People v. Frederick

Citation886 N.W.2d 1,313 Mich.App. 457
Decision Date08 December 2015
Docket NumberDocket Nos. 323642,323643.
Parties PEOPLE v. FREDERICK People v. Van Doorne.
CourtCourt of Appeal of Michigan — District of US

Bill Schuette, Attorney General, Aaron D. Lindstrom, Solicitor General, William A. Forsyth, Prosecuting Attorney, and James K. Benison, Chief Appellate Attorney, for the people.

Shaw Law Group, PLC, Grand Rapids (by Jeffrey P. Arnson ), for defendant Frederick.

Bruce Alan Block, PLC (by Bruce Alan Block, Grand Rapids and Bogomir Rajsic III), for defendant Van Doorne.

Before: TALBOT, C.J., and KIRSTEN FRANK KELLY and SERVITTO, JJ.

TALBOT

, C.J.

These consolidated cases are before us on remand from our Supreme Court.1 On remand, our Supreme Court has directed us to consider “whether the ‘knock and talk’ procedure[s] conducted in th[ese] case[s are] consistent with U.S. Const. Am. IV

, as articulated in Florida v. Jardines, [––– U.S. ––––,] 133 S.Ct. 1409, (2013).” For the reasons discussed, we conclude that the knock-and-talk procedures conducted with respect to both Frederick and Van Doorne were consistent with the Fourth Amendment. Accordingly, we affirm the trial court's decision.

I. FACTS

On March 17, 2014, at approximately 10:15 p.m., the Kent Area Narcotics Enforcement Team (KANET) executed a search warrant at the home of Timothy and Alyssa Scherzer. While executing this warrant, the KANET officers learned that the Scherzers, acting as caregivers, had been providing marijuana butter to corrections officers employed by the Kent County Sheriff Department (KCSD). Scherzer informed the KANET officers that he had given 14 pounds of marijuana butter to one corrections officer, Timothy Bernhardt, who acted as a middleman and distributed the butter to other corrections officers. Frederick and Van Doorne were identified as two corrections officers who received marijuana butter through Bernhardt. Both had been issued medical marijuana cards, and both identified Timothy Scherzer as their caregiver.

Based on this information, the KANET officers contemplated whether to obtain search warrants for the homes of the additional suspects, or alternatively, to simply go to the home of each suspect, knock, and request consent to conduct a search. The officers chose the latter approach. The team, composed that night of seven officers,2 conducted four knock-and-talks in the early morning hours of March 18, 2014. The officers first visited Bernhardt and another corrections officer.3 At approximately 4:00 a.m., the officers, in four unmarked vehicles, arrived at Frederick's home. Each officer was wearing a tactical vest, and each had a handgun holstered at his or her hip. Four officers approached the front door, knocked, and waited. Within a few minutes, Frederick answered the door and spoke to the officers. The officers informed Frederick that his name had come up in a criminal investigation and asked if they could come inside and speak with him. Frederick invited the officers inside. The officers asked if they could see Frederick's marijuana butter, and he agreed. Frederick signed a form granting his consent to conduct a search. The officers also informed Frederick of his Miranda4 rights, and Frederick signed a card waiving those rights. Officers recovered marijuana butter from Frederick's home.

The team arrived at the home of Van Doorne at approximately 5:30 a.m. Because ice made the front door inaccessible, four officers knocked at a side door. Van Doorne awoke and looked outside. Recognizing some of the officers standing outside his home, Van Doorne opened the door and spoke with them. As they had with Frederick, the officers explained the purpose of their visit. Van Doorne, believing that the issue could be resolved by showing the officers his medical marijuana card, invited the officers inside. However, because his dog continued to bark, Van Doorne and the officers decided to speak outside in a van. Once inside the van, Van Doorne signed forms waiving his Miranda rights and consenting to a search of his home. Officers recovered marijuana butter from Van Doorne's home.

Frederick and Van Doorne were charged with various controlled substance offenses.5 Both men filed motions to suppress the evidence obtained during the searches. Each made two arguments: (1) his consent to the search was involuntary, and (2) the knock-and-talk procedure violated the Fourth Amendment under Jardines. After an extensive evidentiary hearing, the trial court denied the motions, concluding that the knock-and-talk procedures were not searches or seizures under the Fourth Amendment, and that both men voluntarily consented to the searches. Frederick and Van Doorne filed separate applications for leave to appeal in this Court, which this Court denied.6 In lieu of granting leave to appeal, our Supreme Court remanded both cases to this Court to determine whether the knock-and-talk procedures were constitutional in light of Jardines.7

II. DISCUSSION
A. STANDARD OF REVIEW

We review for clear error a trial court's findings of fact in a suppression hearing, but we review de novo its ultimate decision on a motion to suppress.”8 Whether a violation of the Fourth Amendment has occurred is an issue of constitutional law which we review de novo.9

B. THE SCOPE OF OUR INQUIRY

We first address the limited scope of our review of the cases before us. The Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution provides that [t]he right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated....”10 Under the plain language of the amendment, [t]he Fourth Amendment is not a guarantee against all searches and seizures, but only against those that are unreasonable.”11 Thus, in any given Fourth Amendment case, there are two general inquiries to be made: (1) whether a “search or seizure” of a person, area, or object protected by the amendment occurred, and (2) if so, whether that search or seizure was unreasonable.

