P. v. Spani
Filed 5/21/13 P. v. Spani CA4/1
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COURT
OF APPEAL, FOURTH APPELLATE DISTRICT
DIVISION
ONE
STATE
OF CALIFORNIA
THE PEOPLE,
Plaintiff and Respondent,
v.
GREGORY ALLEN SPANI,
Defendant and Appellant.
D062281
(Super. Ct.
No. SCD237104)
APPEAL from
an order of the Superior Court
of
County, Frederick Maguire and Kenneth K. So, Judges. Affirmed.
Henry C.
Coker, Public Defender, Randy Mize, Chief Deputy Public Defender, Matthew
Braner and Peter Will, Deputy Public Defenders, for Defendant and Appellant.
Kamala D.
Harris, Attorney General, Dane R. Gillette, Chief Assistant Attorney General,
Julie L. Garland, Assistant Attorney General, James D. Dutton and Donald W.
Ostertag, Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.
Gregory
Allen Spani appeals the order granting him probation
after a jury found him guilty of possessing
and transporting methamphetamine.
(Health & Saf. Code, §§ 11377, subd. (a), 11379,
subd. (a); Pen. Code, § 1210.1, subd. (a).) Spani contends the trial court should have
granted his motion to suppress the methamphetamine because it was obtained as a
result of an illegal search. We reject
this contention and affirm.
FACTUAL
BACKGROUND
San Diego
police officers on patrol at approximately 2:00 a.m. saw Spani driving a
vehicle with expired registration tags in a bicycle lane in a residential
neighborhood. Spani did not live in the
vicinity. The officers stopped Spani and
asked him for his driver's license, vehicle registration, and proof of
insurance. Spani's license had expired,
and the vehicle registration, which was not in Spani's name, had expired more
than a year earlier. When the officers
ran a records check, they learned that Spani's license was suspended and that
he had been arrested for drug offenses.
The officers arrested Spani for driving with a suspended license,
impounded the vehicle, and conducted an inventory search. The officers found a baggie containing
methamphetamine, which they confiscated, but left a surfboard, two bicycles, a
tool box, and other items inside the vehicle.
The officers completed an impound form that listed the items found in
the vehicle.
PROCEDURAL
BACKGROUND
Spani moved
to suppress the methamphetamine on the ground it was obtained as the result of
an unlawful search of his vehicle.
Specifically, he argued the search was presumptively illegal because it
was conducted without a warrant.
The People
opposed the suppression motion. They
argued that the police officers' observation of Spani driving a vehicle with
expired registration tags in a bicycle lane justified the initial stop; the
discovery that Spani's license had expired justified the arrest; and the
impoundment and associated inventory search of the vehicle were lawful.
In his
reply papers, Spani argued the search was illegal because it was not necessary
to impound the vehicle, and the inventory search was a ruse to discover
The court
ruled the methamphetamine was properly seized because it was found during a
lawful inventory search of a vehicle subject to impoundment. The court thus denied Spani's suppression
motion.
DISCUSSION
Spani
argues the inventory search of his vehicle violated his federal constitutional
right "to be secure in [his] person[], houses, papers, and effects,
against unreasonable searches and seizures." (U.S. Const., 4th Amend.; see
[holding 4th Amend. applicable to states through 14th Amend.].) Specifically, he contends that the search was
not a valid inventory search because (1) it was not done in accordance
with departmental policy requiring the removal and storage of all valuable
property from an impounded vehicle, and (2) the officers' decision to
impound the vehicle and then undertake an inventory search was a pretext to
look for contraband. As we shall
explain, these contentions lack merit.
A. Standard of Review
A defendant
may move to suppress evidence obtained as a result of a search or seizure on
the ground the search or seizure was unreasonable. (Pen. Code, § 1538.5,
subd. (a)(1)(A).) When reviewing a
trial court's ruling on a suppression motion, "[w]e 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
independent judgment." (
362.)
