Hunnicutt-Carter v. State

308 P.3d 847

Ralph Laverne HUNNICUTT–CARTER, Appellant (Defendant),

v.The STATE of Wyoming, Appellee (Plaintiff).

No. S–12–0271.

Supreme Court of Wyoming.

Aug. 29, 2013.

Representing Appellant: Diane Lozano, State Public Defender; Tina N. Olson, Chief Appellate Counsel; David E. Westling, Senior Assistant Appellate Counsel; Wyoming Public Defender Program. Argument by Mr. Westling.

Representing Appellee: Gregory A. Phillips, Wyoming Attorney General; David L. Delicath, Deputy Attorney General; Theodore R. Racines, Senior Assistant Attorney General; Prof. Darrell D. Jackson, Faculty Director; Emily N. Thomas, Student Director; and Courtney Gilbert, Student Intern, of the Prosecution Assistance Clinic. Argument by Ms. Gilbert.

Before KITE, C.J., and HILL, VOIGT, BURKE, and DAVIS, JJ.

DAVIS, Justice.

[¶ 1] Appellant Ralph Laverne Hunnicutt–Carter entered a conditional plea to a charge of felony possession of methamphetamine, thereby reserving the right to appeal the district court's denial of his motion to suppress the results of a vehicle inventory which yielded the methamphetamine. Appellant contends that impoundment of the vehicle was unnecessary under the circumstances, and that the search was conducted in bad faith. He also claims that police officers should be required to inquire into less intrusive means of safeguarding a vehicle before inventorying one in anticipation of impoundment.

[¶ 2] We hold that inventory of a vehicle's contents pending impoundment is constitutional when it is authorized by statute or when it is conducted pursuant to the general policy of a law enforcement agency. In this case, a state trooper had both a statutory basis to impound a vehicle whose driver had been arrested, and he was also required to inventory the vehicle's contents before impounding it by a general Wyoming Highway Patrol policy. We also find that the district court's ruling that the trooper acted in good faith is supported by the record and is not therefore clearly erroneous. Consequently, we affirm.

ISSUE

[¶ 3] Did the district court err in denying Appellant's motion to suppress the results of an inventory search preceding the planned impoundment of a vehicle but after its driver had been arrested?

FACTS

[¶ 4] Shortly after midnight on April 5, 2012, Highway Patrol Trooper Scott Templeton observed a Chevrolet Cavalier which appeared to be travelling above the posted speed limit on Highway 51 outside of Gillette, Wyoming. He confirmed by radar that the car was speeding at 74 miles per hour in a 55 mile per hour zone and made a traffic stop. Hunnicutt–Carter was alone in the vehicle. He had no driver's license or proof of insurance, but provided his vehicle registration, and told the officer his name and date of birth.

[¶ 5] Templeton left Hunnicut–Carter in his vehicle and contacted his dispatcher from his patrol car. The dispatcher advised him that Hunnicutt–Carter had an outstanding warrant from Campbell County.¹ Templeton confirmed the validity of the warrant with the dispatcher, arrested Hunnicutt–Carter, and placed him in the patrol car. According to the police report, only eleven minutes transpired between the initial stop and the arrest.

[¶ 6] Trooper Templeton planned to impound the vehicle as required by Highway Patrol policy, and pursuant to that policy he conducted what was intended to be a pre-impoundment inventory of the vehicle. He discovered a small plastic bag of a crystalline substance he suspected to be methamphetamine in the driver's console. He also found an unlocked strongbox which contained five more baggies of suspected methamphetamine, a syringe, a glass pipe, a digital scale, several cotton swabs, and a spoon in the front passenger seat area. A field test indicated that the baggies in fact contained crystal methamphetamine. This was later confirmed by laboratory testing.

[¶ 7] Hunnicutt–Carter's father arrived to take possession of the vehicle shortly after Trooper Templeton completed the inventory which revealed the drugs and paraphernalia, but before a tow truck arrived to take the vehicle to an impoundment yard. Hunnicutt–Carter had called his father to ask him to pick the vehicle up while Trooper Templeton was in his patrol car checking for warrants. Trooper Templeton released the vehicle to Appellant's father, and he drove it away. Appellant was then charged with possession of three or more grams of methamphetamine, a felony under Wyoming Statute § 35–7–1031(c)(ii).

[¶ 8] Appellant pled not guilty and filed a motion to suppress the methamphetamine as the product of an illegal search. He claimed that a warrantless vehicle search was unreasonable under the circumstances, and that an inventory was unnecessary because his father was available to take the vehicle.

