People v. Sanson

FOX, Acting P. J.

Defendants

1

Sanson and Rodriguez were held to answer on the charge of violating section 11500 of the Health and Safety Code (possession of marijuana). Their motion to set aside the information under section 995, Penal Code, was granted. The People have appealed from the order.

At approximately 3 o’clock in the morning of June 1, 1957, Officer Gabe of the Los Angeles Police Department observed a 1947 Ford sedan being driven “very slowly” down Pacific Avenue from Avenue 48 in Venice. The officer “noted at the time that the car had no license plate illumination and that the taillight, instead of being the legal red, was a blue color.” He followed the ear for about five minutes and then stopped it. There were three young men in the front seat. Parra was the driver. When the officers turned on the red lights of the police car and pulled the other car over, Officer Gabe ‘ ‘ noticed

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the two passengers . . . [Sanson and Rodriguez] appeared to be hiding something under the front seat...” As the officers approached the car the driver got out. Officer Gabe opened the door on the passenger’s side and Sanson and Rodriguez got out.

The officer “looked under the seat to see what they had placed under there” and found a dirty paper bag directly under the place where normally a passenger would sit if there were only one passenger in the front seat. The bag contained marijuana.

In conversation with the police officers the defendants told the officers where they had purchased the marijuana.

It is the position of the defendants that the officers had no reasonable cause to search the car; that the seizure of the marijuana was therefore illegal and for that reason it was not admissible in evidence; consequently there was no basis on which to hold them to answer.

“ The real criterion as to the reasonableness of a search is whether or not there has been the commission of a public offense in the presence of a police officer, or whether, under the facts, the police officer has reasonable grounds to believe that the defendant may have committed a felony.”