Virgil v. Superior Court, Placer County

• Decision Date: 12 December 1968
• Citation: 73 Cal.Rptr. 793,268 Cal.App.2d 127
• Court: California Court of Appeals Court of Appeals
• Parties: Noel William VIRGIL, Dale Edward Hinegardner and Ernest Melvin Leggett, Petitioners, v. SUPERIOR COURT of the State of California, COUNTY OF PLACER, Respondent; The PEOPLE of the State of California, by their Attorney Daniel J. HIGGINS, District Attorney for the County of Placer, Real Party in Interest. Civ. 12026.

Page 793

73 Cal.Rptr. 793

268 Cal.App.2d 127

Noel William VIRGIL, Dale Edward Hinegardner and Ernest Melvin Leggett, Petitioners, v. SUPERIOR COURT of the State of California, COUNTY OF PLACER, Respondent The PEOPLE of the State of California, by their Attorney Daniel J. HIGGINS, District Attorney for the County of Placer, Real Party in Interest.

Civ. 12026.

Court of Appeal, Third District, California.

Dec. 12, 1968.

Rehearing Denied Jan. 6, 1969.

Hearing Denied Feb. 5, 1969.

Boon, Coffield & Burford, Roseville, for petitioner Virgil.

Lyle H. Shattuck, Auburn, for petitioner Hinegardner.

Roland E. Iversen, Auburn, for petitioner Leggett.

Thomas C. Lynch, Atty. Gen., by Doris H. Maier, Asst. Atty. Gen., and Edward W. Bergtholdt, Deputy Atty. Gen., Sacramento, for real parties in interest.

PIERCE, Presiding Justice.

Petitioners Virgil, Hinegardner and Leggett were charged in two counts for violation of Health and Safety Code section 11530--cultivating marijuana (Count 1)--and possession of marijuana (Count 2). In the trial court they moved to set aside the information pursuant to Penal Code section 995 and to suppress certain evidence pursuant to Penal Code section 1538.5. Both motions were denied. We issued an alternative writ of prohibition and a temporary stay of proceedings.

The sole evidence upon which petitioners were held to answer and upon which both counts of the information rest is certain contraband found and seized during a search (or, as the People contend, during the 'taking of an inventory' of the contents) of petitioner Virgil's automobile. The question before us is: Did law enforcement officers come by that evidence legally or in violation of petitioners' constitutional rights? The circumstances which we will relate compel us to reach the latter conclusion.

At approximately 4:40 p.m., March 8, 1968, Officer Ewing of the California Highway Patrol was standing near his patrol car on the eastern outskirts of Loomis, near Taylor Road. Taylor Road is narrow with rises and dips (normal to older county roads in the foothill areas). In the vicinity of the point where Ewing stood, there are a church, a high school and numerous businesses. The officer's attention was drawn to the sound of a speeding automobile. He observed a Chevrolet traveling along Taylor Road. It was in view for about a second and a half. During that interval it traveled a distance of from 90 to 100 feet. Ewing estimated its speed at 70 miles per hour. At this point the posted speed limit is 35 miles per hour. (Later petitioner Virgil was identified as the driver and owner of the speeding car. Petitioners Hinegardner and Leggett were riders.) During the initial observation of the Virgil vehicle, Officer Ewing noted Leggett as a person known to him. Ewing got into his patrol car and gave chase. Although he drove along Taylor Road at high speed, which at times reached, he said, 100 miles per hour, he did not again catch sight of the Virgil car. Officer Ewing radioed for assistance from other California Highway Patrol 'units.' He then turned into another road and drove into the town of Penryn, about a mile and a half east of Loomis. While driving through that town, he again saw the Virgil vehicle emerging from a side road. It turned onto the road on which Ewing was driving and was ahead of the officer's car. Virgil was then traveling at a speed of 20 miles per hour. The officer signaled for Virgil to stop. He heeded the officer's direction immediately. Ewing stopped behind the Chevrolet, got out, asked for and obtained Virgil's driver's license. The car's registration slip showed Virgil to be the registered owner. Ewing then ordered Virgil to get out and go back to the patrol car. The officer commenced to issue a citation to Virgil for reckless driving. ¹ Another highway patrolman drove up. Ewing then informed Virgil he was under arrest. Hinegardner and Leggett, the other occupants of the Virgil automobile, were directed to get out of the car. At some time during the foregoing events, all three petitioners were frisked by the officers. Nothing of a suspicious nature was found on their persons, then or later.

Officer Ewing then commenced an examination of the inside of the Chevrolet. At the preliminary hearing he was asked what his purpose was. He said: 'Well, I was inventorying. Q. Did you have a note pad and pencil and * * * (were you) writing down the list of contents? A. No.' That statement should be compared with one made earlier by the officer that he was equipped with 'check-off list forms' for inventory purposes.

