State v. Smith

• Citation: 303 P.3d 1047,177 Wash.2d 533
• Decision Date: 06 June 2013
• Docket Number: No. 86951–1.,86951–1.
• Parties: STATE of Washington, Respondent, v. Christopher Leon SMITH, Petitioner.
• Court: United States State Supreme Court of Washington

177 Wash.2d 533

303 P.3d 1047

STATE of Washington, Respondent,

v.Christopher Leon SMITH, Petitioner.

No. 86951–1.

Supreme Court of Washington,

En Banc.

June 6, 2013.

David Bruce Koch, Nielsen, Broman & Koch, PLLC, Seattle, WA, for Petitioner(s).

Stephen D. Trinen, Pierce County Prosecutors Ofc., for Respondent(s).

Tom P. Conom, Derek Thomas Conom, The Conom Law Firm, Edmonds, WA, for Amicus Curiae on behalf of Washington Association of Crimin.

STEPHENS, J.

[177 Wash.2d 536]¶ 1 When officers ran the names in a motel registry to check for warrants, they found an outstanding arrest warrant for motel guest Christopher Smith. As they apprehended Smith at the threshold of his motel room, they saw Quianna Quabner, bloodied and limping, inside the room. Officers entered the room and learned that Quabner and her 12–year–old daughter, L.S., had been assaulted in the hours preceding the officers' arrival; L.S. alleged she had been raped. An immediate investigation ensued, resulting in charges against Smith. Before the case went to trial, however, this court invalidated the practice of random motel registry searches under article I, section 7. State v. Jorden, 160 Wash.2d 121, 156 P.3d 893 (2007).

¶ 2 At a suppression hearing, Smith argued that the evidence supporting the charges against him was fruit of the unlawful registry search and must be suppressed. The trial court allowed the evidence under the inevitable discovery doctrine, which we later invalidated in State v. Winterstein, 167 Wash.2d 620, 220 P.3d 1226 (2009). On appeal, the Court of Appeals nonetheless upheld Smith's convictions, concluding the evidence against him was admissible under the attenuation doctrine and the independent source doctrine. The court also rejected Smith's claim that his convictions for first degree rape and second degree rape of a child, arising from his assault against L.S., violate double jeopardy.

¶ 3 We affirm the conviction, though on different grounds than the Court of Appeals. We hold that the evidence presented against Smith was admissible because the warrantless search that led to its discovery was justified under an exception to the warrant requirement for actions by law enforcement when lives are in danger.

FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

¶ 4 On the morning of October 22, 2006, Officer Lee of the Lakewood Police Department stopped by the Golden Lion Motel in Lakewood as part of the Crime Free Motel Program. Clerk's Papers (CP) at 488 (Findings of Fact and Conclusions on Admissibility of Evidence CrR 3.6). A normal practice under the program was to randomly view the guest registry and run the names against the outstanding arrest warrant database. Id. Officer Lee got a hit with motel guest Christopher Smith. Id. at 489.

¶ 5 Officers went to Smith's room and knocked on the door. He answered and was arrested on the outstanding warrant. During the arrest, while the door was still open and police were outside the room, they “observed an adult female present in the motel room.” Id. She was badly injured, sobbing, limping, and bloodied. Id. Officers entered the room to render aid. Id. They observed the room was in disarray and there were signs of a struggle. They also discovered 12–year–old L.S., Quabner's daughter, and were told that Smith had sexually assaulted L.S. Id. Quabner alleged that she had been beaten about the head and body by Smith. Id. L.S. told police that items used in the assaults were in a dumpster in the motel parking lot. Id. at 490. When police later searched the dumpster they found bags of bloodied clothing and pieces of braided curtain cord consistent with restraints described by the victims. Id. A warrantless search of the motel room ensued, as well as interviews with the victims at the motel and later at the hospital.¹

¶ 6 Smith was charged with rape, assault, harassment, kidnapping, and child rape, with deadly weapon enhancements. Before trial, this court invalidated the practice of random searches of motel registries, holding it violates privacy rights under article I, section 7 of the Washington Constitution. Jorden, 160 Wash.2d 121, 156 P.3d 893. Smith moved to suppress evidence gathered following the illegal Jorden search, including: evidence recovered from the motel room, officer observations of the victims, victim testimony, and evidence recovered from the dumpster. The State conceded that any evidence recovered from the motel room itself should be excluded because that evidence was recovered without a warrant. II Verbatim Report of Proceedings (VRP) (Oct. 13, 2008) at 152. The State argued that the evidence Smith continued to challenge (officer observations of the victims, victim testimony, and evidence recovered from the dumpster) was exempt from the exclusionary rule under the inevitable discovery doctrine, i.e., because it would have eventually been discovered. The trial court agreed. CP at 492. Smith was tried by a jury and convicted of first degree rape and second degree rape of a child for his assault on L.S., and first degree assault upon Quabner, as well as two counts of first degree kidnapping and two counts of felony harassment.

