People v. Henry J. (In re Henry J.)

• Court: California Court of Appeals
• Writing for the Court: BEDSWORTH, J.
• Decision Date: 30 July 2015
• Docket Number: G050180
• Citation: People v. Henry J. (In re Henry J.), G050180 (Cal. App. Jul 30, 2015)
• Parties: In re HENRY J., a Person Coming Under the Juvenile Court Law. THE PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. HENRY J., Defendant and Appellant.

In re HENRY J., a Person Coming Under the Juvenile Court Law.

THE PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. HENRY J., Defendant and Appellant.

G050180

COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA FOURTH APPELLATE DISTRICT DIVISION THREE

July 30, 2015

NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN OFFICIAL REPORTS

California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule 8.1115(b). This opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115.

(Super. Ct. No. DL049150)

OPINION

Appeal from a judgment of the Superior Court of Orange County, Cheryl L. Leininger, Judge. Affirmed as modified.

Frank J. Torrano, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant.

Kamala D. Harris, Attorney General, Gerald A. Engler, Chief Assistant Attorney General, Julie L. Garland, Assistant Attorney General, Peter Quon, Jr., Randall Einhorn, Stacy Tyler and Teresa Torreblanca, Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.

Appellant, a minor, was placed on probation for possessing a knife on school grounds. He contends the knife was unlawfully seized and one of his probation conditions is unduly vague. Other than to modify the subject probation condition to include an explicit knowledge requirement, we affirm the judgment.

FACTS

On February 5, 2014, appellant left behind a notebook in one of his classes at Santa Ana High School. The notebook got the attention of school officials because it had the letters "SCK" written on it in gang-style writing. Officials suspected the letters stood for the "Sick Crime Krew," which is one of the criminal street gangs that operates around - and has members at - the school. In fact, at the time this case arose, several buildings at the school had recently been "tagged" with SCK graffiti. Gang members at the school were known to engage in assaultive behavior and drug and weapon activity.

Appellant's possible gang involvement was not the only thing that troubled school officials. He also had several "disciplinary referrals" pending against him.¹ So on the morning of February 6, the day after the notebook discovery, vice-principal Thomas Hummel sent out a radio dispatch to the school's safety officers to find appellant and bring him to his office.

Toward the end of first period, around 8:45 a.m., safety officer Lazaro Pita spotted appellant with two other students. Although appellant was wearing his gym clothes, he was not at the outdoor basketball courts, where gym classes are held. Instead, he was in an open area in the middle of the school known as the quad, where students socialize and eat lunch. Pita knew gym teachers sometimes let their students out three to five minutes before the period ends, so they have time to go back to their lockers and change. However, Pita spotted appellant in the quad about 15 minutes before the first period ended. Pita also knew that students cannot get to the locker room from thebasketball courts by walking through the quad. Therefore, he suspected appellant "wasn't where he was suppose[d] to be." This concerned Pita because his experience had taught him that students sometimes acquire drugs, weapons or other prohibited items when they are not in class.

Pita contacted appellant and took him to Hummel's office. When they arrived there, Hummel instructed Pita to pat appellant down and check his backpack for contraband. Although appellant was respectful during the encounter and did not have a history of violent behavior, Hummel was concerned he might be in possession of gang paraphernalia, a weapon, or tagging tools, all of which are prohibited under the school's safety policy.

Before starting the patdown, Pita had appellant spread his legs and put his hands behind his back. Then, moving from low to high, he began feeling the outside of appellant's clothing. While doing so, Pita asked appellant if he had anything he wasn't supposed to have, and appellant admitted he had a lighter. However, before coming across the lighter, Pita felt a hard object near appellant's waist. Appellant did not say anything when Pita asked him what the object was, but suspecting it might be a weapon, Pita lifted appellant's shirt and discovered a knife in his waistband. The knife was attached to a metal clip and had a four-inch retractable blade. After seizing the weapon, Pita continued the patdown and found two lighters, which like the knife, are prohibited under the school's rules. In response to Hummel's questioning, appellant admitted associating with SCK and said his moniker was "Wicked."

