Opinion
No. 3-117 / 02-0342
Filed April 4, 2003
Appeal from the Iowa District Court for Black Hawk County, Nathan A. Callahan, District Associate Judge.
Defendant Paul Finn appeals from his judgment and sentence entered following a trial to the court for possession of methamphetamine and marijuana. AFFIRMED.
Linda Del Gallo, State Appellate Defender, and Martha Lucey, Assistant Appellate Defender, for appellant.
Thomas J. Miller, Attorney General, Kevin Cmelik, Assistant Attorney General, Thomas Ferguson, County Attorney, and Heather Prendergast, Assistant County Attorney, for appellee.
Considered by Huitink, P.J., and Mahan and Hecht, JJ.
Defendant Paul Finn appeals from his judgment and sentence entered following a trial to the court for possession of methamphetamine and marijuana. We affirm.
I. Background Facts and Proceedings. In July 2001, seeking an interview with Paul Finn, Deputy Herbst went to a residence in Elk Run Heights after receiving information that Finn could be found there. Deputy Herbst approached the house and noticed the inside door was open, but the screen door was closed. He saw Finn inside the house standing at the stairway leading to the basement and motioned to him to come outside. Finn complied and stepped outside carrying a black leather, zippered day planner in the crook of his arm.
Deputy Herbst asked Finn to come down to the office for an interview. Finn suggested putting off the interview until the next day. Deputy Herbst asked Finn where he was living, and Finn told him he was not currently living anywhere. Herbst then asked where Finn was working, and Finn told him he was recently unemployed. Deputy Herbst then suggested they have the interview right away because law enforcement might have difficulty finding Finn the next day. Finn agreed, but asked if he could go back into the house and tell his friends he was leaving. Herbst responded, "That's fine. I will just follow you into the house."
Finn acquiesced, saying, "That's fine," and went into the house with Herbst behind him. Finn walked through the kitchen and into the living room. He told Deputy Herbst that his friends must not be there. He placed his day planner on the sofa and said, "We might as well go. We can go now." Deputy Herbst agreed and picked up Finn's day planner from the sofa. When he picked up the day planner, he uncovered a bag of marijuana which had been underneath the day planner. Herbst testified that he picked up the day planner to assist Finn, because Finn seemed flustered and Herbst did not know whether Finn would be returning to the residence after the interview.
Upon questioning, Finn admitted owning the marijuana. Herbst placed Finn in the squad car and then opened and searched the day planner, discovering methamphetamine and hypodermic needles.
The State subsequently charged Finn with possession of marijuana and possession of methamphetamine. Finn filed a motion to suppress, asserting Finn's constitutional rights under the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution and Article I, § 8 of the Iowa Constitution were violated when Deputy Herbst picked up the day planner. Hearing on Finn's motion was heard on October 19, 2001, and on November 13, 2001, the district court issued its findings of fact, conclusions of law and ruling denying Finn's motion. In this ruling, the district court concluded "by picking up the notebook, Deputy Herbst was not conducting a search of the area underneath the notebook on the sofa, but was assisting Finn by taking along his property when they were leaving for the interview."
Finn waived his right to a jury trial, and a trial to the court based on the minutes of testimony was held on February 22, 2002. The district court found Finn guilty on both counts. Finn appeals, alleging the district court erred when it denied his motion to suppress. Finn also contends his trial counsel was ineffective for failing to challenge Deputy Herbst's entrance into the house as an unreasonable search.
II. Standard of Review. Our review of alleged violations of constitutional rights is de novo. State v. Bumpus, 459 N.W.2d 619, 622 (Iowa 1990). We make an independent evaluation on the totality of the circumstances as shown by the entire record. State v. Campbell, 326 N.W.2d 350, 352 (Iowa 1982).
III. Discussion. Finn argues that, as a social guest in his friends' home, he had a legitimate expectation of privacy in the home, that he did not give consent for Deputy Herbst to enter the home, and thus the deputy conducted an illegal search of the home when he entered the home and when he later picked up Finn's day planner from the sofa. See State v. Rainier, 628 N.W.2d 460, 467 (Iowa 2001). He contends the district court erred when it determined that Deputy Herbst's action of picking up the day planner was reasonable and did not constitute a search of the area of the couch underneath the day planner.
Finn does not seem to argue that when Deputy Herbst picked up the day planner, he conducted an illegal search or seizure of the day planner itself.
We first address Finn's contention that Deputy Herbst's entry into the home was an illegal search. The State points out, and Finn concedes, this issue was not raised below in Finn's motion to suppress. After failing to challenge Herbst's entry below, Finn cannot now rely on that argument to seek a reversal on appeal. State v. Halliburton, 539 N.W.2d 339, 342 (Iowa 1995). Because Finn failed to challenge the constitutionality of Deputy Herbst's entry into the home, we do not consider that issue. Id.
We turn, then, to Finn's argument that, once inside the house, Deputy Herbst's action in removing the day planner from the couch amounted to an illegal search under the Fourth Amendment and Article 1, § 8 of the Iowa Constitution. We analyze Finn's claim under a two-step approach. First, Finn must show that he had a legitimate expectation of privacy in the area searched, and second, if Finn had a legitimate expectation of privacy, we must then decide whether the State unreasonably invaded the protected interest. Halliburton, 539 N.W.2d at 342.
Both Finn and the State urge us to accept bright line rules about which category of guests have legitimate expectations of privacy in their hosts' homes. Finn contends the rule is that all social guests have legitimate expectation of privacy, citing Justice Kennedy's special concurrence in Minnesota v. Carter, 525 U.S. 83, 102, 119 S.Ct. 469, 479, 142 L.Ed.2d 376, 387 (1998) ("as a general rule, social guests will have an expectation of privacy in their host's home."). The State, relying on Minnesota v. Olson, 495 U.S. 91, 96-97, 110 S.Ct. 1684, 1687, 109 L.Ed.2d 85, 93 (1990), argues that only overnight guests enjoy a legitimate expectation of privacy. We conclude, however, that the resolution of this case does not require us to adopt either of the proposed bright-line rules. The determination of whether a person has a legitimate expectation of privacy with respect to a certain area is made on a case-by-case basis, considering the unique facts of each particular situation. State v. Breuer, 577 N.W.2d 41, 46 (Iowa 1998). We conclude Finn has not established he had a legitimate expectation of privacy in the Elk Run Heights home. Finn did not submit evidence at the hearing on his motion to suppress indicating the nature of his relationship to the hosts or the residence itself. We know almost nothing about the length of Finn's stay at the home. We know only that Finn had been there long enough for someone to notify law enforcement of his whereabouts, and for Deputy Herbst to drive there. We know that, according to Deputy Herbst's testimony, Finn referred to the people inside as his "friends." We do not find these meager details sufficient to establish that Finn had a legitimate expectation of privacy in the residence under either the broad rule advanced by Finn or the narrower rule asserted by the State. We therefore affirm the district court's denial of Finn's motion to suppress on the ground that Deputy Herbst's removal of the day planner from the couch did not violate Finn's Fourth Amendment or Article 1, § 8 rights.
Finn additionally claims that his trial counsel was ineffective for failing to challenge Deputy Herbst's initial entry into the home as an illegal search. Because we are unable to determine on the record before us if Finn's counsel's decision not to challenge Herbst's entry into the home was a strategic decision or a failure to perform an essential duty, we preserve this issue for possible postconviction relief proceedings.