State v. Brady

• Citation: 585 So.2d 524
• Decision Date: 09 September 1991
• Docket Number: No. 90-KK-2415,90-KK-2415
• Parties: STATE of Louisiana v. Nona L. BRADY. 585 So.2d 524
• Court: Supreme Court of Louisiana

Page 524

585 So.2d 524

STATE of Louisiana v. Nona L. BRADY.

No. 90-KK-2415.

585 So.2d 524

Supreme Court of Louisiana.

Sept. 9, 1991.

Harry F. Connick, Dist. Atty., Valerie A. Welz, for plaintiff-applicant.

Ernest Lee Caulfield, Maurice A. Williams, for defendant-respondent.

LEMMON, Justice

The issue before the court in this second degree murder case is whether the murder weapon and the bloody shirt apparently worn by defendant at the time of the stabbing should have been suppressed by the lower courts. We hold that the police officer who seized the evidence had probable cause to open the closet where the evidence was found and that his immediate and limited warrantless search of the closet was reasonable under the circumstances and within the scope of the defendant's tacit consent to investigate and develop clues to the murder.

Facts

Defendant and the victim, defendant's boyfriend, were living together in an apartment. At approximately 1:00 a.m. on the date of the homicide, defendant's neighbor, at defendant's request, called the police to report a stabbing and to request that officers be sent immediately to defendant's apartment. When the officers arrived in response to this call, defendant answered the door and allowed them to enter the apartment.

The officers found the victim in the hall next to the bathroom. After determining that the victim was dead, the officers called homicide detectives to the scene. Defendant told the officers that the victim said he had been stabbed in another residence and had staggered into their apartment through the front door before collapsing in the hall.

When Detective Demma arrived at the scene, he noted that there were several spots of blood on the kitchen floor near the rear door. There was also a button on the kitchen floor. As Detective Demma stood by the victim's head near the bathroom door, he noted a bloody towel in the lavatory in the bathroom and blood on the handle of the closet door adjacent to the lavatory. He then opened the closet door and found a pair of bloody scissors and a bloody shirt. ¹

Evidently recognizing that the presence of the apparent murder weapon in the closet contradicted defendant's statement that the stabbing occurred in another residence, Detective Demma arrested defendant for murder. Upon questioning after advice of her rights, defendant admitted that she had stabbed the victim.

Defendant subsequently moved to suppress the evidence and the confession. The trial judge suppressed all of the challenged evidence (except the evidence of blood stains on the floor), reasoning that "[t]here is just no crime scene exception to seize this type of evidence." ² The judge concluded that the police did not have the authority under the circumstances to search the linen closet without a warrant or without a more positive showing of consent to search the closet.

On the prosecutor's application for supervisory writs, the court of appeal reversed the suppression of the button and the bloody towel that had been found in plain view in the kitchen and bathroom where the officers were lawfully present. However, the intermediate court affirmed the trial court's suppression of the scissors and the bloody shirt on the basis that the officers did not have probable cause to believe evidence of the stabbing would be found in the closet and that the officers had no justification to open the closet without a warrant. 569 So.2d 110.

We granted the prosecutor's application for certiorari to review the suppression of the scissors and the bloody shirt. 571 So.2d 620.

The two principal issues are: (1) whether Detective Demma had probable cause to believe that evidence of the homicide would be found in the bathroom closet, and (2) whether Detective Demma's immediate and limited warrantless search of the closet was reasonable and within the scope of defendant's tacit consent to investigate the immediate area near the body.

Probable Cause

Probable cause to search exists when a reasonable police officer has cause to believe, under the totality of the circumstances, there is a fair probability that contraband or evidence of a crime will be found in the place to be searched. Illinois v. Gates, 462 U.S. 213, 238, 103 S.Ct. 2317, 2332, 76 L.Ed.2d 527 (1983); State v. Kyles, 513 So.2d 265 (La.1987).

The probable cause standard is a practical, non-technical concept. Brinegar v. United States, 338 U.S. 160, 69 S.Ct. 1302, 93 L.Ed. 1879 (1949). Dealing with probable cause involves dealing with probabilities which are not technical, but are "the factual and practical considerations of everyday life on which reasonable and prudent men, not legal technicians, act." Id., at 175, 69 S.Ct. at 1310. "[P]ractical people formulate certain common-sense conclusions about human behavior; jurors as factfinders are permitted to do the same--and so are law enforcement officers." United States v. Cortez, 449 U.S. 411, 101 S.Ct. 690, 66 L.Ed.2d 621 (1981). Evidence collected by law enforcement officers must be viewed and weighed, not in terms of library analysis by scholars, but as understood by those versed in the field of law enforcement. Id. Probable cause is a fluid concept, turning on the assessment of probabilities in particular factual contexts and not readily reduced to a neat set of legal rules. Illinois v. Gates, 462 U.S. 213, 232, 103 S.Ct. 2317, 2329, 76 L.Ed.2d 527 (1983).