Appellant moved to suppress the knife on the basis there was no justification to pat him down. The court found the patdown was reasonable under the circumstances. It therefore denied appellant's motion and found he unlawfully possessed a weapon on school property. At the disposition hearing, the court put him on probation subject to various conditions, including that he not possess any drugs or alcohol.

DISCUSSION

Legality of the Patdown

Appellant contends the seizure of his knife violated the Fourth Amendment because it resulted from an unlawful patdown that was not supported by reasonable suspicion of wrongdoing. We disagree.

It is well established that "the Fourth Amendment applies to searches conducted by school authorities . . . ." (New Jersey v. T.L.O. (1985) 469 U.S. 325, 337.) However, "[o]ur courts have recognized that the special need of schools to maintain a safe and orderly environment for learning requires different rules regarding search and seizure than those employed in the public in general." (In re Jose Y. (2006) 141 Cal.App.4th 748, 752.) For example, "[s]earches of students on campus do not require probable cause to believe the student violated the law, but rather reasonable suspicion the student is violating or has violated a law, school rule, or regulation." (Ibid., citing In re William G. (1985) 40 Cal.3d 550, 564.)

School officials can also adopt policies that permit searches without individualized suspicion in certain circumstances. (See In re Latasha W. (1998) 60 Cal.App.4th 1524, 1527 [noting school search polices "do not violate the Fourth Amendment where the government need is great, the intrusion on the individual is limited, and a more rigorous standard of suspicion is unworkable."].) However, the Attorney General does not attempt to justify appellant's search under any school policy. Instead, she argues the search was lawful because appellant had gang-style writing on his notebook, and he was not in class when Pita found him on the morning of the search. In the state's view, these facts, combined with the other circumstances presented, created reasonable suspicion appellant was involved in gang-related graffiti activity, and therefore it was reasonable to search him for evidence of such. Because appellant attacks respondent's argument on both factual and legal grounds, we begin our analysis by reciting the standard of review applicable to this appeal.

"'In reviewing a suppression ruling, "we defer to the superior court's express and implied factual findings if they are supported by substantial evidence, [but] we exercise our independent judgment in determining the legality of a search on the facts so found."' [Citation.]" [¶] Thus, while we ultimately exercise our independent judgment to determine the constitutional propriety of a search or seizure, we do so within the context of historical facts determined by the trial court. 'As the finder of fact . . . the superior court is vested with the power to judge the credibility of the witnesses, resolve any conflicts in the testimony, weigh the evidence and draw factual inferences in deciding whether a search is constitutionally unreasonable.' [Citation.] We review its factual findings '"'under the deferential substantial-evidence standard.'"' [Citation.] Accordingly, '[w]e view the evidence in a light most favorable to the order denying the motion to suppress' [citation] and '[a]ny conflicts in the evidence are resolved in favor of the superior court's ruling.' [Citation.]" (People v. Tully (2012) 54 Cal.4th 952, 979.)

This last point is particularly important in this case, because appellant's arguments are primarily targeted at the factual underpinnings of the trial court's ruling. For example, appellant claims the record does not support the trial court's implied factual finding he was not in his gym class when Pita went looking for him on the morning of the search. However, that claim does not withstand scrutiny under the deferential standard set forth above.

Pita did not know appellant's class schedule, but when he found appellant on the morning of the search, he was in the school quad, which is a place where students go to eat and socialize, not attend classes. Because appellant was wearing gym clothes, defense counsel questioned Pita about the possibility he contacted appellant while he was walking from the basketball courts - where gym classes are held - to the locker room in order to change his clothes. To defense counsel's chagrin, Pita testified students cannot even get to the locker room by walking through the quad. And although it is possible for them to walk from the basketball courts to the quad, Pita said they would have to take"the long route" to do so. Moreover, while Pita knew gym teachers sometimes let their students out of class a few minutes early so they have time to go the locker room and change, he saw appellant in the quad about 15 minutes before the first period ended. Viewing this evidence in the light most favorable to the trial court's ruling, it constitutes substantial evidence from which the trial court could infer appellant was cutting class when Pita contacted him in the quad.

So, what is the significance of that? Appellant claims it is sheer speculation to believe his absence from gym class was cause for concern. But Pita testified appell...