 1982, Kain was arrested and charged with robbery. Prior to his trial on that charge he filed a motion to suppress most of the State's material evidence in the case, alleging that such evidence had been obtained as the result of an illegal investigatory stop of an automobile in which he was riding. The district court sustained this motion to suppress after finding that the evidence in question had been obtained as a result of police officers stopping an automobile in which Kain was riding without having sufficient reason to believe that criminal activity had been committed by the vehicle's occupants. Following this ruling, the State dismissed the robbery charge against Kain for lack of other available evidence.

Subsequently, however, the State applied to the district court to revoke Kain's probation on the 1981 burglary conviction based on the same evidence which had been determined to be inadmissible in a criminal trial of the previously dismissed robbery charge. The district court concluded that this evidence could be considered for purposes of deciding whether to revoke Kain's probation. Relying essentially on this evidence, the court revoked Kain's probation, a circumstance which resulted in his incarceration.

Kain then filed the present application for postconviction relief, contending that the illegally gathered evidence was improperly considered at the probation revocation hearing. Such contention was rejected by the district court which heard the trial of his postconviction action, and a judgment was entered denying relief. In appealing from this judgment, Kain urges three separate grounds upon which the evidence should have been excluded: (1) the fourth amendment to the federal constitution; (2) article I, section 8 of the Iowa constitution; (3) Iowa Rule of Criminal Procedure 11(1). We consider these claims separately.

I. The Federal Constitutional Argument.

Kain urges that the exclusionary rule in Mapp v. Ohio, 367 U.S. 643, 81 S.Ct. 1684, 6 L.Ed.2d 1081 (1961), formulated under the fourth amendment and made applicable to the states under the fourteenth amendment, extends to any use of illegally obtained evidence in a criminal adversarial setting. He views a probation revocation hearing as being such a setting and therefore urges that the exclusionary rule applies in that context. The plurality opinion in Mapp does suggest that, if evidence obtained in violation of a person's fourth amendment rights is thereafter used by the state against the penal interests of that person, such use is itself as violative of the fourth amendment as was the original search or seizure. Id. at 649, 81 S.Ct. at 1688, 6 L.Ed.2d at 1086.

As the Mapp exclusionary rule has evolved, however, the Supreme Court has justified its continued existence not as a redress for the victim of the search or seizure but rather as a deterrent to constitutionally violative police conduct. See Stone v. Powell, 428 U.S. 465, 486, 96 S.Ct. 3037, 3048, 49 L.Ed.2d 1067, 1083 (1976); United States v. Calandra, 414 U.S. 338, 348, 94 S.Ct. 613, 620, 38 L.Ed.2d 561, 571 (1974). Most recently that Court has employed a cost-benefit analysis in grafting limitations on the application of the exclusionary rule, an approach which weighs the benefits of applying the rule against the resulting damage to societal interests. See, e.g., United States v. Leon, 468 U.S. 897, 104 S.Ct. 3405, 82 L.Ed.2d 677 (1984) (evidence not excluded where officers reasonably relied upon invalid search warrant).

When faced with the question involved in the present case, several United States courts of appeal have applied a cost-benefit analysis which considers the extent to which use of an exclusionary rule in probation revocation matters will result in an increased deterrence of illegal evidence gathering activities beyond that which is already provided by an exclusionary rule in criminal trials. The increased deterrent effect, if any, is then weighed against the resulting loss to efficient control of convicted criminals who are under the supervision of a probation officer. The application of this balancing test has, in most instances, resulted in approval of the use of illegally gathered evidence at probation revocation hearings. See United States v. Bazzano, 712 F.2d 826, 834 (3d Cir.1983), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 104 S.Ct. 1439, 79 L.Ed.2d 760 (1984); United States v. Frederickson, 581 F.2d 711, 713 (8th Cir.1978); United States v. Winsett, 518 F.2d 51, 53-55 (9th Cir.1975); United States v. Farmer, 512 F.2d 160, 162-63 (6th Cir.), cert. denied, 423 U.S. 987, 96 S.Ct. 397, 46 L.Ed.2d 305 (1975); United States v. Brown, 488 F.2d 94, 95 (5th Cir.1973) (per curiam); United States v. Hill, 447 F.2d 817, 819 (7th Cir.1971); United States ex rel. Sperling v. Fitzpatrick, 426 F.2d 1161, 1163-64 (2d Cir.1970) (parole revocation).

An exception to such conclusion is believed to exist where the evidence in question was gathered for the express purpose of influencing the revocation of probation. See United States v. Schipani, 435 F.2d 26, 28 (2d Cir.1970), cert. denied, 401 U.S. 983, 91 S.Ct. 1198, 28 L.Ed.2d 334 (1971). Clearly, that situation is not presented in the case now before us. The record is clear that the officers making the invalid investigatory stop had no information at that time concerning the identity of the occupants of the automobile.

Typical of the reasoning of those federal courts permitting the use of illegally gathered evidence at probation revocation hearings is that of the ninth circuit in Winsett, 518 F.2d at 54-55:

An important aspect of our probation system is the placing of certain restrictions on the probationer, such as the requirement that he not associate with criminals or travel outside the judicial district. These conditions serve a dual purpose in that they enhance the chance for rehabilitation while simultaneously affording society a measure of...