People of Michigan v. Larry Gerald Mead
People of Michigan v. Larry Gerald Mead
Opinion
**208
The defendant was a passenger in a car when the police pulled it over, ordered him out, and searched his backpack. He thinks that search was unconstitutional. A straightforward application of well-settled Fourth Amendment jurisprudence-complicated only by a peremptory order of this court,
People v. LaBelle
,
We overrule LaBelle , conclude that the defendant had a legitimate expectation of privacy in his backpack, and hold that the warrantless search of the defendant's backpack was unreasonable because the driver lacked apparent common authority to consent to **209 the search. And we therefore reverse the opinion of the Court of Appeals, *560 vacate the trial court order denying the defendant's motion to suppress, and remand the case to the Jackson Circuit Court for further proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion.
I. FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY
In May 2014, Jackson Police Officer Richard Burkart pulled over Rachel Taylor for driving with an expired plate. As he approached the car to ask for Taylor's license and registration, Burkart observed the defendant, Larry Gerald Mead, in the passenger seat, clutching a black backpack on his lap.
Burkart asked for identification from both and determined through a database search that neither had an outstanding warrant. Although Taylor had admitted that she did not have a valid driver's license, Burkart decided that he would not arrest her but would try to get her permission to search the car. Burkart asked Taylor to step out of the car, out of the defendant's earshot. (Burkart later testified that he "typically" pulls the driver aside to obtain consent because "that way you can get an answer from them that's not influenced by the other people that may be in [the] car.") After a brief conversation, Burkart learned that Taylor had just met the defendant-they were traveling the same direction, and she had agreed to drop the defendant off on her way. Burkart obtained Taylor's consent to search her person and the vehicle.
Once Burkart had obtained Taylor's consent to search, he returned to the car and asked the defendant to get out. The defendant left his backpack on the passenger floorboard before stepping outside. 1 He permitted **210 Burkart to frisk him for narcotics and weapons. Burkart also asked the defendant how he knew Taylor. The defendant confirmed that they had met that night at a mutual friend's home and that Taylor had let him hitch a ride.
Burkart requested that the defendant step away from the vehicle, and Burkart then began to search the passenger side. He opened the defendant's backpack and inside found a digital scale, 5 prescription pills, 9.8 grams of marijuana, and 4.03 grams of methamphetamine. The defendant acknowledged the backpack was his and was arrested. He was charged as a fourth-offense habitual offender, MCL 769.12, with possession of methamphetamine, MCL 333.7403(2)(b)( i ).
Officer Burkart testified at the defendant's preliminary examination that Taylor did not give explicit consent to search the backpack (only the vehicle) and that he did not separately seek the defendant's consent to search the backpack. Burkart also testified that he believed (but did not confirm) that the backpack belonged to defendant because he was hugging it in his lap.
The defendant was bound over for trial. In the circuit court, he moved to suppress the evidence of methamphetamine in his backpack as the fruit of an illegal search. The trial court denied his motion, citing this Court's peremptory order in
People v. LaBelle
,
The defendant appealed. A unanimous panel of the Court of Appeals affirmed, holding that the trial court properly denied defendant's motion to suppress the evidence because our
LaBelle
order held that the defendant lacked standing to contest the search of the backpack after the driver
*561
consented to the search of
**211
the car.
People v. Mead
, unpublished per curiam opinion of the Court of Appeals, issued September 13, 2016 (Docket No. 327881),
On remand, the Court of Appeals again affirmed the defendant's conviction and sentence, holding that the defendant's case could not be distinguished from
LaBelle
, that
Rodriguez
's common-authority framework does not apply to third-party consent searches of containers in automobiles in Michigan, and that no other grounds justified the search.
People v. Mead (On Remand)
,
(1) whether Illinois v. Rodriguez ,497 U.S. 177 , 181, 183-189,110 S.Ct. 2793 ,111 L.Ed.2d 148 (1990), should control the resolution of the question whether the police officer had lawful consent to search the backpack found in the vehicle; (2) whether the record demonstrates that the officer reasonably believed that the driver had common authority over the backpack in order for the driver's consent to justify the search; and (3) whether there are any other grounds upon which the search may be justified **212 or the evidence may be deemed admissible. [ People v. Mead ,501 Mich. 1029 , 1030,908 N.W.2d 546 (2018).]
