People v. Bonilla

• Decision Date: 18 October 2018
• Docket Number: Docket No. 122484
• Citation: 427 Ill.Dec. 863,120 N.E.3d 930,2018 IL 122484
• Parties: The PEOPLE of the State of Illinois, Appellant, v. Derrick BONILLA, Appellee.
• Court: Illinois Supreme Court

2018 IL 122484

120 N.E.3d 930

427 Ill.Dec. 863

The PEOPLE of the State of Illinois, Appellant,

v.Derrick BONILLA, Appellee.

Docket No. 122484

Supreme Court of Illinois.

Opinion filed October 18, 2018

JUSTICE KILBRIDE delivered the judgment of the court, with opinion.

¶ 1 This appeal presents a search and seizure issue involving application of this court's recent opinion in People v. Burns , 2016 IL 118973, 401 Ill.Dec. 468, 50 N.E.3d 610. Burns , relying on Florida v. Jardines , 569 U.S. 1, 133 S.Ct. 1409, 185 L.Ed.2d 495 (2013), held that the warrantless use of a drug-detection dog at a defendant's apartment door, located within a locked apartment building, violated a defendant's rights under the fourth amendment to the United States Constitution. U.S. Const., amend. IV. In this case, the circuit court of Rock Island County determined that police violated defendant's fourth amendment rights by conducting a dog sniff of the threshold of defendant's apartment, located on the third floor of an unlocked apartment building. The appellate court affirmed. 2017 IL App (3d) 160457, 415 Ill.Dec. 183, 82 N.E.3d 128. We now affirm.

¶ 2 BACKGROUND

¶ 3 The facts of this case were stipulated to by the parties.¹ Defendant, Derrick Bonilla, lived in an apartment at Pheasant Ridge Apartment Complex in Moline, Illinois. The East Moline Police Department received a tip that defendant was selling drugs from his apartment. Acting on that tip, on March 19, 2015, officers brought a trained drug-detection dog to defendant's apartment building. The exterior doors to the apartment building were not locked. The three-floor apartment building contained four apartments on each floor. Once inside the building, Moline canine officer Genisio² walked his drug-detection dog through the second-floor common area. The dog showed no interest in the second-floor common area and did not alert on any of the apartment thresholds. Officer Genisio then walked his dog through the third-floor common area. The dog showed no interest in units 301, 302, or 303. As the dog came to defendant's apartment, unit 304, however, it moved back and forth in the doorway, sniffed at the bottom of the door, and signaled a positive alert for the presence of narcotics. Officers obtained a search warrant for defendant's apartment based on the drug-detection dog's alert. Officers searched defendant's apartment and found cannabis. Defendant was later arrested and charged with unlawful possession of cannabis with intent to deliver ( 720 ILCS 550/5(c) (West 2014) ).

¶ 4 In June 2015, defendant filed a motion to suppress. A hearing was held on that motion in August 2016. The parties stipulated to the facts, and no additional testimony or evidence was presented. At the conclusion of the hearing, the trial court granted defendant's motion to suppress, stating:

"But I think whether you are doing it as a privacy interest under [ Kyllo v. United States , 533 U.S. 27, 121 S.Ct. 2038, 150 L.Ed.2d 94 (2001),] or a curtilage property interest under [ Jardines , 569 U.S. 1, 133 S.Ct. 1409 ], I think it would just be unfair to say you can't come up on a person who lives in a single family residence and sniff his door but you can go into someone's hallway and sniff their door if they happen to live in an apartment. That's a distinction with an unfair difference. So I'm granting the motion."

¶ 5 After the State's oral motion to reconsider was denied, the State appealed. The State did not file a separate certificate of impairment but did set forth in its notice of appeal that the granting of defendant's motion to suppress had the substantive effect of dismissing the charges.

¶ 6 The appellate court affirmed, holding that the common area just outside the door of an apartment constituted curtilage under Jardines and Burns . 2017 IL App (3d) 160457, ¶ 18, 415 Ill.Dec. 183, 82 N.E.3d 128. The appellate court determined that the State acquired the evidence of drugs by intruding into a constitutionally protected area. 2017 IL App (3d) 160457, ¶ 21, 415 Ill.Dec. 183, 82 N.E.3d 128. The appellate court also rejected the State's argument that the good faith exception applies to prevent the evidence from being suppressed. 2017 IL App (3d) 160457, ¶ 24, 415 Ill.Dec. 183, 82 N.E.3d 128. Justice Wright dissented, arguing that this court had emphasized that police entered a locked apartment complex in Burns and that she would hold the hallway in this unsecured apartment building was not curtilage. 2017 IL App (3d) 160457, ¶¶ 28-40, 415 Ill.Dec. 183, 82 N.E.3d 128 (Wright, J., dissenting). We allowed the State's petition for leave to appeal. Ill. S. Ct. R. 315 (eff. Jan. 1, 2015).

