Opinion
A149259
07-19-2017
THE PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. CHARLES JONATHAN PATTERSON, Defendant and Appellant.
NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN OFFICIAL REPORTS
California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule 8.1115(b). This opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115. (Humboldt County Super. Ct. No. CR1600119)
Defendant Charles Patterson pleaded guilty to one felony count of possession of metal knuckles and was placed on probation for three years. On appeal, his sole claim is that his motion to suppress the metal knuckles was wrongly denied because they were obtained as the result of an unlawful detention. We need not decide whether the detention was unlawful, however, because even if it was, the motion was properly denied. The officer's discovery that Patterson was subject to a probation search condition was an intervening circumstance attenuating the taint of any Fourth Amendment violation that would otherwise justify suppression of the evidence under the exclusionary rule. Accordingly, we affirm.
Patterson pleaded guilty under Penal Code section 21810. After the entry of this plea, the trial court granted the People's motion to dismiss two remaining misdemeanor counts, which were brought under Health and Safety Code sections 11350, subdivision (a) (possession of heroin) and 11377, subdivision (a) (possession of methamphetamine).
I.
FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL
BACKGROUND
The following facts are drawn from the suppression hearing and are undisputed in relevant part. On the morning of January 7, 2016, Eureka Police Officer Raymond Nunez encountered Michael K., a homeless man whom Officer Nunez believed to be camping illegally. Michael K. was lying near the entrance of an abandoned building.
Officer Nunez began talking with Michael K., and, as they spoke, Patterson walked toward them, carrying a bag. When Patterson drew near, Officer Nunez identified himself and asked Patterson his name and what he was doing there. Patterson identified himself and said he was bringing food to Michael K. The officer asked Patterson to "please get out of the walkway and if he would like to take a seat." Patterson sat down, and the officer continued talking with Michael K.
Patterson testified that Officer Nunez did not ask for his name until after he was seated. Otherwise, Patterson's description of the encounter did not differ from the officer's in any significant respect.
Officer Nunez then ran both Michael K.'s and Patterson's names through dispatch. The officer advised Michael K. that he had violated the Eureka Municipal Code and released him. Upon learning that Patterson "was on probation with a search and seizure clause," the officer asked Patterson if he had anything on his person that would violate the terms of his probation. Patterson responded, "No." Officer Nunez nonetheless searched Patterson and found a set of metal knuckles and substances that the officer believed to be heroin and methamphetamine.
After charges were filed against Patterson, he brought a motion to suppress the evidence found by Officer Nunez. The trial court denied the motion, ruling that the initial contact between Patterson and Officer Nunez was consensual. It also ruled that even if the initial contact constituted an unlawful detention, the officer's conduct was not "of a degree that would warrant suppression of the evidence."
II.
DISCUSSION
Patterson argues that the trial court's denial of his motion to suppress was improper because it was based on the erroneous finding that Officer Nunez's initial contact with him was consensual and therefore did not constitute an unlawful detention. The Attorney General argues that even if the contact could be considered an unlawful detention, the motion was nonetheless properly denied because the connection between any constitutional violation and the discovery of the evidence was too attenuated to warrant suppression. We agree with the Attorney General.
A. The Applicable Legal Standards.
The Fourth Amendment prohibits unreasonable searches and seizures. " 'A warrantless search is presumed to be unreasonable, and the prosecution bears the burden of demonstrating a legal justification for the search.' " (People v. Suff (2014) 58 Cal.4th 1013, 1053.) If the prosecution cannot meet this burden, the exclusionary rule normally requires the suppression of any evidence obtained from the search. (Wong Sun v. United States (1963) 371 U.S. 471, 487-488.)
The exclusionary rule requires suppression of evidence, however, only when there was a substantial causal connection between illegal police behavior and the discovery of the evidence. (Hudson v. Michigan (2006) 547 U.S. 586, 592.) Thus, under a principle referred to as the attenuation doctrine, the exclusionary rule does not require suppression of evidence when "the detrimental consequences of [the] illegal police action become so attenuated that the deterrent effect of the exclusionary rule no longer justifies its cost." (Brown v. Illinois (1975) 422 U.S. 590, 609 (Brown).)
The applicable standards of review are well established. In ruling on a motion to suppress, the trial court must "find the historical facts, select the rule of law, and apply it to the facts in order to determine whether the law as applied has been violated." (People v. Hoyos (2007) 41 Cal.4th 872, 891.) We review the court's findings of fact to determine whether they are supported by substantial evidence. (People v. Boyette (2002) 29 Cal.4th 381, 411.) The court's ruling on whether the relevant law was violated is a mixed question of law and fact subject to de novo review. (Ibid.) Thus, we exercise independent judgment in determining the legality of a search and seizure. (People v. Tully (2012) 54 Cal.4th 952, 979.) And we may affirm on any basis supported in the record, regardless of the grounds relied on by the court below. (People v. Brooks (2017) 3 Cal.5th 1, 38.)
