Potts v. State

• Decision Date: 01 September 1984
• Docket Number: No. 4,4
• Parties: William J. POTTS v. STATE of Maryland. ,
• Court: Maryland Court of Appeals

Page 567

300 Md. 567

479 A.2d 1335

William J. POTTS v. STATE of Maryland.

No. 4, Sept. Term, 1984.

Court of Appeals of Maryland.

Aug. 22, 1984.

Thomas J. Saunders, Asst. Public Defender, Baltimore (Alan H. Murrell, Public Defender, Baltimore, on brief), for Appellant.

Deborah K. Chasanow, Asst. Atty. Gen. (Stephen H. Sachs, Atty. Gen., Baltimore, on brief), for Appellee.

Argued before MURPHY, C.J., and ELDRIDGE, COLE, DAVIDSON, RODOWSKY and COUCH, JJ., and JAMES C. MORTON, Jr., Associate Judge of the Court of Special Appeals (retired), Specially Assigned.

MURPHY, Chief Judge.

This case involves a search of appellant Potts' residence under a search warrant issued prior to the Supreme Court's June 8, 1983 decision in Illinois v. Gates, 462 U.S. 213, 103 S.Ct. 2317, 76 L.Ed.2d 527. Appellant's trial motion to suppress incriminating evidence found in his house asserted a lack of probable cause to support issuance of the search warrant under the Supreme Court's pre-Gates decisions of Aguilar v. Texas, 378 U.S. 108, 84 S.Ct. 1509, 12 L.Ed.2d 723 (1964) and Spinelli v. United States, 393 U.S. 410, 89 S.Ct. 584, 21 L.Ed.2d 637 (1969). The Circuit Court for Baltimore City (Hammerman, J.) determined that the probable cause test enunciated in Gates was applicable to the pre-Gates warrant, and that under the standard established by that case, the search warrant was validly issued. The court went on to conclude that were Aguilar and Spinelli controlling, the motion to suppress would have been granted since under those cases the search warrant application failed to demonstrate probable cause for the warrant's issuance. Potts was subsequently found guilty of six narcotic related offenses and appealed. We granted certiorari prior to decision by the intermediate appellate court primarily to determine the applicability of Gates to a pre-Gates search warrant, both under the Fourth Amendment to the Federal Constitution and Article 26 of the Maryland Declaration of Rights.

I.

In Gates, the Court applied "a totality of the circumstances" analysis in determining whether an affidavit based on an anonymous informant's tip provided probable cause under the Fourth Amendment for the issuance of a search warrant. In doing so, the Court expressly abandoned the strict two-prong test derived from Aguilar and Spinelli which required that the magistrate be informed of (1) some of the underlying circumstances from which the informant concluded that the incriminating evidence was located where it was claimed to be, and (2) some of the underlying circumstances from which the affiant concluded that the informant, whose identity need not be disclosed, was "credible" or his information "reliable." Aguilar, supra, 378 U.S. at 114, 84 S.Ct. at 1514. The Court noted in Gates that the two prongs of the test have been considered independent of each other by courts which have applied it, see, e.g., Stanley v. State, 19 Md.App. 507, 530-31, 313 A.2d 847 (1974), and that, consequently, failure to satisfy one prong of the test could not be overcome by a strong showing on the other. Gates, supra, 462 U.S. at ---- n.6, 103 S.Ct. at 2328 n.6. In expressly rejecting the rigid application of the Aguilar-Spinelli test, the Court reaffirmed the totality of the circumstances analysis that "traditionally has informed probable cause determinations." Gates, supra, 462 U.S. at ----, 103 S.Ct. at 2332. It said:

"[T]he traditional standard for review of an issuing magistrate's probable cause determination has been that so long as the magistrate had a 'substantial basis for ... conclud[ing]' that a search would uncover evidence of wrongdoing, the Fourth Amendment requires no more." Id. at 2331.

See United States v. Harris, 403 U.S. 573, 581, 91 S.Ct. 2075, 2080, 29 L.Ed.2d 723 (1971); Jones v. United States, 362 U.S. 257, 271, 80 S.Ct. 725, 736, 4 L.Ed.2d 697 (1960). The Court indicated that the veracity and basis of knowledge of the informant are still relevant to a probable cause determination. It said:

"[T]hey are better understood as relevant considerations in the totality of circumstances analysis that traditionally has guided probable cause determinations: a deficiency in one may be compensated for, in determining the overall reliability of a tip, by a strong showing as to the other, or by some other indicia of reliability." Gates, supra, 462 U.S. at ----, 103 S.Ct. at 2329.

