CHARLES E. JENKINS, APPELLANT,
v.
STATE OF FLORIDA, APPELLEE
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Charles Jenkins was convicted of drug possession after police searched a purse he was carrying when arrested. The Florida appellate court affirmed the conviction, holding that the warrantless search was valid as a search incident to lawful arrest under established Fourth Amendment doctrine.
The search was valid as a search incident to lawful arrest. Although Jenkins was handcuffed downstairs when the purse was searched, the purse was carried by Jenkins at the time of apprehension, and the spatial separation between Jenkins and the searched item does not render the search unreasonable.
[1] A search incident to a lawful custodial arrest is a recognized exception to the warrant requirement.
[2] The fact of a lawful custodial arrest establishes the authority to search the arrestee.
Previewing 2 of 5 headnotes on this case. FLexlaw’s editorially structured points of law — every proposition, pinpointed — are reserved for members.
Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence“A custodial arrest of a suspect based on probable cause is a reasonable intrusion under the Fourth Amendment; that intrusion being lawful, a search incident to the arrest requires no additional justification. It is the fact of the lawful arrest which establishes the authority to search, and we hold that in the case of a lawful custodial arrest a full search of the person is not only an exception to the warrant requirement, but is also a "reasonable" search under that Amendment.”
The foundational principle from U.S. v. Robinson establishing that lawful arrest provides authority for warrantless searches.
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligencePolice responded to a report of a suspicious parked vehicle and followed footprints to a garage apartment. Officers heard noises, saw someone exit thr…
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LEHAN, Judge.
The defendant, Charles E. Jenkins, appeals from his conviction and sentence for violation of the Florida Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act, arguing that the trial court’s denial of his motion to suppress evidence was error. We affirm.
Jenkins was arrested when two police officers, Leedy and Horner, responded to a report of a suspicious parked vehicle on October 9,1981. The officers followed footprints from the vehicle to a garage apartment which appeared to be unoccupied. The officers heard noises from the second floor of the building. As they approached, someone exited the building through a window and ran. Officer Horner followed him.
Officer Leedy proceeded into the second floor apartment and found Jenkins standing in the bathroom area. Jenkins was holding a purse, which he dropped to the floor when ordered to do so by the officer. Jenkins was placed under arrest and handcuffed to a railing at the bottom of the stairs.
Officer Horner returned from pursuing the other suspect and entered the upstairs apartment. The testimony of the two officers differed as to whether Officer Horner went upstairs specifically to get the purse or whether he went up to secure the premises without knowing that Jenkins had dropped a purse. In any event, Officer Horner saw the purse lying on the floor, picked it up, and opened it. Inside the purse were six marijuana cigarettes and a clear plastic container with several pills in it, one of which was later determined to be lysergic acid diethylamide.
Jenkins was charged with possession of a controlled substance in violation of section 893.13, Florida Statutes. Jenkins moved to suppress any evidence derived from the search of the purse on the grounds that the search was warrantless, unreasonable, and illegal. The court denied the motion, and this appeal followed.
Of the generally recognized exceptions to the requirement that a search be conducted pursuant to a warrant, one is especially applicable to the facts of this case. That exception involves a search incident to a lawful arrest. Jenkins had been placed in custodial arrest at the time the purse was searched. No argument has been made that the arrest was not lawful. Thus, the issue is whether the search was a search incident to an arrest, under the foregoing exception, when the search took place inside the upstairs apartment after Jenkins had been arrested and handcuffed to the railing downstairs.
In U.S. v. Robinson, 414 U.S. 218, 94 S.Ct. 467, 38 L.Ed.2d 427 (1973) the Supreme Court upheld as a valid search the opening of a cigarette package taken from a defendant’s pocket during a search of his person after a lawful arrest. The Court stated:
A custodial arrest of a suspect based on probable cause is a reasonable intrusion under the Fourth Amendment; that intrusion being lawful, a search incident to the arrest requires no additional justification. It is the fact of the lawful arrest which establishes the authority to search, and we hold that in the case of a lawful custodial arrest a full search of the person is not only an exception to the warrant requirement, but is also a “reasonable” search under that Amendment.
414 U.S. at 235, 94 S.Ct. at 476.
Following the Robinson decision, , a war-rantless search of a briefcase carried by the suspect at the time of his arrest has been upheld as reasonable. U.S. v. Eatherton, 519 F. 2d 603 (1st Cir.1975); Savoie v. State, 422 So. 2d 308 (Fla.1982). In the instant case, the purse was carried by Jenkins at the time he was apprehended. The fact that the search of the purse occurred while Jenkins was handcuffed a short distance away does not make the search unreasonable.
The trial court properly denied Jenkins’ motion to suppress the evidence.
AFFIRMED.
GRIMES, A.C.J., and SCHEB, J., concur.
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Cited By
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State v. Earnest James, 526 So. 2d 188 (Fla. 3d DCA 1988)…d does not prevent immediate warrantless search of jacket); State v. Cole, 674 P. 2d 119 (Utah 1983) (police permitted to retrieve and search knapsack that defendant handed to friend immediately before defendant’s arrest). See also Jenkins v. State, 426 So. 2d 1305 (Fla. 2d DCA 1983); State v. Quinn, 565 S.W. 2d 665 (Mo.App.1978). “[I]f the police are already possessed of probable cause that a particular object in view is a fruit, instrumentality, or evidence, then it is unobjectionable that they proceed to in…
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State v. Barth, 434 So. 2d 19 (Fla. 2d DCA 1983)…applicable here. One concerns a search incident to a lawful arrest. State v. Valdes, 423 So. 2d 944 (Fla. 3d DCA 1982); State v. Padron, 425 So. 2d 644 (Fla. 3d DCA 1983); State v. Allen, 407 So. 2d 369 (Fla. 2d DCA 1981); see also Jenkins v. State, 426 So. 2d 1305 (Fla. 2d DCA 1983). The arrest in this case was lawful. The second exception concerns an inventory search conducted in accordance with standard police procedure. See State v. Forbes, 419 So. 2d 782 (Fla. 2d DCA 1982). The search in this case was pur…
Authorities Cited
- United States v. Robinson, 414 U.S. 218 (U.S. 1973)
- THE Florida BAR v. Schell, 422 So. 2d 308 (Fla. 1982)
- United States v. Eatherton, 519 F.2d 603 (1st Cir. 1975)