B. The Trial Court's Denial of the Motion to Suppress Was Proper Under the Attenuation Doctrine.
Initially, Patterson contends that we should not consider the applicability of the attenuation doctrine because the People forfeited the issue by failing to raise it below. Even when the People do not raise the issue of attenuation in the trial court, however, we may consider "the claim of attenuation for the first time on appeal where . . . the record is sufficient to support such a finding." (People v. Brendlin (2008) 45 Cal.4th 262, 267, fn. 1 (Brendlin).) Here, even though the People did not raise the issue below, they did introduce evidence of Patterson's probation search condition and argue that the condition justified the search. (See ibid.) Therefore, they did not forfeit the issue, and we will consider it on the merits.
Under the attenuation doctrine, evidence may be admissible even though it would not have been discovered "but for" illegal police conduct. (Brendlin, supra, 45 Cal.4th at p. 268.) The applicability of the doctrine turns on whether the evidence was discovered by " ' " 'exploitation of that illegality or instead by means sufficiently distinguishable to be purged of the primary taint.' " ' " (Ibid.) Courts consider three factors in determining whether the taint of an antecedent Fourth Amendment violation was sufficiently attenuated so as to permit the introduction of the evidence. These are commonly referred to as the Brown factors, and they are "the temporal proximity of the Fourth Amendment violation to the procurement of the challenged evidence, the presence of intervening circumstances, and the flagrancy of the official misconduct." (Brendlin, at p. 269.)
To guide our application of the three Brown factors, we look to Brendlin. In that case, a sheriff's deputy stopped a car in which the defendant was a passenger. (Brendlin, supra, 45 Cal.4th at pp. 265-266.) The prosecution conceded that the stop was "not supported by reasonable suspicion of criminal activity." (Id. at p. 268.) After the stop, the deputy learned that the defendant was "a parolee at large and had an outstanding no-bail warrant for his arrest." (Id. at p. 266.) The deputy then arrested the defendant, searched him and the car, and discovered an illegal controlled substance. (Ibid.) The defendant moved to suppress the controlled substance in the ensuing prosecution on the ground that it would not have been discovered but for the unlawful traffic stop. The trial court denied the motion, and the Court of Appeal reversed. (Ibid.)
In reversing the Court of Appeal's ruling barring the evidence, our state Supreme Court focused on the second and third Brown factors. It held that "the discovery of an outstanding arrest warrant prior to a search incident to arrest constitutes an intervening circumstance that may—and, in the absence of purposeful or flagrant police misconduct, will—attenuate the taint of the antecedent unlawful traffic stop." (Brendlin, supra, 45 Cal.4th at p. 265.) The discovery of such a warrant supplies the officer with "legal authorization to arrest [the] defendant that [is] completely independent of the circumstances that led the officer to initiate the traffic stop." (Id. at p. 271.) The Supreme Court found no sufficiently flagrant or purposeful police misconduct under the third Brown factor, but it reaffirmed the importance of the factor, which "is generally regarded as the most important [one] because 'it is directly tied to the purpose of the exclusionary rule—deterring police misconduct.' " (Ibid.)
The Supreme Court also discussed the first Brown factor—the temporal proximity of any Fourth Amendment violation to the evidence's procurement—but gave it little or no weight. (Brendlin, supra, 45 Cal.4th at p. 270.) The court recognized that in some situations, the time between illegal police conduct and a volitional response by the defendant, such as resisting or flight, might weigh against the application of the attenuation doctrine because close timing could indicate that "the defendant's response was influenced by the illegality or that the illegality was exploited." (Ibid.) But close timing, the court explained, is either irrelevant or outweighed by the other two factors when the intervening circumstance is the discovery that the defendant is subject to an outstanding arrest warrant. (Ibid.)
Based on Brendlin's reasoning, we conclude that the trial court properly denied the motion to suppress here. True enough, Brown's first factor—the short period between the initial contact and Officer Nunez's discovery of the contraband—offers no reason to apply the attenuation doctrine. The Attorney General concedes this point, but he argues, and we agree, that the other two factors compel the doctrine's application.
Here, the intervening circumstance, Brown's second factor, was Officer Nunez's discovery that Patterson was on probation and subject to a search condition. The parties dispute whether a search condition, like the arrest warrant in Brendlin, "tends to dissipate the taint" caused by illegal police misconduct. (Brendlin, supra, 45 Cal.4th at p. 271.) Their disagreement is centered on two Court of Appeal decisions.
