Opinion
F041185.
7-17-2003
THE PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. MICHAEL EDGAR MARTIN, Defendant and Appellant.
Elisa A. Brandes, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant. Bill Lockyer, Attorney General, Robert R. Anderson, Chief Assistant Attorney General, Jo Graves, Assistant Attorney General, Jeffrey D. Firestone and Kathleen A. McKenna, Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.
After pleading nolo contendere to a violation of Health and Safety Code section 11378 (possession for sale of methamphetamine), Michael Edgar Martin appeals from the denial of his Penal Code section 1538.5 motion to suppress evidence. We will affirm.
FACTS
On March 29, 2002, officers from the Kern Narcotics Enforcement Team went to a residence on Washington Avenue to serve a search warrant. The warrant was obtained following an informants tip that methamphetamine could be purchased from a man named Mike. With this information, Officer Blunt, the affiant officer, conducted a records check which showed that appellant lived at that Washington Avenue address. The informant positively identified appellant from his Department of Motor Vehicles photograph.
The "tip" from the informant is particularly significant since he had been inside the building and knew the layout.
On the day of the search, officers approached the residence and contacted the appellant standing outside the front gate. After knocking and announcing themselves at the front door several times without any response, the officers entered the residence through the unlocked door. Officers conducted a search of the residence and located items associated with the sale of methamphetamine, as well as a large quantity of suspected methamphetamine.
Ronald Martin, brother of the appellant, consented to a search of the upstairs of residence "A" where an officer seized methamphetamine.
Appellant admitted the suspected methamphetamine located in the residence "B" belonged to him. He also admitted to selling and using methamphetamine.
Appellant contends that all evidence seized on the day of the search should be suppressed because the warrant failed to describe with particularity the place to be searched in that it described an entire building without regard to the individual apartments.
DISCUSSION
"The standard of appellate review of a trial courts ruling on a motion to suppress is well established. We defer to the trial courts 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. Glaser (1995) 11 Cal.4th 354, 362, 902 P.2d 729.)
"Both the United States Constitution and the Constitution and statutory law of California require that a search warrant describe with particularity the place to be searched. (U.S. Const., 4th Amend; Cal., Const., art. I, § 13; Pen. Code, § 1525.) Whether this requirement is met is a question of law on which an appellate court makes an independent judgment. [Citation.] As a general rule, the requirement is satisfied if the officer conducting the search "can with reasonable effort ascertain and identify the place intended." [Citations.]" (People v. MacAvoy (1984) 162 Cal. App. 3d 746, 753— 754, 209 Cal. Rptr. 34.) Since Officer Blunt is the author of the affidavit as well as the officer conducting the search, he would have no trouble identifying the place that the warrant describes to be searched.
We also "review the warrants description of the property to be searched in a commonsense and realistic fashion, [citation] recalling that they are drafted by nonlawyers amidst the haste of a criminal investigation. "Technical requirements of elaborate specificity ... have no proper place in this area." [Citation.]" (People v. Minder (1996) 46 Cal.App.4th 1784, 1788.)
The courts finding that the building described in the search warrant was not two separate apartments is supported by substantial evidence. Appellant and his brother may consider the residence to be two separate living quarters, but objectively, one could reasonably conclude it was not.
Appellant argues that there is substantial evidence that two apartments exist. Indeed there is an exterior door on the side of the building with the letter "B" appearing on it, but the approach to it is blocked by tall weeds. The doorbell that rings to "B" is not visible unless one lifts the corner of an electrical box. The inner doors within "B" were not shut and nothing with a "B" on it was observed. Witnesses testified that they would use the "A" doorway to go to appellants "apartment." The informant used this entrance as well. A doorway in the hallway would then lead to a door that entered a laundry and garage area before reaching appellants living area. Although there were exterior entrances marked "A" and "B," appellant s private entrance seems to have rarely been used. Appellant further argues that because kitchens were located in both the upstairs and downstairs living areas, two separate apartments existed. The kitchen located downstairs is described by Officer Blunt as "a very simple setup, like it had a microwave, sink, and I believe it had a hot plate." While it may have served appellant well as a kitchen, we do not believe a setup such as this mandates a conclusion his downstairs room is a separate apartment.
However, the test is not whether substantial evidence supports that conclusion, but whether substantial evidence supports the judges conclusion it was not.
Moreover, the utility bills were addressed to the Washington Avenue address. No mention is made in the utility bills of any "A" or "B" units that would indicate an apartment building. Although two of the bills do specify "2 units," there is only one amount to be paid, and only Ronalds name appears on the bills. The court found that"all the utilities are one and then they just split it up at the end of the month." The fact that the utility costs are all shared points to a living situation more akin to roommates than of men living in two completely separate apartments. As the trial court repeatedly reinforced, "These are two brothers that are living there, and because they said to each other, I11 live upstairs and you live downstairs, that does not make them separate apartments ...."
In Maryland v. Garrison (1987) 480 U.S. 79, 80, 94 L. Ed. 2d 72, 107 S. Ct. 1013, police applied for a warrant and conducted a search of a premises mistakenly believing there was only one apartment on the third floor, when, in fact, there were two. The court held the validity of the search of the defendants apartment, made pursuant to a warrant authorizing the search of the entire third floor, depended on whether the officers failure to recognize the overbreadth of the warrant was objectively understandable and reasonable. (Id. at p. 88.)
Appellant argues "the officers in the present case should have known that there was more than one residence at the address." His contention is not supported by the information in the affidavit, nor is it supported by the conditions of the residence that officers encountered when they executed the warrant. Maryland v. Garrison, supra, 480 U.S. at page 85 plainly states that "if the officers had known, or even if they should have known, that there were two separate dwelling units on the third floor ..., they would have been obligated to exclude respondents apartment from the scope of the requested warrant. But we must judge the constitutionality of [the officers] conduct in light of the information available to them at the time they acted." (Italics added).
Neither appellants nor his brothers conduct when the officers executed the warrant would lead the officers to be aware that there were two separate apartments in the residence. Appellant only told the officer that the "downstairs" area was his living area. Appellants brother signed a consent form to search the "upstairs living quarters." Like appellant, he did not indicate the living quarters were designated as "A" and "B." Officer Blunt testified that he "thought everything was A that day."
As substantial evidence supports the courts conclusion the officers reasonably construed the circumstances as involving only one residence, the suppression motion was properly denied. (Maryland v. Garrison, supra, 480 U.S. at p. 85.)
DISPOSITION
The 9 judgment is affirmed.