¶ 7 Following trial, this court invalidated the inevitable discovery doctrine in Winterstein, 167 Wash.2d 620, 220 P.3d 1226. Smith appealed his convictions, arguing that the evidence against him should have been excluded. He also argued that his convictions for first degree rape and second degree child rape, arising from the same act, violate double jeopardy. In response, the State acknowledged that inevitable discovery—the trial court's stated grounds for admitting the evidence tainted by the Jorden search—was no longer good law. The State instead urged the Court of Appeals to uphold the admission of the evidence under either the independent source doctrine or the attenuation doctrine. Smith replied that the State had not timely raised the argument and that in any event these doctrines could not save the evidence, in particular because the attenuation doctrine is inconsistent with article I, section 7.

¶ 8 A majority of the Court of Appeals ruled that the evidence against Smith was not fruit of the poisonous tree because it was both independently gained and sufficiently attenuated from the unlawful registry search. Judge David H. Armstrong dissented on this issue, arguing that the court had misapplied the independent source doctrine and agreeing with Smith that the attenuation doctrine is incompatible with article I, section 7 protections. The Court of Appeals rejected Smith's double jeopardy claim.

¶ 9 Smith filed a petition for review, which we granted.

ANALYSIS

¶ 10 Smith makes two distinct and unrelated challenges to his convictions. First, he claims that the evidence presented against him at trial was illegally obtained in violation of his article I, section 7 protections and should have been suppressed. Next, he argues that his convictions for rape violate his constitutional guaranty against double jeopardy. We address each claim in turn.

A. Article I, Section 7

¶ 11 The parties agree that this case is not about Fourth Amendment protections, but about article I, section 7 protections. As we have stated many times, article I, section 7 is often more protective than the Fourth Amendment, particularly where warrantless searches are concerned. See State v. Morse, 156 Wash.2d 1, 9–10, 123 P.3d 832 (2005). Under our state constitution, warrantless searches are per se unreasonable unless one of the narrow exceptions to the warrant requirement applies. Winterstein, 167 Wash.2d at 628, 220 P.3d 1226.

¶ 12 Here, the Court of Appeals relied on the doctrines of attenuation and independent source in affirming the trial court's decision to deny Smith's suppression motion. The Court of Appeals agreed with the State that “the victims' testimonies were admissible under the independent source exception because the emergency aid and community caretaking exceptions acted as intervening factors.” State v. Smith, 165 Wash.App. 296, 309, 266 P.3d 250 (2011).

¶ 13 Under the independent source doctrine, an unlawful search does not result in the suppression of evidence ultimately obtained using “a valid warrant or other lawful means independent of the unlawful action.” State v. Gaines, 154 Wash.2d 711, 718, 116 P.3d 993 (2005). But the lawfully gained information must be genuinely independent of the illegal search. Id. at 721, 116 P.3d 993 (citing Murray v. United States, 487 U.S. 533, 108 S.Ct. 2529, 101 L.Ed.2d 472 (1988)).

¶ 14 A majority of the Court of Appeals reasoned that “the officers' decision to enter the motel room was based on independent, untainted information because Quabner sought their assistance as community caretakers after the officers had arrested Smith and were preparing to leave.” Smith, 165 Wash.App. at 311, 266 P.3d 250. The need to render aid was a “supervening, intervening factor” triggering the emergency aid exception to the warrant requirement. Id. Stated differently, the search that followed was not at all motivated by the illegal Jorden search. See id.

¶ 15 Judge Armstrong disagreed that the State could rely on the independent source doctrine, noting that “absent the initial, unlawful search of the motel guest registry, the officers had no independent basis for knocking on Smith's door.... Their observations stemmed directly from the initial, illegal search.” Id. at 331–32, 266 P.3d 250 (Armstrong, J., dissenting).

¶ 16 The points in Judge Armstrong's dissent are well taken insofar as the independent source doctrine is concerned. It is impossible to extricate the officers' presence at the motel room threshold and their observation of Quabner from the illegal search the officers performed just prior to arriving at the threshold. Thus, this search cannot be justified by the independent source doctrine.

¶ 17 But the State's argument points to another justification. The State argued before the trial court that the warrantless entry and...