The officer first opened the glove compartment. There is no evidence that he noted (or inventoried) anything therein. He next examined the bare floorboard of the driver's compartment. There he discovered a single seed which Ewing stated he thought was a marijuana seed. Next a pan containing approximately fifteen growing plants was discovered on the floor underneath the front seat. At the hearing these were proven to be marijuana plants. In an ashtray in the rear compartment of the car a single charred seed was found. Ewing also believed this to be a marijuana seed. All of the petitioners were then arrested for possession of marijuana.

Ewing testified that when he had opened the car door to commence taking his 'inventory' Virgil said 'I didn't have the right to go in his car.' He 'challenged' Ewing's right. There was no further conversation.

The authority under which Officer Ewing purported to act in 'inventorying the contents' of Virgil's antomobile was the right under Vehicle Code section 22651, subdivision (h), ² to arrest and take one to be charged with reckless driving before a magistrate plus an authority assumed by the California Highway Patrol. Ewing stated: '(We) store these vehicles and to insure the safekeeping of this property, we inventory and store this property, in this case being a vehicle, and it is then released to a bonded towing agency to insure the safety of the property.'

The officer misunderstood the nature and extent of his authority. Although there are cases, to be discussed below, which authorize under proper circumstances the taking of an automobile into custody, after its removal from the highway, and also the taking of an inventory of its contents, the facts above do not describe such a situation.

There is no dearth of case law covering the legality of searches of impounded vehicles. Decisions follow two lines, seemingly parallel, destined, with one noteworthy exception, People v. Upton (1968) 257 A.C.A. 774, 65 Cal.Rptr. 103 to meet only at infinity. Since our concern here with either line is somewhat cursory, citation of the cases will be illustrative rather than exhaustive. Both groups pay homage, at least by statement, to the rule that there must be compelling reasons and exceptional circumstances to justify a search in the absence of a search warrant. A warrantless search may be made only when the search is incident to a lawful arrest and is a reasonable search with probable cause. We mention first some of the decisions following a somewhat simplistic takeoff from that launching. (See People v. Gil (1967) 248 Cal.App.2d 189, 191--192, 56 Cal.Rptr. 88 (hear. den.); People v. Garcia (1963) 214 Cal.App.2d 681, 684--685, 29 Cal.Rptr. 609--a decision of this court; People v. Odegard (1962) 203 Cal.App.2d 427, 431--432, 21 Cal.Rptr. 515; People v. Myles (1961) 189 Cal.App.2d 42, 47, 10 Cal.Rptr. 733; People v. Nebbitt (1960) 183 Cal.App.2d 452, 459, 7 Cal.Rptr. 8; People v. Ortiz (1956) 147 Cal.App.2d 248, 250, 305 P.2d 145.) In some of the cited cases Fourth Amendment search and seizure problems are muted and there is language suggesting that if there is a right to arrest the driver of a car and to take him before a magistrate (e.g., see fn. 1) and a right to remove the driver's vehicle from the highway (see fn. 2) then there is a right to take the car into custody and a resulting right, in fact a duty, to inventory its contents. In all of the foregoing cases, however, there were circumstances (e.g., intoxication of the driver evidence that he was driving a stolen car, furtive behavior, etc.) which made reasonable a Search of the accused vehicle. The resultant holdings, therefore, were proper, irrespective of any question of a right to impound.

The other group of cases (see e.g., Preston v. United States (1964) 376 U.S. 364, 84 S.Ct. 881, 11 L.Ed.2d 777; Cooper v. California (1967) 386 U.S. 58, 87 S.Ct. 788, 17 L.Ed.2d 730; People v. Harris (1967) 67 Cal.2d 866, 871, 64 Cal.Rptr. 313, 434 P.2d 609; People v. Webb (1967) 66 Cal.2d 107, 114, 56 Cal.Rptr. 902, 424 P.2d 342; People v. Burke (1964) 61 Cal.2d 575, 580--581, 39 Cal.Rptr. 531, 394 P.2d 67) recognize that custodial possession of an automobile is not an inevitable concomitant of an arrest of the driver. (See particularly the comparison in Cooper v. California, supra, distinguishing its facts from Preston v. United States, supra, and where it is said (at p. 790 of 87 S.Ct., at p. 732 of 17 L.Ed.2d): '* * * The search (in Preston) was therefore to be treated as though his (i.e., defendant's) car was in his own * * * possession, safe from intrusion by the police or anyone else.') The decision in People v. Upton, supra, 257 A.C.A. 774, 65 Cal.Rptr. 103, is the 'noteworthy exception' mentioned above which attempts expressly to draw together the lines of cases cited. Of the former group it says that the court is not 'unmindful' of the cases expressing what we will call the 'lawful arrest equals the right of removal, equals the right to take into custody, equals the right to take an inventory, equals the right to search' doctrine. It says (on p. 780 of 257 A.C.A., on p. 107 of 65 Cal.Rptr.) 'nor do we think that the Constitution permits an otherwise unreasonable search of a car simply because the police have statutory authority to impound it under Vehicle Code, sections 22650 and 22651.'

We go farther. We hold...