People v. Lopez CA4/3

Filed 1/22/26 P. v. Lopez CA4/3

NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN OFFICIAL REPORTS California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule 8.1115(b). This opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115.

IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

FOURTH APPELLATE DISTRICT

DIVISION THREE

THE PEOPLE,

Plaintiff and Respondent, G064646

v. (Super. Ct. No. 21WF1937)

KARINA JANETTE LOPEZ, OPINION

Defendant and Appellant.

Appeal from a judgment of the Superior Court of Orange County, Elizabeth G. Macias, Judge. Affirmed. Mytili G. Bala, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant. Rob Bonta, Attorney General, Lance E. Winters, Chief Assistant Attorney General, Charles C. Ragland, Assistant Attorney General, Christopher P. Beesley and Namita Patel, Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.

Karina Janette Lopez appeals from her convictions for drug and identity theft crimes, contending the trial court wrongly denied her motion to 1 suppress. (Pen. Code, § 1538.5.) We conclude the motion was correctly denied because (1) probable cause supported a search incident to arrest and (2) the result of that search warranted a vehicle search. We affirm. FACTS A loss prevention worker saw a man walk out of a Home Depot store in Huntington Beach with unpaid merchandise. When the worker identified himself, the man abandoned the merchandise and got into the front passenger seat of a white Chevy Colorado truck. The worker reported the truck’s license plate number to the police. A nearby police officer stopped a white Colorado with the same license plate number “just east” of the store. The front passenger matched the description of the man who took the items from Home Depot. There were two occupants in the back seat. In the truck’s uncovered bed, the officer saw packaged Home Depot merchandise. The worker arrived at the truck with another officer and identified the front passenger as the man he had confronted. The worker told the officers the merchandise in the truck bed was from another Home Depot store. The officers ordered the driver, Lopez, to exit the truck. Lopez claimed: “But sir, I gave somebody a ride.” A third police officer searched her, finding a bag appearing to contain methamphetamine in her left bra cup. The officers searched the truck. Inside of “a purse on the floorboard of the driver’s seat” were “two pipes . . . consistent with pipes used to smoke