In this case, however, our inquiry is limited to the question whether the knock-and-talk procedures used in these cases amounted to a “search” within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment. To understand the scope of our inquiry, we reiterate that our Supreme Court has directed us to consider only whether the knock-and-talk procedures conducted in these cases were consistent with the Fourth Amendment as articulated in Jardines. In Jardines, the United States Supreme Court's inquiry was “limited to the question of whether the officers' behavior was a search within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment.”12 The Court did not address whether, assuming a search occurred, the search was reasonable, nor did it address whether a seizure had occurred. Thus, we read our Supreme Court's order as directing us to consider a limited question: whether the knock-and-talk procedures used in these consolidated cases were “searches” within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment, as a “search” is defined by Jardines.13 We answer this question in the negative.

C. FLORIDA V. JARDINES

The starting point of our analysis is the United States Supreme Court's opinion in Florida v. Jardines. In Jardines, two police officers, acting on a tip that a home was being used to grow marijuana, approached the home on foot.14 The officers were accompanied by a dog trained to detect the odor of specific controlled substances.15 The dog detected the odor of one of these substances and alerted at the base of the home's front door.16 The officers then used this information to obtain a warrant to search the home.17 Writing for the majority, Justice Scalia used a property-rights framework to determine whether the officers had conducted a search by approaching the home with the drug-sniffing dog.18

First, Justice Scalia explained that [w]hen ‘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.’19 Justice Scalia explained that a home's front porch was a “classic exemplar of an area adjacent to the home,” commonly known as the “curtilage,” which is considered part of a home, and thus, is protected by the Fourth Amendment.20 Because “the officers' investigation took place in a constitutionally protected area,” the question became “whether it was accomplished through an unlicensed physical intrusion.”21 To answer this question, Justice Scalia inquired into whether Jardines “had given his leave (even implicitly) for” the officers to set foot on his property.22 Justice Scalia then explained:

“A license may be implied from the habits of the country,” notwithstanding the “strict rule of the English common law as to entry upon a close.” McKee v. Gratz, 260 U.S. 127, 136, 43 S.Ct. 16, 67 L.Ed. 167 (1922)

(Holmes, J.). We have accordingly recognized that “the knocker on the front door is treated as an invitation or license to attempt an entry, justifying ingress to the home by solicitors, hawkers and peddlers of all kinds.” Breard v. Alexandria, 341 U.S. 622, 626, 71 S.Ct. 920, 95 L.Ed. 1233 (1951). This implicit license typically permits the visitor to approach the home by the front path, knock promptly, wait briefly to be received, and then (absent invitation to linger longer) leave. Complying with the terms of that traditional invitation does not require fine-grained legal knowledge; it is generally managed without incident by the Nation's Girl Scouts and trick-or-treaters. Thus, a police officer not armed with a warrant may approach a home and knock, precisely because that is “no more than any private citizen might do.” Kentucky v. King, 563 U.S. [452], [469], 131 S.Ct. 1849, 1862, 179 L.Ed.2d 865 (2011).[23

]In Jardines, the majority concluded that the officers exceeded the scope of this implied license, and thus, conducted a search within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment. This was because while any ordinary citizen...

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2 cases
  • State v. Christensen
    • United States
    • Tennessee Supreme Court
    • April 7, 2017
    ...dog onto the front porch, will his approach offend the Fourth Amendment. Jardines , 133 S.Ct. at 1417–18 ; see alsoPeople v. Frederick , 313 Mich.App. 457, 886 N.W.2d 1, 9 (2015) (stating that, under Jardines , officers "do not violate the Fourth Amendment by approaching a home and seeking ......
  • People v. Frederick
    • United States
    • Michigan Supreme Court
    • June 1, 2017
    ...The majority concluded that the knock and talk procedures at issue were permitted by the Fourth Amendment. People v. Frederick , 313 Mich.App. 457, 461, 886 N.W.2d 1 (2015). The majority emphasized that the officers approached the home, knocked, and waited to be received, and " Jardines pla......

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