People v. Cobb

• Decision Date: 05 November 1984
• Docket Number: No. 84SA212,84SA212
• Citation: 690 P.2d 848
• Parties: PEOPLE of the State of Colorado, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Michael J. COBB, Eddie J. Owens, Ronald T. Harrison, Defendants-Appellees.
• Court: Colorado Supreme Court

Page 848

690 P.2d 848

PEOPLE of the State of Colorado, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Michael J. COBB, Eddie J. Owens, Ronald T. Harrison,

Defendants-Appellees.

No. 84SA212.

Supreme Court of Colorado,

En Banc.

Nov. 5, 1984.

Norman S. Early, Jr., Dist. Atty., O. Otto Moore, Asst. Dist. Atty., Brooke Wunnicke, Chief Appellate Deputy Dist. Atty., Denver, for plaintiff-appellant.

Kevin Chavous, Denver, for defendant-appellee Michael J. Cobb.

Diane Carlton, Denver, for defendant-appellee Eddie J. Owens.

Richard A. Hostetler, Denver, for defendant-appellee Ronald T. Harrison.

LOHR, Justice.

This is an interlocutory appeal from a suppression order entered by the Denver District Court in a case in which Michael J. Cobb, Eddie J. Owens and Ronald T. Harrison are charged with the crimes of second degree burglary ¹ and felony theft. ² On the defendants' motions, the district court suppressed evidence consisting of a woman's purse, certain statements made by defendant Harrison concerning the purse, and evidence derived by police officers from those statements or from a search of the purse's contents. The district attorney appeals this order as it applies to defendants Cobb and Owens, but does not challenge its correctness as it relates to defendant Harrison. Because the district court erroneously permitted Cobb and Owens to assert a violation of Harrison's constitutional rights, we reverse the suppression order and remand this case to the trial court for further proceedings.

I.

At 12:14 a.m. on January 13, 1984, police officers were summoned to the residence of Alan Tenenbaum in southeast Denver. When Officers Chagolla and Vasquez arrived, Tenenbaum reported that someone had knocked on his door at about midnight. Upon opening the door, he saw a black male in a dark stocking cap. Tenenbaum did not recognize the man. The stranger said he was sorry, that he had the wrong address, and left. Tenenbaum told the officers that the man got into the back seat of a large, dark blue or black, four-door car--possibly a Chrysler--and that there were two other persons already in the car.

The officers spent only a few minutes with Tenenbaum and then drove through the neighborhood. At 12:26 a.m. they stopped a large, four-door, dark blue Mercury automobile at an intersection not far from Tenenbaum's home. There were three black males in the car. The man in the back seat was wearing a dark stocking cap. From the time the officers left the Tenenbaum residence until they stopped the car in which the defendants were riding, they saw no other cars traveling in the racially mixed residential area in which these events transpired.

Defendant Cobb, who was driving, could not produce a driver's license, and Officer Chagolla asked him to get out of the car and return with Chagolla to the police patrol car. It was at this point that Officer Chagolla noticed that on the floor of the front seat, in front of defendant Harrison, there was what appeared to be a woman's brown leather purse.

The officers obtained names and dates of birth from the defendants, and then radioed police headquarters, relaying this information and a description of the vehicle. While waiting for the results of a computer check for outstanding warrants, the officers filled out a "field contact card" for each of the defendants. Officer Chagolla testified that these cards are used by the Denver Police Department as standard procedure to gather information on suspects. Information from the cards is stored in a computer for possible future use in criminal investigations.

While Officer Chagolla was filling out a contact card for defendant Cobb, he asked Cobb about the ownership of the purse. The defendant replied that he wasn't sure, but that he thought it belonged to defendant Harrison's wife or sister. After Cobb's contact card was completed, and about fifteen minutes after the defendants were stopped, the officers received a call from the police department advising them that Harrison was wanted for failure to appear in Arapahoe County Court. Harrison was taken from the car, frisked, handcuffed, and placed under arrest for failure to appear. When asked about the purse that had been in front of him, Harrison said he had found it, and, when the officers offered to try to return it to its rightful owner, he agreed to let them take it.

