State v. Roussell

• Decision Date: 11 May 2001
• Docket Number: No. 99-504-C.A.,99-504-C.A.
• Citation: 770 A.2d 858
• Parties: STATE v. Louise ROUSSELL.
• Court: Rhode Island Supreme Court

770 A.2d 858

STATE v. Louise ROUSSELL.

No. 99-504-C.A.

Supreme Court of Rhode Island.

May 11, 2001.

Present LEDERBERG, BOURCIER, FLANDERS, and GOLDBERG, JJ.

Aaron Weisman, Esq., Assistant Attorney General, for Plaintiff.

Paula Rosin/Paula Lynch Hardiman (Asst. Public Defender), for Defendant.

OPINION

PER CURIAM.

The state has invoked the community-caretaking functions of police officers to justify a state trooper's opening of the defendant's car door that led to her conviction in this case. The defendant, Louise Roussell, appeals from a judgment of conviction following a jury trial in Superior Court. The jury found her guilty of operating a vehicle while under the influence of alcohol in violation of G.L.1956 § 31-27-2. A single justice of this Court directed the defendant to show cause why the issues raised in her appeal should not be summarily decided. Because she has not done so, we proceed to decide her appeal at this time. The defendant filed a pretrial motion to suppress the field sobriety and breath-test results that led to her conviction. She contended that there was no probable cause to search her or her automobile. Pursuant to the federal and state constitutional prohibitions against unreasonable searches and seizures, she argued that any evidence seized as a result of the allegedly unlawful search should have been suppressed. The court denied the motion and then the jury convicted her, based upon the relevant facts set forth below.

On October 30, 1998, a state trooper conducted a motor-vehicle stop on Route 24 in Tiverton, Rhode Island. While attending to this task, the officer activated the emergency lights on his marked cruiser. As he walked back to his cruiser, he noticed a red automobile, traveling at the same speed as the traffic, driving in the breakdown lane towards his cruiser. He did not observe any signs that the fast-approaching car was in distress. He noted that the car did not have its hazard lights flashing and there was no smoke coming from it. Believing that the car might strike the rear of his cruiser, the trooper quickly positioned himself — for his own protection — between his cruiser and the vehicle he had stopped. The oncoming car "slowed down some" and then stopped abruptly about ten feet from the rear of his cruiser. The defendant was driving this car.

The defendant testified that she was forced into the breakdown lane after a van came to a halt in front of her automobile. She explained that, after the van stopped, she pulled over into the breakdown lane to avoid hitting it. She also stated that she saw the state trooper in the breakdown lane and continued to travel in that lane to let him know what she was doing. She alleged that she came to an abrupt stop because her brakes were not working that well.

After the car stopped in the breakdown lane, the trooper approached it from the passenger side. He could not approach from the driver's side where defendant sat, because part of the car protruded into the lane of travel. He then opened the passenger-side door and observed defendant in the driver's seat. He detected "a moderate odor of alcohol," observed that defendant's speech was slurred, and noted that her eyes were watery and bloodshot. Believing that she was under the influence of alcohol, he asked her to get out of the car. She did so, and the officer noticed that she appeared tohave difficulty standing, that she was swaying, and that she had to place her hands on the car to steady herself. The defendant explained that she placed both of her hands on the car because that is what she believed she was supposed to do. Based upon his observations of defendant, the trooper asked defendant to submit to several field sobriety tests, which she failed to pass. He then placed her under arrest.

At the police barracks, defendant voluntarily submitted to a Breathalyzer test. On appeal defendant asserts only that the trial justice erred in denying her motion to suppress the results of the field sobriety and Breathalyzer tests. She suggests that the trooper lacked probable cause to open her car door, that the evidence seized thereafter was the product of an unlawful search, and that, therefore, it should have been suppressed. She contends that the trooper violated her state and federal constitutional rights by opening the car door and by intruding "into a place where she had a reasonable expectation of privacy." The defendant relies upon State v. James, 977 P.2d 489 (Utah Ct. App. 1999), to support her claim that her motion to suppress should have been granted, but her reliance is misplaced. In fact, the Supreme Court of Utah reversed that case and held in State v. James, 13 P.3d 576, 579-80 (Utah 2000), that the trooper's opening of the passenger door of the defendant's truck was within his authority to investigate a report of the defendant's reckless driving and did not, therefore, violate the Fourth Amendment's prohibition against unreasonable searches. See also Maryland v. Wilson, 519 U.S. 408, 412-15, 117 S.Ct. 882, 885-86, 137 L.Ed.2d 41, 46-49 (1997)

(extending the rule in Mimms to apply to passengers of a lawfully stopped vehicle); Pennsylvania v. Mimms, 434 U.S. 106, 110-11, 98 S.Ct. 330, 333-34, 54 L.Ed.2d 331, 336-37 (1977) (holding that, owing to inherent safety concerns and the limited nature of the intrusion, officers may order the driver of a lawfully stopped vehicle to leave the vehicle during the course of the investigation).

The state maintains that the trooper's actions were proper because his reason for opening defendant's car door was "not to ferret out potential criminal activity, but rather * * * to determine what crises prompted defendant to so abruptly approach Trooper Allen's marked [with overhead lights activated] cruiser in the...