State v. Cora

• Decision Date: 27 June 2017
• Docket Number: No. 2016–0145,2016–0145
• Citation: 170 N.H. 186,167 A.3d 633
• Parties: The STATE of New Hampshire v. Daniel Jesus CORA
• Court: New Hampshire Supreme Court

170 N.H. 186

167 A.3d 633

The STATE of New Hampshire

v.Daniel Jesus CORA

No. 2016–0145

Supreme Court of New Hampshire.

Argued: January 26, 2017

Opinion Issued: June 27, 2017

Joseph A. Foster, attorney general (Sean R. Locke, assistant attorney general, on the brief and orally), for the State.

Christine C. List, assistant appellate defender, of Concord, on the brief and orally, for the defendant.

HICKS, J.

The State appeals an order of the Superior Court (Abramson, J.) granting the motion filed by the defendant, Daniel Jesus Cora, to suppress all evidence obtained from the warrantless entry by the police into his vehicle. See RSA 606:10 (2001). On appeal, the State contends that the police were allowed to enter the vehicle without a warrant either under the federal automobile exception to the warrant requirement, which the State asks that we adopt under the State Constitution, or because the defendant had a diminished expectation of privacy in the interior space of his vehicle that is visible to the public. Under the federal automobile exception, police officers, with probable cause to search "a lawfully stopped vehicle," may conduct a warrantless search "of every part of the vehicle and its contents that may conceal the object of the search." United States v. Ross, 456 U.S. 798, 825, 102 S.Ct. 2157, 72 L.Ed.2d 572 (1982).

The State urges us to overrule our decision in State v. Sterndale, 139 N.H. 445, 449–50, 656 A.2d 409 (1995), in which we declined to adopt, under Part I, Article 19 of the State Constitution, the federal automobile exception to the warrant requirement as articulated in Ross and other Supreme Court cases. Alternatively, the State asks that we conclude that Sterndale has been abrogated by our decision in State v. Goss, 150 N.H. 46, 48–49, 834 A.2d 316 (2003), and that we adopt a "slightly more narrow exception" to the warrant requirement based upon the defendant's diminished expectation of privacy in the "publicly visible areas of his car."

We decline to overrule Sterndale. However, we agree with the State that Sterndale has been abrogated by Goss, at least in part, and that its abrogation requires that we re-evaluate whether to adopt an automobile exception to our warrant requirement. We now recognize a limited automobile exception to the warrant requirement pursuant to which the police do not need to obtain a warrant to enter an automobile when the vehicle has been lawfully stopped while in transit and the police have probable cause to believe that a plainly visible item in the vehicle is contraband.

In this case, the police did not need a warrant before entering the defendant's vehicle because the vehicle was subject to a lawful traffic stop, and the police had probable cause to believe that the baggie and cigarette, which were plainly visible, were drugs. Accordingly, we reverse and remand.

I. Relevant Facts

The trial court found, or the record establishes, the following facts. The defendant's vehicle was pulled over by Manchester Police Officer Day because it ran a red light and "cut ... off" Day's cruiser. The defendant was the driver of the vehicle and had two passengers with him. While Day spoke with the defendant, he noticed the odor of fresh marijuana. Day returned to his cruiser, ran a license check on the defendant, and requested that another officer assist him. When the other officer, Officer Horn, arrived on the scene, Day asked the defendant to exit the vehicle while Horn spoke with the passenger sitting in the front seat. Day told the defendant that he smelled marijuana in the automobile. The defendant admitted that he sometimes smoked marijuana inside his vehicle. When Day advised the defendant that the marijuana smelled fresh, the defendant admitted that there were a "couple roaches" in the vehicle. Day asked the defendant to consent to a search of the automobile; the defendant declined to do so.

Meanwhile, Horn asked the passenger sitting in the front seat to get out of the vehicle. From outside the vehicle, Horn saw that near the doorjamb of the front passenger side of the vehicle were a "tied-off baggie" containing a brown, powdery substance and a "cigarette" containing a leafy, green substance. Horn called Day's attention to the items. Based upon his training and expertise, Day believed that the baggie contained heroin and that the cigarette contained marijuana. Day seized the baggie and cigarette from the vehicle.

The defendant was charged with one misdemeanor and one felony count of possession of a controlled drug. See RSA 318–B:2, I (2011). Before trial, he moved to suppress all evidence obtained from Day's warrantless entry into his vehicle. The defendant argued that the search of his vehicle was unconstitutional because it was not authorized by a warrant and because it did not fall within a judicially-recognized exception to the warrant requirement. The defendant contended that, contrary to the police officers' assertions, the plain view exception did not allow Day to enter his vehicle. The defendant brought his motion under both the State and Federal Constitutions.

