People v. Superior Court

Opinion

DAVID, J. pro tem.

*

This is a petition for a writ of mandate to compel the Superior Court of Santa Clara County to set aside its order of November 19, 1969, which granted a motion to suppress evidence, made under Penal Code section 1538.5. We conclude that a peremptory writ should issue, as prayed, as no unconstitutional search and seizure was involved.

[638]

In People v. Mata (No. 47282 in the lower court), it appeared that Henry L. Chamness, police officer of San Jose, stopped Mata, after observing the Cadillac he was driving pass cars on the right, and cutting in. From the police car, stopped four feqt behind Mata’s after it was halted by the whistle and red light of the police car, Chamness got out and met Mata, who also stepped out of his vehicle. Chamness stated: “I asked him for his driver’s license; he didn’t have one. He gave me a draft card which showed him to be Fred Mata . . . then I went up to the right front of his car to look at the registration which he said was on the window.” There was a registration on the window. Then “I shined my light on to the front seat, and then I shined it on the floor. ... I observed a folded match book with the match book cover behind the matches leaving the matches exposed, and between the matches and the cover was a small, clear plastic bag containing a small quantity of purple pills. ... I believed them to be restricted dangerous drug upon seeing them.”

He went in the passenger door to get them. It was stipulated at the preliminary examination that Mr. Hider of the crime laboratory, an expert, would testify that the purple tablets contained LSD, an acid derivative.

The officer testified that although he was about to do so, he did not issue a traffic citation, but arrested Mata for violation of Flealth and Safety Code section 11910 (possession of LSD).

The trial court’s analysis of the situation was: “This is a matter where maybe the upper Court would like to be called upon for a further interpretation of the law. In this case, as the Court remembers the facts, the business of the officer was fully concluded. He went to the front of the automobile, and he saw the registration or bill of sale, or the document of title which is on the window, and then says he deliberately, and this was at night-time, commenced a search through the windows of the—or into the car by flashing the light first upon the seat and then down into the floor board where he did perceive what he finally picked up, and the .Court finds this was a search not prompted by any furtive actions or other matters apparent to the Officer. He had finished his business, and this being a traffic stop, the Court is of the opinion that it all should have stopped when he became satisfied with the documents on the window, and the Motion to Suppress is granted.”