U.S. v. Riedesel

• Decision Date: 16 March 1993
• Docket Number: No. 92-2816,92-2816
• Citation: 987 F.2d 1383
• Parties: UNITED STATES of America, Appellee, v. Kevin Dale RIEDESEL, Appellant.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Eighth Circuit

Page 1383

987 F.2d 1383

UNITED STATES of America, Appellee, v. Kevin Dale RIEDESEL, Appellant.

No. 92-2816.

United States Court of Appeals Eighth Circuit.

Submitted Nov. 10, 1992.

Decided March 16, 1993.

Alfred Parrish, Des Moines, IA, for appellant.

Patrick J. Reinert, Cedar Rapids, IA, for appellee.

Before WOLLMAN, Circuit Judge, BRIGHT and HENLEY, Senior Circuit Judges.

WOLLMAN, Circuit Judge.

Kevin Dale Riedesel moved the district court ¹ to suppress evidence that police officers had seized during a warrantless search of his car and a subsequent search of his home pursuant to a warrant. The district court denied his motion. Reserving his right to appeal the district court's denial of his motion, Riedesel conditionally pled guilty to one count of possession with intent to distribute cocaine, in violation of 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1) and 841(b)(1)(C), and one count of using a firearm during a drug-related offense, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(1). Riedesel now appeals his convictions, and we affirm.

I.

In the early morning hours of October 1, 1991, Fort Dodge, Iowa, Police Officer Thomas Hofbauer observed a car that was lawfully parked, but had its motor running. After Officer Hofbauer had called in the vehicle's license plate number and his location, he walked up to the car and noticed that the driver appeared to be asleep or unconscious. Officer Hofbauer tapped on the window, awakening the driver, Kevin Riedesel, from his sleep. Riedesel told Hofbauer that he had gotten drowsy and had thought it would be best if he pulled over to the side of the road to rest his eyes. Riedesel gave Hofbauer his driver's license, which appeared to be valid. Hofbauer then radioed in the license number for a status check.

Because of technical difficulties, Hofbauer was unable to obtain the status report immediately. Consequently, because of the apparent validity of the license, he returned the license to Riedesel and told him that he was free to go. At some point during Hofbauer's encounter with Riedesel, Officer Tim Hayes arrived at the scene. Several minutes after Riedesel had driven away, Hofbauer and Hayes received word from the station that Riedesel's license had been suspended. The two officers drove off in different directions to look for Riedesel.

A few minutes later, Hayes spotted Riedesel's car at a Holiday gas station and reported its location to Hofbauer. As Hayes parked his squad car, Riedesel walked out from the station. The two met at Riedesel's car. Hayes asked to see Riedesel's license, which Riedesel handed over. Shortly thereafter, Hofbauer arrived at the Holiday station and advised Riedesel that he was under arrest for driving with a suspended license.

Riedesel asked the officers what would be done with his car. When they told him that he could leave it at the Holiday station, Riedesel asked the officers if he could lock the doors, and they assented. Riedesel entered the car through the driver's door and leaned across the front bench seat to lock the passenger door, placing his knee on the driver's seat.

At the suppression hearing, Officer Hofbauer stated that he was standing behind Riedesel near the open driver's door when Riedesel reached across the seat to lock the front passenger door. According to his testimony, Hofbauer observed a cellophane package containing a green leafy substance on the front seat as Riedesel leaned across. When Riedesel backed out of the car, Hofbauer entered it to retrieve the package, which contained marijuana. After the officers had handcuffed Riedesel and had placed him in a squad car, they returned to Riedesel's car and searched its interior. They found two additional packages in the crevice between the front seat and the backrest; one contained a larger quantity of marijuana, and the other contained a yellowish-white powder that the officers believed to be methamphetamine.

After the officers had completed their search of the car's interior, they obtained the car keys from Riedesel and searched the trunk for more drugs. Under a piece of carpet in the trunk, they discovered a stowaway safe. The officers seized the safe, but did not open it. After the officers had finished their search of the vehicle, they completed a standard inventory form describing the vehicle's contents and had a tow truck remove the car to an impound lot.

The police then applied for a warrant to search Riedesel's trailer home. In the accompanying affidavit, the police described the drugs and the safe found during their search of Riedesel's car and other evidence linking Riedesel to drug trafficking. Specifically, the affidavit stated that when the police had inventoried Riedesel's personal possessions during his booking at the station on October 1, they had discovered $2600 in cash. Additionally, the affidavit explained that Riedesel's trailer had been searched on March 15, 1991, when the police were investigating Riedesel in connection with the shooting of a Fort Dodge resident at Riedesel's girlfriend's house. During the execution of the March 15th search warrant, the police had discovered marijuana, books on growing marijuana, other drug paraphernalia, and several guns.