In the present case it was evident that a homicide had been committed with a knife or similar weapon a short time before Detective Demma arrived at the scene. When Detective Demma saw the bloody towel in plain view in the bathroom lavatory near the body and further saw blood on the handle of the closet door next to the lavatory, a reasonable person versed in the field of law enforcement could have formulated a reasonable conclusion that there was a fair probability evidence relating to the stabbing would be found inside the closet. Clearly, the existence of probable cause was established by the evidence.

Reasonableness of Search

The more difficult question is whether the search of the closed closet and the seizure of the scissors and bloody shirt (which were not in plain view before the door was opened) were reasonable under the circumstances during the death scene investigation.

Generally, searches may be conducted only pursuant to a warrant which has been issued by a judge on the basis of probable cause. U.S. Const. amend. IV; La. Const. art. I, Sec. 5; La.Code Crim.Proc. art. 162; United States v. Ventreseca, 380 U.S. 102, 85 S.Ct. 741, 13 L.Ed.2d 684 (1965). The warrant requirement protects persons against unjustified governmental interference with their lives by limiting searches to those based on probable cause and by requiring a neutral determination of probable cause except when exigent circumstances warrant immediate action.

Prior to Mincey v. Arizona, 437 U.S. 385, 98 S.Ct. 2408, 57 L.Ed.2d 290 (1978), many state courts and lower federal courts frequently permitted warrantless searches when there were compelling reasons for the immediate investigation of the scene of a possible murder. When the initial entry of the police was legal and there were exigent circumstances such as the fleeing of the unknown assailant, the need for immediately developing possible identification evidence was deemed to justify warrantless action. Other cases involving a warrantless continuation of an investigation also turned on the initial lawful entry onto the scene. See 2 W. LaFave, Search and Seizure, A Treatise on the Fourth Amendment Sec. 6.5(e) (2nd ed. 1987); Note, Warrantless Murder Scene Searches in the Aftermath of Mincey v. Arizona, 58 Wash.U.L.Q. 367 (1980).

Although not a murder case, the decision in Michigan v. Tyler, 436 U.S. 499, 98 S.Ct. 1942, 56 L.Ed.2d 486 (1978) was illustrative of the reasoning. In Tyler firefighters while battling a blaze discovered possible evidence of arson. After the fire was extinguished, but before firefighters left the scene at 4:00 a.m., an arson investigator found two plastic containers of inflammable liquid. At 8:00 and 9:00 a.m. a fire official responsible for determining the origin of fires entered the premises without a warrant and made two searches, the second while accompanied by a police arson investigator. Evidence of arson was seized. The Court approved the seizure of the evidence, noting that the two later searches were no more than a continuation of the initial legitimate entry. The Court held that fire officials, once legitimately in a building to fight a fire, may remain for a reasonable time after extinguishment of the fire to investigate its cause.

Three weeks later the Court decided Mincey v. Arizona, 437 U.S. 385, 98 S.Ct. 2408, 57 L.Ed.2d 290 (1978). In that case the police went to Mincey's apartment where a drug sale was scheduled to take place. One of the officers was fatally injured during an exchange of gunfire in a room in which Mincey was the only other occupant. The other officers made a quick search for other shooting victims or accomplices and then guarded the other suspects and the premises, but did not find or seize any evidence. Ten minutes later homicide detectives arrived and conducted a general warrantless search of the apartment that lasted four days. They examined every item in the apartment, including furniture and carpets, and they seized 200 to 300 objects. The state court held it was permissible to conduct a warrantless search of the scene of the homicide, limited to determining the circumstances of death, when the police were legally on the premises in the first instance. The Supreme Court reversed, noting that there were no exigent circumstances, no indication that evidence would be removed or destroyed, and no suggestion that the police could not conveniently obtain a warrant. The Court held that "the warrantless search of Mincey's apartment was not constitutionally permissible simply because a homicide had recently...