The trial court granted the defendant's motion, over the State's objection, agreeing with him that the plain view exception did not justify Day's entry into the defendant's vehicle. The trial court observed that Day's entry would be justified under the federal automobile exception to the warrant requirement, but that, in Sterndale, this court had declined to adopt that exception under the State Constitution. The State moved to reconsider, arguing that the trial court had misapplied Sterndale in light of the expectation of privacy analysis that we adopted in Goss. The State contended that, because the defendant had no reasonable expectation of privacy in the area of the vehicle in which the evidence had been found, Day was not required to obtain a warrant before entering the vehicle and seizing the evidence. The trial court denied the State's motion, concluding that Goss did not abrogate Sterndale. This appeal followed.

II. Analysis

When reviewing a trial court's rulings on a motion to suppress, we accept its findings of fact unless they lack support in the record or are clearly erroneous. State v. Mouser, 168 N.H. 19, 22, 119 A.3d 870 (2015). We review its legal conclusions de novo. Id. We first address the parties' arguments under the State Constitution and rely upon federal law only to aid our analysis. State v. Ball, 124 N.H. 226, 231–33, 471 A.2d 347 (1983).

Part I, Article 19 of the New Hampshire Constitution protects an individual from "all unreasonable searches and seizures of his person, his houses, his papers, and all his possessions." N.H. CONST. pt. I, art. 19. "A warrantless search is per se unreasonable and invalid unless it comes within one of a few recognized exceptions." State v. Graca, 142 N.H. 670, 673, 708 A.2d 393 (1998) (quotation omitted). "Absent a warrant, the burden is on the State to prove that the search was valid pursuant to one of these exceptions." Id. (quotation omitted).

One exception to the warrant requirement is the plain view exception, see State v. Nieves, 160 N.H. 245, 247, 999 A.2d 389 (2010), which authorizes the police to seize an item, see Horton v. California, 496 U.S. 128, 133–36, 110 S.Ct. 2301, 110 L.Ed.2d 112 (1990). In order for an item's warrantless seizure to be justified under the plain view exception: (1) the item must be in plain view; (2) the officer must not have violated the constitution "in arriving at the place from which the evidence could be plainly viewed"; and (3) the officer "must also have a lawful right of access to the object itself." Id. at 136–37, 110 S.Ct. 2301 ; see Coolidge v. New Hampshire, 403 U.S. 443, 468, 91 S.Ct. 2022, 29 L.Ed.2d 564 (1971) (explaining that "plain view alone is never enough to justify the warrantless seizure of evidence"), overruled on other grounds by Horton, 496 U.S. 128, 110 S.Ct. 2301 ; see also Nieves, 160 N.H. at 251, 999 A.2d 389 (stating that, although we abolish the inadvertency requirement for drugs, weapons, and other dangerous items, "the initial intrusion under the plain view exception must still be justified by a warrant or an exception to the search warrant requirement"); State v. Harriman, 467 A.2d 745, 748–49 (Me. 1983) (noting that "[t]he plain view sighting of contraband or evidence of crime does not, standing alone, give rise to a right to enter a constitutionally protected area to seize the item"). In addition, the incriminating nature of the item seized must be "immediately apparent," which means that, at the time of the seizure, the police must have probable cause to believe that the item seized constitutes incriminating evidence. State v. Davis, 149 N.H. 698, 701, 828 A.2d 293 (2003). Because the items at issue are drugs, there is no requirement that the officers' view of them be inadvertent. Nieves, 160 N.H. at 250, 999 A.2d 389 ; see State v. Bell, 164 N.H. 452, 455, 58 A.3d 665 (2012).

In the instant case, for the purposes of this appeal, there is no dispute that the items at issue (the baggie and cigarette) were in plain view or that the police had probable cause to believe that they constituted incriminating evidence. See State v. Gilson, 116 N.H. 230, 233, 356 A.2d 689 (1976) (holding that "[a]n officer with sufficient experience to recognize the odor of burning marijuana has probable cause to suspect its presence when he detects the odor within the confines of an automobile"). Nor is there any claim that the police violated the New Hampshire Constitution when they observed the items from outside of the defendant's vehicle during a lawful traffic stop. Rather, this case turns upon whether the officers had a lawful right of access to the items themselves. See Horton, 496 U.S. at 137, 110 S.Ct. 2301 ; see also Nieves, 160 N.H. at 251, 999 A.2d 389. In other words, this case requires us to decide whether the police violated Part I, Article 19 when they entered the defendant's vehicle in...