The officers then opened the purse and found identification indicating that it belonged to a woman living on East Princeton Avenue. A radio report that reached the officers at 12:45 a.m. announced that the woman's home had been burglarized. All three defendants were then arrested for burglary and given Miranda ³ warnings.

II.

At a hearing on motions by each of the defendants to suppress evidence obtained as a result of the stop, the district court held that, in asking defendant Harrison about the purse after he had been arrested for failure to appear and without giving him a Miranda advisement, the police officers had violated Harrison's rights. And since the officers' suspicion was aroused only after Cobb and Harrison had made conflicting statements concerning the ownership of the purse, anything obtained as a result of Harrison's statement was fruit of the poisonous tree and could not be used against Harrison or against Cobb and Owens. See, e.g., Wong Sun v. United States, 371 U.S. 471, 83 S.Ct. 407, 9 L.Ed.2d 441 (1963); People v. Saiz, 620 P.2d 15 (Colo.1980). On this basis the district court ordered suppression of the purse and its contents. We conclude that this ruling is erroneous insofar as it applies to defendants Cobb and Owens, because we hold that they cannot vicariously assert Harrison's Miranda rights; nor did they assert any privacy interest in the purse that would render the search of its contents unreasonable as to either of them.

III.

After learning from a radio report that there was a warrant outstanding for Harrison's arrest for failure to appear in court, Officers Chagolla and Vasquez arrested and handcuffed Harrison. It was not until after they had done this that they asked Harrison about the woman's purse found in the car. Assuming, without so holding, that the trial court's finding that this was an unlawful interrogation was correct, ⁴ it does not follow that evidence inadmissible against Harrison on this basis is also inadmissible against the other defendants. In fact, defendants Cobb and Owens have conceded this point on appeal. Fourth and Fifth Amendment rights are personal and cannot be vicariously asserted. Couch v. United States, 409 U.S. 322, 93 S.Ct. 611, 34 L.Ed.2d 548 (1973); Alderman v. United States, 394 U.S. 165, 89 S.Ct. 961, 22 L.Ed.2d 176 (1969); Simmons v. United States, 390 U.S. 377, 88 S.Ct. 967, 19 L.Ed.2d 1247 (1968); see also People v. Spies, 200 Colo. 434, 615 P.2d 710 (1980).

Defendants Cobb and Owens also concede on appeal that they had no legitimate expectation of privacy in the purse and therefore cannot object to the search of its contents. Rawlings v. Kentucky, 448 U.S. 98 (1980); Rakas v. Illinois, 439 U.S. 128, 100 S.Ct. 2556, 65 L.Ed.2d 633 (1978); People v. Spies, 200 Colo. 434, 615 P.2d 710 (1980). We agree that the trial court erred in implicitly holding to the contrary.

Notwithstanding their concessions, defendants Cobb and Owens argue that the evidence in question cannot be used against them because the initial detention was unlawful. Were the detention found valid, these defendants admit that they could not complain of the seizure and ensuing search of the purse or of any other evidence derived from the questioning of Harrison.

In discussing the validity of the detention, the trial court focused on the three-pronged test developed in Stone v. People, 174 Colo. 504, 485 P.2d 495 (1971) (Stone). If the three parts of the test are met, a police officer can detain an individual temporarily, with less than probable cause for arrest, without violating the unreasonable search and seizure protections of the Fourth Amendment. The requirements are:

(1) the officer must have a reasonable suspicion that the individual has committed, or is about to commit, a crime; (2) the purpose of the detention must be reasonable; and (3) the character of the detention must be reasonable when considered in light of the purpose.

Stone, 174 Colo. at 509, 485 P.2d at 497. Accord People v. Tate, 657 P.2d 955 (Colo.1983); People v. Johnson, 199 Colo. 68, 605 P.2d 46 (1980).

The trial court found that the first prong of the test had been met. The officers had reasonable, specific and articulable suspicion that the defendants had engaged in criminal activity or were about to do so. Officer Chagolla, who had seven years of experience as a patrolman in the area where the events occurred, testified that the defendants' actions were consistent with the behavior of persons "casing"...