B. Legal Analysis
"An
inventory search is the search of property lawfully seized and detained, in
order to ensure that it is harmless, to secure valuable items (such as might be
kept in a towed car), and to protect against false claims of loss or
damage." (Whren v. United States (1996) 517 U.S. 806, 811, fn. 1.) Such a "search may be 'reasonable' under
the Fourth Amendment even though it is not conducted pursuant to a warrant
based upon probable cause." (
371.) An inventory search does not violate
the Fourth Amendment if it is
conducted "pursuant to standard police procedures" (
364, 372 (Opperman)) or if it is
regulated by "standardized criteria" or "established
routine" (Florida v. Wells (1990)
495 U.S. 1, 4 (Wells)). Such a search, however, "must not be a
ruse for a general rummaging in order to discover incriminating
evidence." (Ibid.)
The
requirements of a lawful inventory search were satisfied in this case. A police officer may impound a vehicle where,
as here, the driver has a suspended license or the vehicle registration expired
more than six months before impoundment.
(Veh. Code, § 22651, subds. (h)(1), (o)(1)(A); People v. Redd
(2010) 48 Cal.4th 691, 721 (Redd).) "Having impounded the vehicle, [the
officers] had authority to conduct an inventory of the vehicle's contents
'aimed at securing or protecting the [vehicle] and its contents.' " (Redd,
at p. 721.) The record indicates
the inventory search here was conducted for the purpose of protecting the
contents of the vehicle. One of the
officers who arrested Spani testified that the police department has procedures
officers must follow when impounding a vehicle, including conducting a search
of the vehicle and completing a form that lists the contents of the vehicle in
order to keep track of what is delivered to the impound yard. This testimony "established that the
inventory was conducted pursuant to standard criteria, and that [the officers
were]
latitude that [the search could turn] into "a purposeful and general means
of discovering evidence of crime." ' " (Id. at
pp. 721-722.)
Spani
asserts the inventory search here was unlawful because the officers did not
strictly comply with "the core parts of the policy designed to safe[guard]
the owner's property."
Specifically, Spani complains that by keeping his surfboard, bicycles,
and other items in the vehicle, the officers violated written departmental
policy that all property of evidentiary or monetary value be removed from the
vehicle and stored at police headquarters or the local police station. We are not persuaded.
As an initial matter, it is not
clear from the record that the particular policy provisions Spani relies upon apply
to inventory searches. The policy manual
was not admitted as evidence in the trial court; and according to the testimony
at the suppression hearing, the provisions Spani cites are included in a
section of the manual entitled "Investigations" and thus may apply
only to investigative searches. Even if
we assume arguendo that the provisions cited by Spani are applicable, failure
to comply with every detail of a written policy governing inventory searches
does not invalidate such a search. Such
a search need not "be conducted in a totally mechanical 'all or nothing'
fashion." "The allowance of
the exercise of judgment based on concerns related to the purposes of an
inventory search does not violate the Fourth Amendment." (Wells,
supra, 495 U.S. at p. 4.) Here, one of the police officers who arrested
Spani testified, based on his training and 20 years of experience, that when
performing the inventory search required whenever a vehicle is impounded,
police routinely leave surfboards, bicycles, luggage, and other such personal
belongings inside the vehicle so that the owners may retrieve them from the
impound yard. Following such standard
police practice, even though unwritten, renders a search reasonable under the Fourth
Amendment. (People v. Needham (2000) 79 Cal.App.4th 260, 266-267;
367, 375 (Green);
887, 891-892 (Steeley).)
Spani also
argues that the vehicle impoundment and associated inventory search were
unconstitutional because they were merely a ruse for police to conduct an
investigative search. Spani does
"not disput[e] that subjectively an officer could have genuinely decided to tow [the] vehicle rather than
search it for contraband." But, he
claims the officers' decisions to arrest him and to impound the vehicle, after
learning of his prior arrests for drug offenses, and their failure to store his
personal belongings at a police facility, indicate the officers "were much
less concerned about protecting [his] property than searching through
it." The trial court, however,
concluded the decision to impound the vehicle was made for legitimate reasons
and not "for purposes of harassment or abuse." The record supports that conclusion.