The Attorney General argues that People v. Durant (2012) 205 Cal.App.4th 57 (Durant) governs. In Durant, this District used broad language in holding that the discovery of a probation search condition is an intervening circumstance that warrants the application of the attenuation doctrine. In that case, the police officer stopped the defendant's car based on a perceived traffic violation, recognized the defendant as someone subject to a probation search condition, searched the defendant, and found a loaded handgun. (Id. at pp. 60-61.) This court held that probation search conditions operate as a " ' "complete waiver of that probationer's Fourth Amendment rights, save only his [or her] right to object to harassment or searches conducted in an unreasonable manner." ' " (Id. at p. 64.) It then concluded that the probation "search condition supplied legal authorization to search that was completely independent of the circumstances leading to the traffic stop." (Id. at p. 66.) The court continued by explaining that the third Brown factor—the flagrancy of any official misconduct—weighed in favor of applying the attenuation doctrine because, while the traffic stop was made without reasonable suspicion, there was no "purposefulness to the alleged unlawful conduct" and the officer did not act in an "arbitrary, capricious, or harassing manner." (Ibid.)
Patterson, in contrast, argues that People v. Bates (2013) 222 Cal.App.4th 60 (Bates) governs. In Bates, a sheriff's deputy stopped a vehicle based solely on a hunch that the occupants of the car might have been involved in a theft. (Id. at pp. 63-64.) One of the occupants was the defendant, who identified himself. (Id. at p. 64.) Although the deputy did not know the defendant, another officer had told the deputy that someone with the defendant's name was subject to a probation search condition. (Id. at p. 63.) Based on this information, the deputy arrested the defendant, searched him, and apparently discovered evidence of the theft. (Id. at p. 64.)
The Sixth District Court of Appeal ruled that the vehicle stop in Bates was unlawful, and in applying Brown's second factor it concluded that "the unlawfulness of a suspicionless vehicle detention is not retroactively cured when one of the passengers turns out to be a probationer with a search condition." (Bates, supra, 222 Cal.App.4th at pp. 62, 70.) Declining to adopt Durant's broad language, Bates distinguished probation search conditions from arrest warrants on the basis that, unlike an arrest warrant, a probation search condition is "a discretionary enforcement tool." (Id. at p. 70.) According to Bates, the discovery of a defendant's probation status after a search when that status was "wholly unknown to law enforcement at the time of the initial detention" does not "sanitize any unlawful detention without regard to the circumstances surrounding that seizure." (Ibid.) Bates also found no justification for the application of the attenuation doctrine under the third Brown factor. "Unlike the officer in Durant, who stopped a car based on a perceived traffic violation, [the deputy] stopped the . . . car without any observation of possible wrongdoing[, and] . . . we find his suspicionless stop . . . nonetheless purposeful for our attenuation analysis." (Bates, at p. 71.) The court therefore concluded that the evidence obtained should have been suppressed "[b]ased on this finding, together with our determination that defendant's probation search condition was an insufficient attenuating circumstance." (Ibid.)
We recognize that there is some tension between Durant and Bates, but the holdings of both cases are consistent with our conclusion that when there has been no flagrant or purposeful conduct by the police, the discovery of a defendant's probation search condition is an intervening circumstance supporting the application of the attenuation doctrine. The flagrancy of the police misconduct is the most critical of the Brown factors in that it "is tied directly to the rationale underlying the exclusionary rule." (Bates, supra, 222 Cal.App.4th at p. 70.) In Durant, the traffic stop was based on a possible mistake of law and was therefore neither flagrant nor purposeful (Durant, supra, 205 Cal.App.4th at p. 64), whereas in Bates, the stop was made "without any observation of possible wrongdoing" and was therefore, according to the court, purposeful. (Bates, at p. 71.) We do not think Bates stands for the proposition that a probation search condition can never be a sufficient attenuating circumstance. Rather, the decision concluded that because such a condition is "a less compelling intervening circumstance than an arrest warrant," it did not justify application of the attenuation doctrine where the illegal conduct was purposeful. (Id. at p. 70.)
This case is more analogous to Durant than it is to Bates. The Attorney General argues that Officer Nunez's actions were neither flagrant nor purposeful and were motivated by safety concerns, and we agree. As in Durant, there is no evidence here that the officer's actions were taken "in an arbitrary, capricious, or harassing manner." (Durant, supra, 205 Cal.App.4th at p. 66.) And unlike the officer in Bates, Officer Nunez did not purposefully seek out and detain the suspect. (See Bates, supra, 222 Cal.App.4th at p. 71.) Instead, it was Patterson who approached Officer Nunez while the officer was engaged in the legitimate task of investigating Michael K.'s criminal behavior. We conclude that the discovery that Patterson was subject to a probation search condition, in combination with the lack of any flagrant or purposeful misconduct by Officer Nunez, sufficiently dissipated the taint that may have flowed from any unlawful detention. Accordingly, the attenuation doctrine applies, and the motion to suppress was properly denied.
III.
DISPOSITION
The judgment is affirmed.
/s/_________
Humes, P.J. We concur: /s/_________
Margulies, J. /s/_________
Dondero, J.