[¶ 9] At the suppression hearing, the State called Trooper Templeton as its only witness. He testified that the Wyoming Highway Patrol (WHP) has a policy requiring impoundment of vehicles when no one is available to drive the vehicle after an arrest, and that the policy also requires troopers to inventory the contents of vehicles to be impounded before releasing them to a towing company or any other person or entity.

That policy provides that we will do an inventory of the vehicle, its contents, prep it for being towed.

...

The procedure is to go completely through the vehicle either by audio or write it down what's in the vehicle.

...

[W]e go through there [the vehicle], we talk about anything of value, any loose items, things like that that are in the vehicle that could be taken from the vehicle.

Trooper Templeton stated that the purpose of an inventory is to “hold everyone accountable when they take possession of the vehicle.”

[¶ 10] Trooper Templeton testified that no one was available to take the car until after the inventory. He indicated that he did not know that Appellant's father was on his way to pick up the car when he performed the inventory. He testified that he was simply complying with the WHP's established policy for inventorying vehicles when he discovered the methamphetamine and assorted paraphernalia.

[¶ 11] Cross-examination elicited that Trooper Templeton saw that Appellant was on his phone while his license was being checked through dispatch, and that he heard the phone ringing after the arrest. However, the trooper also testified that Hunnicutt–Carter did not tell him that his father was coming to get the car. He indicated that the arrest was based solely on the outstanding warrant, and that he did not arrest Appellant for speeding or other traffic violations. He testified that he conducted a routine inventory, and that it was not intended to discover evidence related to Appellant's outstanding warrant.

[¶ 12] Defense counsel asked, “Now, don't you have to impound the car before you have the right to do an inventory search?” Trooper Templeton responded “No, sir.” He clarified that once an arrest is made, the arrestee's vehicle is technically in his possession under the WHP inventory policy. At that point, he is required by the policy to conduct an inventory before he can release the vehicle to anyone but the driver or a passenger.

[¶ 13] Trooper Templeton admitted that the vehicle was not stolen, abandoned, or a hazard to other drivers. It was parked approximately six feet from the roadway, and it could have been moved further from traffic. He believed that the car might have been safe for the night, but reiterated that Highway Patrol policy does not permit troopers to leave cars on the side of the road when an arrest is made. He also admitted that the car was never impounded. The court questioned Trooper Templeton on the meaning of the word “impound,” and he clarified, “We did not impound the car, take it, have a tow truck come and take it and put it in our safe keep.”

[¶ 14] The district court held that Trooper Templeton conducted an inventory in good faith pursuant to a valid inventory policy, and denied the motion to suppress. Hunnicutt–Carter entered into a conditional plea agreement, pleading no contest to the felony possession charge, but reserving his right to appeal the denial of his motion to suppress. SeeW.R.Cr.P. 11(a)(2) (defendant may enter a conditional plea and appeal an adverse pretrial determination subject to certain conditions). The district court accepted Appellant's conditional plea and sentenced him to a term of three to five years of incarceration. This appeal was timely perfected.

DISCUSSION

[¶ 15] The Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution and Article 1, Section 4 of the Wyoming Constitution prohibit unreasonable searches and seizures. U.S. Const. amend. IV; Wyo. Const. art. 1 § 4; see, e.g., Sen v. State, 2013 WY 47, ¶ 26, 301 P.3d 106, 117 (Wyo.2013); Owens v. State, 2012 WY 14, ¶ 10, 269 P.3d 1093, 1096 (Wyo.2012); Hageman v. Goshen Cnty. Sch. Dist. No. 1, 2011 WY 91, ¶ 6, 256 P.3d 487, 492 (Wyo.2011). Under either provision, “searches and seizures made without a warrant or outside the judicial process are per se unreasonable unless they fall within one of the recognized exceptions.” Tucker v. State, 2009 WY 107, ¶ 22, 214 P.3d 236, 243 (Wyo.2009) (citing Callaway v. State, 954 P.2d 1365, 1369 (Wyo.1998)); see also Illinois v. McArthur, 531 U.S. 326, 330, 121 S.Ct. 946, 949, 148 L.Ed.2d 838 (2001) (“When faced with special law enforcement needs, diminished expectations of privacy, minimal intrusions, or the like, the Court has found that certain general, or individual, circumstances may render a warrantless search or seizure reasonable.”); Sen, ¶ 26, 301 P.3d at 117 (“Warrantless searches and seizures are presumptively unreasonable unless they are justified by probable cause and an established exception to the warrant requirement.”).

[¶ 16] Vehicle inventories are an exception to the general warrant requirement. Johnson v. State, 2006 WY 79, ¶ 13, 137 P.3d 903, 906 (Wyo.2006) (citing Roose v. State, 759 P.2d 478, 481 (Wyo.1988)). The inventory...