At the hearing on Spani's motion to
suppress evidence, one of the arresting officers testified he based his
decision to impound the vehicle on the facts that Spani's license was
suspended, he was arrested, and the vehicle registration expired more than six
months earlier. These are statutorily
authorized (and therefore reasonable) grounds upon which to impound a
vehicle. (Veh. Code, § 22651,
subds. (h)(1), (o)(1)(A), (p);
Cal.App.3d at p. 892.) The officer
further testified that when deciding whether to impound a vehicle, he considers
whether the driver is alone, whether a properly licensed person is available to
drive the vehicle, whether he suspects the driver is lying or trying to conceal
something, the time of day, and whether the stop occurs near the driver's
residence. Although the officer's
testimony regarding suspicion of lying or concealment might suggest an
investigative motive, the other circumstances considered by the officer
indicate the decision to impound the vehicle was, as a whole, "based on
factors other than using it as a pretext to engage in a search for criminal
activity." (People v. Benites (1992) 9 Cal.App.4th 309, 326.) Substantial evidence thus supports the trial
court's finding that the decision to impound the vehicle Spani was driving was
not a ruse to search for incriminating evidence.
decided to impound the vehicle, they were permitted to conduct an inventory
search. (Opperman, supra, 428 U.S.
at p. 373; Redd,
At oral argument, Spani's counsel
urged us to hold the inventory search invalid based on three federal appellate
decisions. (See U.S. v. Cartwright (7th Cir. 2010) 630 F.3d 610;
F.3d 1348; U.S. v. Rowland (8th Cir.
2003) 341 F.3d 774.) Of course, these
lower federal court decisions are not binding on us. (See, e.g., People v. Collins (2010) 49 Cal.4th 175, 233; People v. Crittenden (1994) 9 Cal.4th 83, 120, fn. 3.) They are also not on point. The Proctor
court held an inventory search was unreasonable when police officers' decision
to impound the vehicle violated the department's written policy, and the
officers conducted an inventory search under conditions where the policy
expressly prohibited such a search. (489
F.3d at pp. 1354-1356.) Here, by
contrast, Spani's counsel conceded the impoundment was proper, and the
inventory search itself was authorized by standard police procedure. In Rowland,
the court held an inventory search was pretextual when law enforcement officers
impounded a vehicle; "called for a drug-sniffing dog to be brought to the
scene"; "sifted through the vehicle's contents searching only for and
recording only incriminating evidence"; and "testified the search was
partly conducted to investigate the possibility Rowland might be trafficking
narcotics." (341 F.3d at pp. 780,
782.) As we discussed earlier, the
record here discloses no comparable circumstances suggesting the search of
Spani's vehicle was pretextual. Finally,
the Cartwright court "held that
minor deviations from department policy" — there, the failure to make
a complete list of the property found in the impounded car — "do not
render an inventory search unreasonable."
(630 F.3d at p. 616.) Here,
the deviation complained of was even more minor, for it concerned not the
taking of the inventory but the post-inventory storage of certain items. We thus conclude that none of these decisions
supports invalidation of the inventory search conducted in this case.
In sum, we
hold that the impoundment and associated inventory search of the vehicle Spani
was driving were reasonable and did not violate the Fourth Amendment. We also hold that because contraband
discovered during a lawful inventory search may be seized and used as evidence
in a criminal prosecution (Green,
the trial court correctly denied Spani's motion to suppress.
DISPOSITION
The order is affirmed.
IRION, J.
WE CONCUR:
McCONNELL, P. J.
HUFFMAN,
J.
name="_ftn1" title="">[1] An order granting probation is deemed a final judgment for
purposes of appeal. (Pen. Code,
§§ 1237, subd. (a), 1466, subd. (b)(1).)
name="_ftn2" title="">[2] To the extent we are required to review claims of pretext
de novo, we agree with the trial court's assessment of the evidence. (Cf. People
v. Valenzuela (1999) 74 Cal.App.4th 1202, 1208 [whether decision to stop
taxicab to conduct administrative inspection was pretextual was subject to de
novo review].)