II. ANALYSIS
To resolve this case, we must determine whether the challenged search infringed an interest the Fourth Amendment was designed to protect, and if so, whether the search complied with the Fourth Amendment. But we cannot address those questions without first ironing out a wrinkle in our jurisprudence-our peremptory order in
People v. LaBelle
. In
LaBelle
, we held that passengers categorically lack "standing" to challenge a search of the vehicle in which they were traveling. We also held that the search of LaBelle's (the passenger's) backpack was valid because the officer had authority to search the passenger compartment (based on either the driver's consent or, in the alternative, as a search incident to arrest) and "[a]uthority to search the entire passenger compartment of the vehicle includes any unlocked containers located therein, including the backpack in this case."
LaBelle
,
A. "STANDING"
The Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution-like Article 1, § 11 of the 1963 Michigan Constitution, whose protections have been construed as coextensive with its federal counterpart, see
*562
People v. Slaughter
,
In the usual case, a passenger will not have a legitimate expectation of privacy in someone else's car. As
Rakas
explained, "a passenger
qua
passenger simply would not normally have a legitimate expectation of privacy" in areas like the glove compartment or trunk.
Rakas
,
**214 (emphasis added). In short, the usual case is not every case; normally does not mean never.
Thus, we overrule
LaBelle
's holding that "[b]ecause the stop of the vehicle was legal, the defendant, a passenger, lacked standing to challenge the subsequent search of the vehicle."
LaBelle
,
Applying that standard here, we conclude that the defendant had a legitimate expectation of privacy in his backpack. To begin with, this case differs from
Rakas
in one important way: the defendant challenges the search of a personal effect-his backpack. The Fourth Amendment specifically guarantees "[t]he right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and
effects
...." U.S. Const., Am. IV (emphasis added). And the record establishes that the defendant asserted a clear possessory interest in his backpack by clutching it in his lap. Burkart saw the defendant with "a black backpack sitting in his lap that he kind of had his arms around," and Burkart believed that the backpack belonged to the defendant because of the way the defendant was holding it. "[O]ne who owns or lawfully
*563
possesses or controls property will in all likelihood have a legitimate expectation of privacy by virtue of [the] right to exclude."
Rakas
,
Thus, although the defendant had no (and claimed no) legitimate expectation of privacy in the interior of Taylor's vehicle, he had a legitimate expectation of privacy in his backpack that society is willing to recognize as reasonable. We reverse the Court of Appeals; the defendant may challenge the search of his backpack on Fourth Amendment grounds.
B. CONSENT
Because the search of the defendant's backpack "infringed an interest of the defendant which the Fourth Amendment was designed to protect,"
Rakas
,
**216
There are three ways a court may find that a consent search was unreasonable: consent wasn't voluntary, the consent-giver lacked authority, or the scope of the search exceeded the consent. It is the prosecution's burden to prove that consent was "freely and voluntarily given."
Bumper v. North Carolina
,
Taylor's consent to search the car was voluntary. Only the latter two issues are in dispute: whether an objectively reasonable officer would conclude that Taylor had apparent common authority over the defendant's backpack, and whether the defendant's backpack was within the scope of her consent to search the car.
**217
An officer must obtain consent to search from someone who has the authority to give it. Generally, that means either the property's owner or a third party who shares common authority over the property. In
Rodriguez
, the United States Supreme Court recognized one more source of consent-a third party with
apparent
common authority. The defendant in that case severely assaulted his girlfriend, Gail Fischer. The defendant and Fischer had lived together in an apartment. But Fischer had moved out almost a month before the assault, taking her clothing with her but leaving behind some furniture and household effects. Fischer led the police to the defendant's apartment, unlocked the door with her key, and gave the police permission to enter. The police arrested the defendant after observing drug paraphernalia and containers of cocaine in plain view.
Rodriguez
,
The Court agreed with Rodriguez that the prosecution could not establish that Fischer had common authority over the premises. But it went on to hold that the search still could have been reasonable if Fischer appeared to have common authority-if the officers reasonably believed under the circumstances that Fischer had the authority to permit them to enter the defendant's apartment. Rodriguez , drawing on other Fourth Amendment jurisprudence, announced the following standard:
As with other factual determinations bearing upon search and seizure, determination of consent to enter must "be judged against an objective standard: would the facts available to the officer at the moment ... 'warrant a man of reasonable caution in the belief' " that the consenting party had authority over the premises? Terry v. Ohio ,392 U.S. 1 , 21-22,88 S.Ct. 1868 , 1880,20 L.Ed.2d 889 (1968).