A Webster County, Iowa, magistrate determined that the police had probable cause to believe that contraband and other evidence of a crime was located at Riedesel's trailer and issued the warrant. Upon executing the warrant, the officers seized marijuana, cocaine residue, drug paraphernalia, and a loaded firearm. They also observed a gun barrel and a can of acetone, a precursor to methamphetamine manufacture, but they did not seize these items.

The police next applied for a warrant to search the stowaway safe. They included in their application all of the information used to support their initial search warrant application, together with the results of their search of Riedesel's trailer. The magistrate issued the warrant. When the police opened the safe, they discovered approximately one-third of a kilogram of cocaine in a wrapper of sufficient size to hold a full kilogram of cocaine.

Finally, the police obtained a search warrant to reenter Riedesel's trailer in order to seize the gun barrel and acetone that they had observed in the course of their first search of Riedesel's residence.

On the basis of the items found during the searches of Riedesel's car, the safe, and the trailer, a federal grand jury indicted Riedesel for possession with intent to distribute cocaine and using a firearm during a drug-related crime. Riedesel moved to suppress all of the items seized during the various searches.

A suppression hearing was conducted before a magistrate judge, ² who issued a report and recommendation that the defendant's motion to suppress be denied. The district court adopted the magistrate judge's report and denied Riedesel's motion to suppress. Riedesel entered a conditional guilty plea, and the district court sentenced him to 30 months' imprisonment on the possession charge and a consecutive 60 month term of imprisonment on the firearm charge.

II.

In reviewing the grant or denial of a motion to suppress evidence on Fourth Amendment grounds, we are bound by the district court's findings of fact regarding the circumstances of the search unless we believe on the basis of the record as a whole that the district court clearly erred. See United States v. McBride, 801 F.2d 1045, 1046 (8th Cir.1986), cert. denied, 479 U.S. 1100, 107 S.Ct. 1325, 94 L.Ed.2d 177 (1987); see also United States v. Jorgensen 71 F.2d 725, 728 (8th Cir.1989). We may reverse the district court's ultimate ruling on the suppression motion, however, if the ruling reflects an erroneous view of the applicable law. Id.

In this case, each search conducted by the police stemmed, in part, from evidence gained in previous searches. Riedesel argues that the initial warrantless searches of his car's passenger compartment and trunk were unreasonable under the Fourth Amendment and that any evidence produced in those searches should therefore have been suppressed. He also asserts that evidence seized in subsequent searches should have been suppressed as the fruit of the poisonous tree. Accordingly, we will address the validity of the several searches in the order in which they occurred.

A. Search of the Passenger Compartment.

The "cardinal principle" in Fourth Amendment search and seizure jurisprudence is that "searches conducted outside the judicial process, without prior approval by judge or magistrate, are per se unreasonable under the Fourth Amendment--subject only to a few specifically established and well-delineated exceptions." Mincey v. Arizona, 437 U.S. 385, 390, 98 S.Ct. 2408, 2412, 57 L.Ed.2d 290 (1978) (quoting Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347, 357, 88 S.Ct. 507, 514, 19 L.Ed.2d 576 (1967) (footnotes omitted)). When the government seeks to introduce evidence that was seized during a warrantless search, it bears the burden of showing the need for an exemption from the warrant requirement and that its conduct fell within the bounds of the exception. See Mincey, 437 U.S. at 391, 98 S.Ct. at 2412 (citing Vale v. Louisiana, 399 U.S. 30, 34, 90 S.Ct. 1969, 1971, 26 L.Ed.2d 409 (1970)).

One exception to the warrant requirement allows the police to search a lawfully arrested individual's person and the immediately surrounding area. Chimel v. California, 395 U.S. 752, 763, 89 S.Ct. 2034, 2040, 23 L.Ed.2d 685 (1969). The rationales underlying this exception are the need to remove any weapons with which the arrestee might possibly harm the arresting officers or someone else and the need to prevent the concealment or destruction of evidence. Id.

The Supreme Court has applied this exception to the context of vehicle searches when an occupant has been arrested. New York v. Belton, 453 U.S. 454, 460, 101 S.Ct. 2860, 2864, 69 L.Ed.2d 768 (1981). In Belton, the Court fashioned a clearly-defined rule for such automobile searches: "[W]hen a policeman...