38 Mass. App. Ct. 526 | Mass. App. Ct. | 1995
Two police officers on patrol in an unmarked cruiser drove by the defendant’s car and the car of a person known to them parked at the roadside. The person whom the officers knew, and of whom they were suspicious for reasons not put in evidence, was walking toward the defendant’s car. The officers reversed direction to return to the scene and saw the defendant’s car pulling away “at a fairly good rate of speed.” They followed the defendant’s car in the cruiser and observed it drive through a stop sign at an intersection, slowing but not stopping, and turn into the parking
After the powder was tested and weighed, the defendant was indicted for trafficking in cocaine and was convicted. The appeal raises, as the principal issue, the judge’s denial of the defendant’s motion to suppress the cocaine.
The entry into the car was lawful. The case comes within the authority of such cases as Commonwealth v. Almeida, 373 Mass. 266, 270-273 (1977); Commonwealth v. Ferrara, 376 Mass. 502, 504-505 (1978); Commonwealth v. Sumerlin, 393 Mass. 127, 129-131 (1984), cert, denied, 469 U.S. 1193 (1985); and Commonwealth v. Robbins, 407 Mass. 147, 151-152 (1990). See also Commonwealth v. Silva, 366 Mass. 405-410 (1974). The officers had seen a traffic violation, which justified stopping the defendant’s car and asking to see the defendant’s driver’s license and automobile regis
Faced with this situation, the officer’s entry into the car was justified on either of two rationales. First, prior to allowing the defendant to reenter the car to obtain the registration, the officers could properly effect a Terry-type search of the areas of the car which would be readily accessible to the defendant on reentering. The purpose of the search would be protective only, analogous to a pat frisk of the defendant’s person for weapons. The reasonableness of a scan for weapons turns, we think, not so much on the finding that the defendant bent down and to the right before leaving the car,
Second, the officers could properly have entered the passenger compartment, including the glove compartment, to retrieve the registration themselves. In Michigan v. Long, 463 U.S. 1032 (1983), where the court approved the extension of Terry searches for weapons into the passenger compartment of a stopped car, Justice Brennan, dissenting, suggested that, rather than permitting a driver already outside the car to reenter for the purpose of obtaining the registration, an investigating officer, as a less intrusive alternative to a Terry search of the car, could determine from the driver where in the vehicle the registration was located and then enter the car for the limited purpose of getting it himself. Id. at 1065 n.7. Compare Cotton v. United States, 371 F.2d 385, 393 (9th Cir. 1967), United States v. Powers, 439 F.2d 373, 375 (4th Cir.), cert, denied, 402 U.S. 1011 (1971), and Commonwealth v. Navarro, 2 Mass. App. Ct. 214, 217-221 (1974), all decisions approving police entries into vehicles for the limited purpose of ascertaining vehicle ownership or place of origin through the vehicle identification number or the inspection sticker.
On either rationale the officer’s entry into the car was justified. When he observed bags of cocaine powder partially visible on the floor, the officer was justified in seizing them and in searching for additional contraband. See Commonwealth v. Skea, 18 Mass. App. Ct. 685, 688, 689-690 & n.8 (1984). The motion to suppress the cocaine was correctly denied.
Judgment affirmed.
The reason we do not give weight to this finding is that the defendant seems not to have realized that he was being pursued by the police until after he got out of the car. Therefore, the line of decisions that suggest that furtive movements in response to a stop or chase may give a police officer particular reason for concern, see Commonwealth v. Silva, 366 Mass, at 407; Commonwealth v. Moses, 408 Mass. 136, 138, 143 (1990); Commonwealth v. Tompert, 27 Mass. App. Ct. 804, 805, 809 (1989), may not be relevant.