The Court continued:

"The task of the issuing magistrate is simply to make a practical, common-sense decision whether, given all the circumstances set forth in the affidavit before him, including the 'veracity' and 'basis of knowledge' of persons supplying hearsay information, there is a fair probability that contraband or evidence of a crime will be found in a particular place. And the duty of a reviewing court is simply to ensure that the magistrate had a 'substantial basis for ... conclud[ing]' that probable cause existed." Id. at 2332.

After-the-fact judicial scrutiny of the affidavit should not take the form of de novo review; the Court said: "A magistrate's 'determination of probable cause should be paid great deference by reviewing courts.' Spinelli, supra, 393 U.S., at 419 ." Id. at 2331. The Court added that a grudging attitude toward warrants is inconsistent with the Fourth Amendment's strong preference for searches conducted pursuant to a warrant. Id. But mere conclusory statements made in a "bare bones" affidavit are not enough, the Court cautioned. It said:

"Sufficient information must be presented to the magistrate to allow that official to determine probable cause; his action cannot be a mere ratification of the bare conclusions of others." Id. at 2332.

In Massachusetts v. Upton, --- U.S. ----, 104 S.Ct. 2085, 80 L.Ed.2d 721 (1984), the Court clarified its holding in Gates. ¹ In that case, the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts had earlier held that Gates did not significantly change the Aguilar-Spinelli test but only indicated that corroboration of an informant's tip may satisfy the probable cause requirement, even though the two-prong test was not otherwise met. The Supreme Court responded:

"We think that the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts misunderstood our decision in Gates. We did not merely refine or qualify the 'two-pronged test.' We rejected it as hypertechnical and divorced from 'the factual and practical considerations of everyday life on which reasonable and prudent men, not legal technicians, act.' Brinegar v. United States, 338 U.S. 160, 69 S.Ct. 1302, 93 L.Ed. 1879 (1949)." Id. --- U.S. at ----, 104 S.Ct. at 2087.

The Massachusetts court erred, said the Court, by not examining each piece of information in the affidavit and balancing the various indicia of reliability concerning the tip. Instead, the Court explained, the Massachusetts court

"insisted on judging bits and pieces of information in isolation against the artificial standards provided by the two-pronged test." Id. 104 S.Ct. at 2088.

Additionally, the state court failed to defer to the decision of the magistrate who issued the warrant. The Court said:

"Instead of merely deciding whether the evidence viewed as a whole provided a 'substantial basis' for the magistrate's finding of probable cause, the court conducted a de novo probable cause determination. We rejected just such after-the-fact, de novo scrutiny in Gates." Id.

The Court noted that

"[a] deferential standard of review is appropriate to further the Fourth Amendment's strong preference for searches conducted pursuant to a warrant." Id.

In finding the existence of probable cause in that case, the Court stated:

"[T]he magistrate can hardly be accused of approving a mere 'hunch' or a bare recital of legal conclusions. The informant's story and the surrounding facts possessed an internal coherence that gave weight to the whole." Id. at 2089.

II.

The affidavit in support of the search warrant application in this case recited the observations of a Baltimore City Police Officer and the information which he received from an unnamed informant. The affiant asserted that Potts' home, located at 222 South Gilmor Street in Baltimore City, was being used by Potts for the keeping and distribution of controlled dangerous substances and related paraphernalia. The affiant said that during the last week of December 1982 an informant told him that Potts was selling heroin from his residence, which he used as "a stash house," and from his automobiles; that the informant further stated that Potts transported the heroin from his residence to the 800 block of Carroll Street, where he sold it; and that Potts sold his last bag of heroin on December 31, 1982 and was due to resupply himself the first of the following week. The affiant stated that the informant also advised him that he had purchased a $35 bag of heroin from Potts during the last week of December 1982 while in the 800 block of Carroll Street; and that Potts supplied the bag of heroin from the trunk of his Buick Skylark automobile. The affiant asserted that he knew his informant to be a heroin addict; that the informant had proven reliable in the past by furnishing narcotic related information which led to the conviction of more than ten persons.

The affiant specified that he had Potts under periodic surveillance since July of 1982; and that during November and December of 1982 he had followed Potts as Potts drove his Buick Skylark from his residence to the 800 block of Carroll Street, which was a popular gathering place for narcotic addicts, and then back to his residence. The affiant stated that he had previously received information from the informant that Potts and James Stencil were partners in the narcotic business; that as a result of that information, an investigation was conducted which led to the recovery of twenty-four bags of heroin and the arrest of Stencil; and that while there was insufficient evidence to charge Potts on that particular occasion, Stencil...