Opinion
NOT TO BE PUBLISHED
Super. Ct. No. 07F01097
HULL, J.Following denial of her motion to suppress (Pen. Code, § 1538.5; unspecified section references that follow are to the Penal Code), a jury convicted defendant Kristy Kirkland of receiving stolen property (§ 496, subd. (a)) and unlawful possession of another’s access card. (§ 484e, subd. (d).) The trial court found a prior strike allegation to be true. (§ 667.5, subd. (b).) Defendant was sentenced to the upper term of three years for receiving stolen property, doubled to six years under the three strikes law. Sentence was stayed for the offense of possession of a stolen access card pursuant to section 654. On appeal, defendant challenges the denial of her suppression motion. We affirm the judgment.
Facts and Proceedings
In light of defendant’s contention on appeal, the facts are taken from the hearing on defendant’s motion to suppress.
In February 2008, Officers Dutra and Oliver saw a white truck parked near the curb with white smoke “basically billowing . . . from its exhaust.” The officers pulled their patrol car alongside the driver’s side of the truck. They saw a woman, later identified as defendant, in the driver’s seat and a man in the front right passenger’s seat.
The officers asked defendant about her truck exhaust. At this point, the male passenger in the truck got out and walked away. The officers did not attempt to stop him. Defendant told the officers the truck belonged to her boyfriend and turned it off. In response to a question regarding identification, defendant volunteered that she was on parole. The officers then detained defendant and searched the truck. They discovered an envelope containing the following items: “a credit card, a blank check, registration paperwork, insurance card, all in the name of Baron Bonner as well as a notepad piece of paper with Baron Bonner’s personal information, account information handwritten on it.” These items had been stolen from Mr. Bonner’s vehicle three days earlier.
Defendant was charged with receiving stolen property (§ 496, subd. (a)), unlawful possession of another’s access card (§ 484e, subd. (d)), and forgery (§ 475, subd. (b)). Prior to trial, defendant moved to suppress the evidence seized from the truck as fruit of an unreasonable detention. The motion was denied. Defendant was thereafter convicted of receiving stolen property and unlawful possession of another’s access card and sentenced as stated above.
Discussion
In denying the motion to suppress, the trial court concluded: “[T]his was a consensual contact in the beginning the officers never even exited their [patrol car] when they engaged in this colloquy. . . . [¶] The reason the contact escalated was because the defendant voluntarily indicated that she was on parole.” The court further concluded the parole search “was not conducted for an arbitrary or capricious reason. [The officers] had a good faith basis on which to conduct the parole search, and they did so based on a series of events that were consensual that then gave rise to a parole search.”
Defendant challenges the trial court’s finding that she was not detained at the time she volunteered her parole status. She further contends the detention was not supported by a reasonable suspicion of unlawful activity and, even if the initial detention was lawful, the officers exceeded the lawful scope of that detention. Because we conclude substantial evidence supports the trial court’s finding that defendant was not detained at the time she volunteered her parole status, we need not reach her remaining arguments.
“Police contacts with individuals may be placed into three broad categories ranging from the least to the most intrusive: consensual encounters that result in no restraint of liberty whatsoever; detentions, which are seizures of an individual that are strictly limited in duration, scope, and purpose; and formal arrests or comparable restraints on an individual’s liberty. [Citations.] Our present inquiry concerns the distinction between consensual encounters and detentions. Consensual encounters do not trigger Fourth Amendment scrutiny. [Citation.] Unlike detentions, they require no articulable suspicion that the person has committed or is about to commit a crime.” (In re Manuel G. (1997) 16 Cal.4th 805, 821 (Manuel G.).)
“‘[T]o determine whether a particular encounter constitutes a seizure, a court must consider all the circumstances surrounding the encounter to determine whether the police conduct would have communicated to a reasonable person that the person was not free to decline the officers’ requests or otherwise terminate the encounter.’” (Manuel G., supra, 16 Cal.4th at p. 821.) “[A] seizure does not occur simply because a police officer approaches an individual and asks a few questions.” (Florida v. Bostick (1991) 501 U.S. 429, 434 [115 L.Ed.2d 389, 398].) “Only when the officer, by means of physical force or show of authority, in some manner restrains the individual’s liberty, does a seizure occur.” (Manuel G., supra, at p. 821.) This inquiry is an objective one, and does not take into account “[t]he officer’s uncommunicated state of mind [or] the individual citizen’s subjective belief [in whether a detention has occurred].” (Ibid.)
“‘The standard of appellate review of a trial court’s ruling on a motion to suppress evidence is well established. We defer to the trial court’s factual findings, express or implied, where supported by substantial evidence. In determining whether, on the facts so found, the search or seizure was reasonable under the Fourth Amendment, we exercise our independent judgment. [Citations.]’” (People v. Weaver (2001) 26 Cal.4th 876, 924.)
Here, the record contains substantial evidence to support the trial court’s finding that the encounter was consensual. When the officers first approached defendant, her vehicle was parked parallel to the curb. Officer Dutra stopped his patrol car alongside the truck. He then spoke to defendant.
Before speaking with Officer Dutra, defendant turned the truck engine off. Defendant contends this indicates submission to the officer’s show of authority. However, this assumes there was a show of authority. The trial court concluded otherwise. Officer Dutra did not activate his lights or siren and did not block the path of defendant’s vehicle. There were no vehicles in front of or behind defendant’s vehicle that would have prevented or impeded her departure. The officers spoke to defendant through her open driver’s side window and their open passenger’s side window and the officers sat in their car during the initial conversation. During that conversation, the man in defendant’s truck got out and walked away. There is no indication the officers in any way raised their voices or otherwise engaged in coercive activity during this encounter. Accordingly, regardless of defendant’s subjective belief, a reasonable person in her position would have felt “free to decline the officers’ requests or otherwise terminate the encounter.” (Manuel G., supra, 16 Cal.4th at p. 821.)
Defendant relies on Barber v. Superior Court (1973) 30 Cal.App.3d 326, to support her contention that she was detained. In Barber, the court determined the defendant was detained when a police officer asked him to remain in his car while the officer conducted a warrant check. (Id. at p. 330.) The Court of Appeal concluded the officer’s direction to the defendant to remain in his car represented a sufficient show of authority to constitute a detention.
There was no such show of authority here. At no time did the officers ask defendant to remain in her truck or indicate to her in any way that she was not free to end the encounter and leave.
At some point during the initial conversation with the officers, defendant volunteered the fact that she was on parole. It is undisputed that at that point the officers had the legal right to detain and search defendant based on her parole status. “[T]he Fourth Amendment does not prohibit a police officer from conducting a suspicionless search of a parolee.” (Samson v. California (2006) 547 U.S. 843, 857 [165 L.Ed.2d 250, 263].) Before this point, however, defendant was not detained.
Defendant’s remaining contentions are predicated on an assumption that she was detained prior to volunteering her parole status. In light of our holding that the trial court properly concluded otherwise, we need not reach these contentions.
We conclude that substantial evidence supports the finding that defendant’s encounter was consensual. Defendant’s suppression motion was therefore properly denied.
Disposition
The judgment is affirmed.
We concur: SIMS, Acting P.J., BUTZ, J.