¶ 7 ANALYSIS

¶ 8 The State appeals from the judgment of the appellate court affirming the trial court's order granting defendant's motion to suppress. On appeal, we give great deference to a trial court's findings of fact when ruling on a motion to suppress. People v. Cregan , 2014 IL 113600, ¶ 22, 381 Ill.Dec. 593, 10 N.E.3d 1196. We will reverse the trial court's findings of fact only if they are against the manifest weight of the evidence. Cregan , 2014 IL 113600, ¶ 22, 381 Ill.Dec. 593, 10 N.E.3d 1196. The trial court's legal ruling on whether the evidence should be suppressed is reviewed de novo . People v. Bridgewater , 235 Ill. 2d 85, 92-93, 335 Ill.Dec. 208, 918 N.E.2d 553 (2009).

¶ 9 Here, the parties stipulated to the facts. The record on appeal does not contain the search warrant and affidavit relied on by the trial court in ruling on defendant's motion to suppress. The State, as the appellant, has the burden of presenting a record sufficient to support its claim of error, and any insufficiencies must be resolved against it. People v. Hunt , 234 Ill. 2d 49, 58, 333 Ill.Dec. 58, 914 N.E.2d 477 (2009). Obviously, our legal analysis on a motion to suppress is heavily dependent on the specific facts of each case, and we admonish the State for not providing this court with a complete record in this appeal. Here, there was no testimony at the hearing on defendant's motion to suppress. The only evidence to support issuance of the search warrant was the search warrant itself and the affidavit. It is inconceivable that the State would expect this court to review the propriety of the trial court's ruling on defendant's motion to suppress evidence without providing a copy of the documents that were considered by the trial court in making its ruling. Accordingly, any doubts that may arise from the incompleteness of the record will be resolved against the State, as the appellant. Foutch v. O'Bryant , 99 Ill. 2d 389, 391-92, 76 Ill.Dec. 823, 459 N.E.2d 958 (1984).

¶ 10 The question of law at issue in this appeal is whether the warrantless use of a drug-detection dog at the threshold of an apartment door, located on the third floor of an unlocked apartment building containing four apartments on each floor, violated defendant's fourth amendment rights. We review this question of law de novo . People v. Caballes , 221 Ill. 2d 282, 289, 303 Ill.Dec. 128, 851 N.E.2d 26 (2006).

¶ 11 I. Whether Defendant's Fourth Amendment Rights Were Violated

¶ 12 The State argues that use of the drug-detection dog did not violate defendant's fourth amendment rights because the common-area hallway in front of defendant's apartment door did not constitute curtilage. Defendant counters that use of the drug-detection dog at the threshold of his apartment door violated the fourth amendment to the United States Constitution ( U.S. Const., amend. IV ). According to defendant, "a citizen's home is first among equals in Fourth Amendment jurisprudence, and the threshold is part of the home as a matter of law."

¶ 13 The fourth amendment to the United States Constitution provides:

"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized." U.S. Const., amend. IV.

¶ 14 The parties disagree whether this court's recent decision in Burns and the United States Supreme Court's decision in Jardines control. We begin by reviewing the Supreme Court's decision in Jardines . In Jardines , police received an "unverified tip" that marijuana was being grown in the defendant's home. Jardines , 569 U.S. at 3, 133 S.Ct. 1409. Police subsequently went to defendant's home with a drug-detection dog and approached the front porch. After sniffing the base of the front door, the dog gave a positive alert for narcotics. Police applied for and received a warrant to search defendant's residence based on the dog sniff. A search of the residence resulted in the discovery of marijuana plants. Jardines , 569 U.S. at 3-4, 133 S.Ct. 1409.

¶ 15 The Supreme Court limited its review "to the question of whether the officers' behavior was a search within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment." Jardines , 569 U.S. at 5, 133 S.Ct. 1409. The Supreme Court held that a warrantless "dog sniff" of an individual's front porch was a search for purposes of the fourth amendment and suppressed the recovered evidence. The Supreme Court stated that the fourth amendment establishes

"a simple baseline, one that for much of our history formed the exclusive basis for its protections: When ‘the Government obtains information by physically intruding’ on persons, houses, papers, or effects, ‘a "search" within the original meaning of the Fourth Amendment’ has ‘undoubtedly occurred.’ " Jardines , 569 U.S. at 5, 133 S.Ct. 1409 (quoting United States v. Jones , 565 U.S. 400, 406 n.3, 132 S.Ct. 945, 181 L.Ed.2d 911 (2012) ).

¶ 16 The Court in Jardines recognized that its decision in Katz v. United States , 389 U.S. 347, 88 S.Ct. 507, 19 L.Ed.2d 576 (1967), holding that property rights are not the sole measure of the fourth amendment's protections, may add to this baseline but...