Opinion
NOT TO BE PUBLISHED
APPEAL from a judgment of the Superior Court of Kern County. No. BF117247A, John I. Quinlen, Judge.
Francine R. Tone, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant.
Edmund G. Brown, Jr., Attorney General, Dane R. Gillette, Chief Assistant Attorney General, Michael P. Farrell, Senior Assistant Attorney General, Carlos A. Martinez and Darren K. Indermill, Deputy Attorneys General for Plaintiff and Respondent.
OPINION
Before Vartabedian, Acting P.J., Wiseman, J., and Gomes, J.
Appellant, Gary Ray Davis, pled guilty to one count of possession of methamphetamine (Health & Saf. Code, § 11377, subd. (a)) after the court denied his suppression motion. The court found appellant ineligible for a drug diversion program. The court suspended imposition of sentence, placed Davis on three years formal probation pursuant to Penal Code section 1210.1, and ordered him to participate in a drug treatment program. On appeal, Davis contends the trial court erred in denying his motion to suppress because the officer lacked reasonable suspicion to stop his vehicle. We will reverse.
FACTS
On November 25, 2006, Police Officer Jose Galvan stopped Davis because his car had a cracked windshield, which Officer Galvan believed constituted a violation of Vehicle Code section 26710. Officer Galvan found that Davis was driving with a suspended driver’s license. He arrested Davis and impounded his car. During an inventory search of Davis’s vehicle, Officer Galvan found a small baggie containing methamphetamine.
Davis filed a motion to suppress pursuant to Penal Code section 1538.5. At a hearing on the motion, Officer Galvan testified that while on patrol he drove within four to five feet of the side of Davis’s car and noticed that the front windshield was cracked. Prior to stopping Davis, Officer Galvan “determined the cracked windshield…impaired Mr. Davis’s view.” He did not explain the basis for his conclusion that the cracks on Davis’s windshield impaired Davis’s vision.
The defense showed Officer Galvan two photographs of Davis’s car, taken from behind the car. The photos show two horizontal cracks in the front windshield, one on the driver’s side and one on the passenger’s side. Both are very low on the window, just above the dashboard. Officer Galvan recognized the car shown in the photo, but could not recall whether the cracks on the windshield looked the same on the date of the stop. The court took the matter under submission stating, “I would indicate, however, that there’s no testimony from the officer that what he observed before he stopped the vehicle would appear to impair the driver’s vision and that is a necessity of the statute. [¶] So even without the photos, I’m not sure there’s enough here to justify the stop based on evidence I heard today.”
On June 15, 2007, the court denied appellant’s motion by minute order and without stating reasons.
DISCUSSION
Davis contends Officer Galvan’s stop of his vehicle was unreasonable because the officer lacked an objectively reasonable suspicion that the crack in his windshield impaired his vision. Thus, the court erred when it denied his suppression motion. We agree.
“In reviewing the action of the lower courts, we will uphold those factual findings of the trial court that are supported by substantial evidence. The question of whether a search was unreasonable, however, is a question of law. On that issue, we exercise ‘independent judgment.’ [Citation.]” (People v. Camacho (2000) 23 Cal.4th 824, 830.)
On a suppression motion, “the prosecution has the burden of proving … some justification for a warrantless search or seizure [citations], and therefore a warrantless search is presumptively unreasonable.… [O]nce defendants have made a prima facie showing that the police proceeded without a warrant, the prosecution must prove a justification for the search or seizure…” (People v. Williams (1999) 20 Cal.4th 119, 127.)
“‘A detention is reasonable under the Fourth Amendment when the detaining officer can point to specific articulable facts that, considered in light of the totality of the circumstances, provide some objective manifestation that the person detained may be involved in criminal activity.’” (People v. Colbert (2007) 157 Cal.App.4th 1068, 1072.) “[A] police officer can legally stop a motorist only if the facts and circumstances known to the officer support at least a reasonable suspicion that the driver has violated the Vehicle Code or some other law. [Citations.]” (People v. Miranda (1993) 17 Cal.App.4th 917, 926.)
Vehicle Code section 26710, the section at issue in this case, provides: “It is unlawful to operate any motor vehicle upon a highway when the windshield or rear window is in such a defective condition as to impair the driver’s vision either to the front or rear.”
Here, Officer Galvan testified that he stopped Davis’s car because it had a cracked windshield, which he believed impaired Davis’s vision constituting a violation of Vehicle Code section 26710. He did not, however, provide any specific, objective facts that supported his bare conclusion that the cracks in the windshield constituted a defective condition that impaired Davis’s vision.
This case is similar to People v. White (2003) 107 Cal.App.4th 636. There, an officer stopped the defendant because he believed the defendant had violated the Vehicle Code by hanging an air freshener from his rear view mirror. In reversing the trial court’s denial of the defendant’s suppression motion, the White court noted that “the officer never testified that he believed the air freshener obstructed the [defendant’s] view” or to “specific and articulable facts, like hesitant or erratic driving, that might suggest the driver’s clear view was impeded. (Id. at p. 642; cf. People v. Colbert, supra, 157 Cal.App.4th at p. 1073 [denial of suppression motion upheld where officer who stopped driver for an air freshener hanging on a rear view mirror testified to the size of the air freshener and his personal experience that an air freshener of that size in the officer’s personal car had impaired his vision].)
Likewise, Officer Galvan did not testify to any specific and articulable facts that supported his conclusion that the cracks on Davis’s windshield impaired Davis’s view. We have examined the photographs admitted into evidence. They show a single, thin, linear crack, located in the extreme lower part of the windshield that extends horizontally from the driver’s seat toward the middle of the windshield. Another crack, a little higher on the window but still very near the dashboard appears on the front passenger’s side of the windshield. In our view, the location, thinness, and length of the cracks are such that it is readily apparent they would not cause the windshield to be “in such a defective condition as to impair the driver’s vision.” (Veh. Code § 26710.)
On this record, we must conclude that the prosecution did not provide sufficient evidence to justify the traffic stop. Accordingly, the court erred in denying Davis’s motion to suppress.
DISPOSITION
The judgment is reversed.