**218 If not, then warrantless entry without further inquiry is unlawful unless authority actually exists. But if so, the search is valid. [ Rodriguez ,497 U.S. at 188-189 ,110 S.Ct. 2793 .]
Rodriguez is just one more application of the touchstone principle that governs all search and seizure questions-reasonableness.
On this point, we again break with
LaBelle
. There, we held that the search of the backpack was valid because the officer had the authority to search the car (either based on the driver's consent or as a search incident to arrest) and "[a]uthority to search the entire passenger compartment of the vehicle includes any unlocked containers located therein, including the backpack in this case."
LaBelle
,
But our order was not a model of clarity. So it is understandable that the trial court applied this rule to the consent search here. In any event, our
LaBelle
holding is now a dead letter in both contexts:
Gant
supplanted
Belton
for searches incident to arrest. And if we intended to graft the
Belton
standard onto consent
**219
searches, we overrule it. We instead reaffirm that an officer must obtain consent from someone with the actual or apparent authority to give it,
Rodriguez
,
With these principles understood, we turn to the search here. An objectively reasonable police officer would not have believed that Taylor had actual or apparent authority over defendant's backpack. Officer Burkart testified that he believed the backpack belonged to the defendant. No evidence suggested that Taylor had mutual use of the backpack. A backpack is used to transport personal items, which suggests individual ownership rather than common ownership. See
Utah v. Harding
,
Given this brief relationship, a reasonable officer could not conclude that Taylor had mutual use of the defendant's backpack. Taylor was like a rideshare driver who has only short-term contact with passengers-an objectively reasonable officer would not believe (absent unusual circumstances) that an Uber driver could consent to the search of his passenger's purse, for example. And since Taylor didn't have the apparent authority to consent to the search of the backpack, the scope of her consent is irrelevant. By definition, the scope of a person's consent cannot exceed her apparent authority to give that consent. See
**220
Rodriguez
,
Because Taylor did not have apparent common authority over the backpack, the search of the backpack was not based on valid consent and is per se unreasonable unless another exception to the warrant requirement applies. Officer Burkart conceded that he did not have probable cause to search or reasonable suspicion that the defendant or Taylor was armed. And we agree with the Court of Appeals that none of the other exceptions to the warrant requirement has been satisfied. We therefore hold that the warrantless search of the defendant's backpack was unreasonable and violated his Fourth Amendment rights.
III. CONCLUSION
For these reasons, we overrule
*566
People v. LaBelle
,
Markman, Zahra, Viviano, Bernstein, and Clement, JJ., concurred with McCormack, C.J.
Cavanagh, J., did not participate in the disposition of this case because the Court considered it before she assumed office.
The defendant claimed that Burkart ordered him to leave the backpack in the car. Burkart did not recall doing so.
Our
LaBelle
order referred to "standing." Although use of the term persists in search and seizure contests,
Rakas
"dispens[ed] with the rubric of standing" in the Fourth Amendment context.
Rakas
,
Analyzed in these terms, the question is whether the challenged search or seizure violated the Fourth Amendment rights of a criminal defendant who seeks to exclude the evidence obtained during it. That inquiry in turn requires a determination of whether the disputed search and seizure has infringed an interest of the defendant which the Fourth Amendment was designed to protect. [ Id . ]
Put another way, rather than framing it as a standing issue, the question is whether the defendant has stated a substantive Fourth Amendment claim on which relief may be granted.
We want to be precise in describing how the occurrence of the search in an automobile affects the analysis. That the search took place in a car is one fact that may inform whether, based on the totality of the circumstances, a defendant had a legitimate expectation of privacy in the place searched. The law recognizes that expectations of privacy are diminished in an automobile when compared, for example, to a home.
Byrd
, 584 U.S. at ----,
Reference
- Full Case Name
- PEOPLE of the State of Michigan, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Larry Gerald MEAD, Defendant-Appellant.
- Cited By
- 32 cases
- Status
- Published