State v. D.S.
| Decision Date | 11 December 1996 |
| Docket Number | No. 96-706,96-706 |
| Citation | 685 So.2d 41 |
| Parties | 115 Ed. Law Rep. 210, 21 Fla. L. Weekly D2615 The STATE of Florida, Appellant, v. D.S., a juvenile, Appellee. |
| Court | Florida District Court of Appeals |
Robert A. Butterworth, Attorney General, and Michael J. Neimand, Assistant Attorney General, for appellant.
Bennett H. Brummer, Public Defender, and Manuel Alvarez, Assistant Public Defender, for appellee.
Before COPE, LEVY and FLETCHER, JJ.
The State appeals the trial court's order granting a juvenile's motion to suppress. For the following reasons, we reverse the order granting the motion to suppress.
After Karen Robinson (hereinafter "Robinson"), an Assistant Principal of a Middle School, received separate reports from four students that D.S., a juvenile and student at the school, had offered to sell drugs that he had with him, Robinson explained the situation to Alberto Carvalho (hereinafter "Carvalho"), a second Assistant Principal. Thereafter, both Assistant Principals escorted D.S. to Robinson's office. When they entered the office, a Dade County Public School Police Officer 1 was sitting at Robinson's desk doing paperwork. He continued his work as Robinson told the juvenile that she believed that he possessed contraband and told the juvenile to empty his pockets on a table. After D.S. placed a plastic bag with marijuana on the table, Robinson asked the school police officer to come forward. Robinson informed the school police officer that the juvenile had possessed marijuana, which violated public school rules.
The next day, the State filed a Petition for Delinquency against D.S., charging him with possession of marijuana in a public middle school. The juvenile denied the charge and moved to suppress the marijuana, arguing that the school search required probable cause because a school police officer was present in the room where the search was conducted. On February 21, 1996, the trial court granted the motion to suppress, finding that Robinson had a reasonable belief that the juvenile possessed drugs, but that the search required probable cause because a police officer was present, and that the search was not supported by probable cause. The State appeals this order.
In granting the motion to suppress, the trial court erred for three significant reasons, any one of which, considered alone, would require reversal.
First, the trial court relied on M.J. v. State, 399 So.2d 996 (Fla. 1st DCA 1981) to support its ruling. That case states:
Additionally, where a law enforcement officer directs, participates, or acquiesces in a search conducted by school officials, the officer must have probable cause for that search, even though the school officials acting alone are treated as state officials subject to a lesser constitutional standard for conducting searches in light of the loco parentis doctrine.
Id. at 998. Applying M.J. v. State, the trial court ruled that the fact that the search was conducted in the presence of a school board police officer required probable cause to justify the search.
However, the fact that the school police officer was coincidentally inside Robinson's office doing paper work does not mean that he directed, participated, or acquiesced in the search. The mere presence of the school police officer did not trigger the requirement of probable cause under M.J. v. State. Accordingly, the standard that would be required if the school police officer had participated is irrelevant here since, in fact, he did not participate. In other words, assuming arguendo that M.J. v. State is a correct statement of the law--a notion which we reject below--it was error for the trial court to require probable cause to support the search because the officer did not participate in the search.
Second, the appropriate requirement that should have been applied herein, is reasonable suspicion, the standard applicable to school officials. Accordingly, we decline the trial court's implicit invitation to use the language featured in M.J. v. State as the standard to which this court must look in deciding the instant case. Specifically, we hold that M.J. v. State does not correctly state the law. Rather, we find that the cases...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
R.D.S. v. State
...863 N.E.2d at 369 (noting that the school liaison officer was employed by the Indianapolis Public School Police); State v. D.S., 685 So.2d 41, 43 (Fla.Dist.Ct. App.1996) (noting that the law enforcement officer conducting the challenged search was employed by the local school system and not......
-
Com. v. JB
...(Wis.1997); People v. Dilworth, 169 Ill.2d 195, 214 Ill.Dec. 456, 661 N.E.2d 310, 317 (Ill.1996) (collecting cases); State v. D.S., 685 So.2d 41, 43 (Fla. Dist.Ct.App.1996). Moreover, this Court implicitly endorsed this distinction in both In re S.F., infra, and In re S.K., infra, where we ......
-
T.S. v. State
...the reasonableness standard, regardless of the involvement of other school administrators or the purpose of the search. State v. D.S., 685 So.2d 41, 43 (Fla.Ct.App.1996) (holding that school police officers are always subject to the reasonable suspicion standard for school searches "since t......
-
M.D. v. State
...2005); K.K. v. State, 717 So.2d 629, 630 (Fla. 5th DCA 1998); State v. Whorley, 720 So.2d 282, 283 (Fla. 2d DCA 1998); State v. D.S., 685 So.2d 41, 43 (Fla. 3d DCA 1996). The only possible support for applying the probable-cause standard to a search by a school resource officer is a 1981 ca......
-
Circumventing the Law: Students’ Rights in Schools With Police
...20, 295-315.Skolnick, J. H. (1966). Justice without trial: Law enforcement in democratic society. New York: John Wiley.State v. D. S., 685 So. 2d 41 (Fla. Dist. Ct. App. 1996).Tinker v Des Moines, 393 U.S. 503 (1969).Torres, M. S., & Chen, Y. (2006). Assessing columbine’s impact on students......