State v. Lester, Minn.S.Ct., 2/10/2016. Soon to be federal judge Justice Wright takes the court on an "error correcting" journey to slap down the court of appeals. The court of appeals had reversed the trial court's conclusion that the search of Mr. Lester's car for drugs was lawful under either the automobile exception or the search incident to arrest exception to the warrant requirement.
The cops got a tip that in roughly ten minutes a man whom the CRI knew as "J" would be at a certain location to deliver heroin. The tipster described this man as a black male, 28 to 30 years old, approximately five nine to five ten in height, medium build, and medium light complexion. Cops set up surveillance at the described location. They soon observed a man in the front passenger seat of a parked car who matched this description. The CRI came over, who identified this passenger as "J". Mr. Lester was behind the wheel. Eventually "J" got out of this car, went over to another car and got into it. That car drove off, as did Mr. Lester separately. The cops then stopped both cars and arrested everyone; they searched Mr. Lester's car and found suspected heroin. The court of appeals concluded that the cops didn't have probable cause to arrest Mr. Lester or to search his car, mostly because "J" - who was supposed to be delivering heroin - was no longer in Mr. Lester's car when the cops stopped it. Justice Wright thought that was just too narrow a view of the "totality of the circumstances":
Based on the totality of the circumstances, including the CRI’s tip, the officer’s observations of J. and Lester, and the officer’s training and experience, and with due weight given to reasonable police inferences drawn from experience and training, we hold that there was probable cause to believe that Lester’s car contained heroin.
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