State v. Hite, 338 P.3d 803

Defendant was arrested on an outstanding warrant; police inventoryed his backpack per policy and seized items linked to identity theft and forgery.
The backpack contained many items belonging to others, including forged documents, checks, IDs, and a password-protected computer with payee and forged-check data.
Defendant was indicted on multiple identity-theft, forgery, and related weapon/tools offenses; some charges stemmed from items found in the backpack.
Police inventories were performed under two policies: Eugene Police Department General Order 601.4 and Lane County Sheriff’s Office Order 02.02.05(D)(5), governing storage and inventory, including what to look for.
Defendant moved to suppress the backpack evidence, arguing the inventories unlawfully opened closed containers beyond a reasonable scope; the trial court denied the motion.
The Oregon Court of Appeals held the LCSO policy, as applied, was overbroad because it required opening closed containers to search for items (e.g., food, alcohol) not reasonably tied to inventory purposes, so the backpack inventory violated Article I, section 9.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Whether the inventory policy is constitutionally overbroad	State argues policy valid when applied to jail storage rules	Defendant contends policy requires opening all closed containers, extending beyond valuables	Policy overbroad; inventory violated Article I, §9
Whether opening closed containers to inventory is implicitly required by dual policies	State asserts compliance with both EPD and LCSO policies necessitates opening containers	Defendant argues implicit requirement cannot be so broad	Open-container requirement too broad; not justified by purposes of inventory
Whether the evidence should be suppressed or saved by an alternative search theory	State seeks affirmance under search-incident-to-arrest theory	Record insufficient to support alternative theory; potential different record if raised below	Cannot affirm on alternative theory; suppression of backpack evidence warranted
Whether convictions tied to backpack evidence must be reversed	State contends backpack evidence supported identity-theft convictions	Backpack evidence tainted key identity-theft/forgery convictions	Identity-theft/forgery convictions reversed to the extent based on backpack evidence

State v. Ridderbush, 71 Or App 418 (1985) (inventory policy cannot authorize opening all closed containers)
State v. Taylor, 250 Or App 90 (2012) (wallets/purses exception; implicit open-any-container requirement for valuables)
State v. Mundt/Fincher, 98 Or App 407 (1989) (inventory of specified valuables implicitly requires opening containers)
State v. Williams, 227 Or App 453 (2009) (overbreadth discussion of inventory policies that require opening all containers)
State v. Cordova, 250 Or App 397 (2012) (invalidates policy requiring all closed containers to be opened for valuables)
State v. Weber, 184 Or App 415 (2002) (scope must be reasonable in relation to inventory purpose)
State v. Cherry, 262 Or App 612 (2014) (overbreadth of inventory policy that authorizes opening broad range of containers)
State v. Owens, 302 Or 196 (1986) (searches of closed containers on arrestee may be allowed if evidence could be concealed)
State v. Stock, 209 Or App 7 (2006) (reasonableness in time/place/scope for searches incident to arrest)
State v. Newport, 204 Or App 489 (2006) (search incident to arrest considerations for evidence relating to crime)
State v. Atkinson, 298 Or 1 (1984) (inventory must be conducted under properly authorized program with no officer discretion)
State v. Connally, 339 Or 583 (2005) (article I, §9 exceptions to warrantless searches; administrative inventories)