State v. Stanley, 896 N.W.2d 669

Background

At ~1:00 a.m. during the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally, two officers approached a single-occupancy portable toilet after a report that a male and female entered it together.
Officers stood a short distance from the unit and overheard a normal-volume conversation and the rustling of a plastic bag; one officer (Varilek) believed, from training and experience, the sounds indicated a drug transaction.
Officers knocked, the door opened, Shuler exited, and Officer Strickland stayed with Stanley, who was seated and placed a plastic bag into the toilet waste receptacle when commanded to show her hands.
Strickland retrieved a clear plastic bag and a cut, red straw from the waste pile; powder on the straw and lab testing confirmed the bag contained cocaine. Both were arrested; Stanley refused to give a urine sample.
Pretrial rulings: refusal-to-test evidence admissible; officers could testify about the overheard conversation; defense was barred from introducing evidence that officers did not obtain a warrant for urine testing.
Jury convicted Stanley of possession of a controlled substance; court sentenced her to 5 years (fully suspended except 180 days jail and 5 years probation). Stanley appealed raising Fourth Amendment, evidentiary, confrontation, and prosecutorial-misconduct claims.

Issues

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Whether evidence seized from portable toilet should be suppressed (Fourth Amendment search/seizure)	Police had a particularized and objective basis to investigate based on overheard conversation and rustling; seizure lawful.	Stanley argued she had a reasonable expectation of privacy and officers lacked suspicion to conduct a warrantless search/stop.	Court held no reasonable expectation of privacy in sounds from a vented, public portable toilet; officers had reasonable suspicion to investigate and recover abandoned evidence; suppression denied.
Admissibility of officer testimony about Stanley's refusal to provide urine	State: refusal is admissible as consciousness-of-guilt evidence; McNeely does not bar using refusal as evidence.	Stanley: reliance on McNeely and related decisions to argue using refusal violates Fourth Amendment rights (and Instruction allowing jury to consider it was improper).	Court held admission was proper; asking for urine is not shown to be a Fourth Amendment search/seizure for this purpose and South Dakota precedent permits adverse inference from refusal.
Whether defense should have been allowed to present evidence officers did not obtain a warrant for urine	State: not relevant and would confuse jury into deciding a legal question.	Stanley: omission of warrant seeking is relevant under McNeely to show illegality.	Court affirmed exclusion as within discretion; McNeely argument rejected and probative value outweighed by risk of confusing jury.
Admissibility of Shuler’s statements (officer repeating overheard remarks) / Confrontation Clause	State: offered nonhearsay (not to prove truth but to explain basis for officers’ suspicion); not facially incriminating.	Stanley: statements are hearsay and, alternatively on appeal, violated Sixth Amendment confrontation right because Shuler did not testify.	Court held statements were not hearsay (not offered for truth) and not Bruton-type facially incriminating statements; Sixth Amendment claim was waived and, if considered, would fail.
Prosecutorial misconduct in closing (referencing court’s suppression ruling; comment that defendant could subpoena witnesses)	Stanley: prosecutor improperly referred to pretrial ruling and shifted burden to defendant to call witnesses.	State: comments responded to defense closing and were permissible; court promptly curtailed and instructed jury about argument limits.	Court found no reversible misconduct given context, the court’s bench intervention, and instructions to jury.
Cumulative error claim	N/A	N/A — argued that combined errors denied fair trial.	Rejected because individual error claims lacked merit.

Key Cases Cited

Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1 (establishes standards for brief investigative stops)
Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347 (subjective and objective expectations of privacy test)
Smith v. Maryland, 442 U.S. 735 (public exposure limits Fourth Amendment protection)
United States v. Jones, 565 U.S. 400 (Fourth Amendment trespass/history context)
California v. Greenwood, 486 U.S. 35 (no Fourth Amendment protection for trash exposed to public)
Arizona v. Hicks, 480 U.S. 321 (observation of plainly visible items is not a search)
Navarette v. California, 572 U.S. 393 (reasonable suspicion under totality of circumstances)
Missouri v. McNeely, 569 U.S. 141 (warrant requirement and exigent circumstances in blood-alcohol testing)
Bruton v. United States, 391 U.S. 123 (confrontation limits on admitting nontestifying codefendant confessions)
Richardson v. Marsh, 481 U.S. 200 (distinguishing facially incriminating statements from those becoming incriminating only in context)
Neville v. United States, 459 U.S. 553 (use of refusal to submit to testing as admissible evidence)