COMMONWEALTH of Pennsylvania, Appellee, v. Angel SANCHEZ, Appellant. COMMONWEALTH of Pennsylvania, Appellee, v. J.J. BRICENO-RODRIGUEZ, Appellant. COMMONWEALTH of Pennsylvania, Appellee, v. Maria RIVERA, Appellant.
Supreme Court of Pennsylvania
Decided July 21, 1998.
Argued Jan. 30, 1997.
716 A.2d 1221
Emmanuel H. Dimitriou, Reading, for J.J. Briceno-Rodriguez.
Michael Dautrich, Reading, for Maria Rivera.
Mark C. Baldwin, Iva C. Dougherty, Reading, for Com.
Before FLAHERTY, C.J., and ZAPPALA, CAPPY, CASTILLE, NIGRO and NEWMAN, JJ.
CASTILLE, Justice.
In this case of first impression this Court is asked to determine whether Pennsylvania law or California law should be used to evaluate the propriety of a canine sniff search conducted in California which provided probable cause for a search warrant in Pennsylvania. For the following reasons, we affirm the order of the Superior Court and hold that the legality of the canine sniff conducted in California must be evaluated under California law.
The relevant facts are as follows: On August 26, 1993, an agent from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) was on assigned duty at a Federal Express location in Bakersfield, California investigating drug trafficking from the facility when he observed a man and woman pay $77 in cash in order to ship a package to Pennsylvania. The agent noted the license plate on the couple‘s automobile as they departed. The agent then inspected the package in question, which weighed thirty-seven pounds, and observed that it was addressed to Sr. Angel Sanchez at a specific address in Shillington, Pennsylvania. The return address was listed as Ceramics, Inc., with a local address and telephone number.
The ATF agent called directory assistance and learned that there was no listing for Ceramics, Inc. in the Bakersfield area. He further referenced several telephone directories and determined that the address given for Ceramics, Inc. did not exist. The agent then called the telephone number listed on the return slip. When what seemed to be a young Hispanic female answered the phone, the agent heard young children crying in the background, and hung up without speaking. The agent then ran a check of the license plate with the California Department of Motor Vehicles. The car was registered to one Maria Ramirez of Bakersfield, California.
Subsequently, the ATF agent called the Kern County Sheriff‘s Department and requested that an officer bring a drug detecting canine to the Federal Express office. The officer arrived shortly thereafter with his trained canine, which posi-
Appellant Briceno-Rodriguez accepted delivery of the package and signed for its receipt. Appellant Sanchez was the owner of the premises and the person to whom the package was addressed. Police found substantial evidence, including telephone bills, connecting appellant Rivera to the residence. Appellants were each charged with possession of a controlled substance, possession with intent to deliver a controlled substance, possession of drug paraphernalia, and conspiracy to possess a controlled substance. Appellants Sanchez and Ramirez were also charged with conspiracy to possess with the intent to deliver a controlled substance and conspiracy to possess drug paraphernalia.
Appellants filed requests for habeas corpus relief and motions to suppress, alleging violations of the Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution and
The Commonwealth certified that the suppression orders terminated the prosecution and appealed the trial court‘s order to the Superior Court. The cases were consolidated for appeal. The Superior Court, in a published opinion and order, reversed the trial court and remanded the matter for trial.1 The Superior Court found that the question of the propriety of the canine sniff was a question of substantive law that should be analyzed under California law, and concluded that the sniff of appellants’ package was legally conducted pursuant to California law. Petitioners filed a timely petition for allowance of appeal to this Court and allocatur was granted limited to the issue of whether Pennsylvania law or California law should apply to evaluate the propriety of the canine sniff.
Information secured through valid and legal means in a foreign jurisdiction may be used to establish probable cause for a search warrant in this Commonwealth. The result of a canine sniff constitutes admissible evidence in both California and Pennsylvania, and can be used to support a search warrant in Pennsylvania so long as the sniff was conducted legally. Thus, the issue that this Court must address is whether Pennsylvania or California law should be used to determine whether the canine sniff in the instant case was conducted through valid and legal means.2
In conflicts cases involving procedural matters, Pennsylvania will apply its own procedural laws when it is serving as the forum state. In cases where the substantive laws of Pennsylvania conflict with those of a sister state in the
Initially, we note that this case does not present a question of conflict between procedural laws as appellants assert. Appellants rely on the Superior Court‘s decision in Commonwealth v. Dennis, 421 Pa.Super. 600, 618 A.2d 972 (1992), alloc. denied, 535 Pa. 654, 634 A.2d 218 (1993) to support their position that the issue of whether a canine sniff is a search is a matter of procedural rather than substantive law; and that accordingly, this Court should apply Pennsylvania law to evaluate the propriety of the canine sniff. We disagree. A substantive right is defined as “a right to equal enjoyment of fundamental rights, privileges and immunities; distinguished from a procedural right.” Black‘s Law Dictionary 1429 (6th ed.1990). By contrast, procedural law is “that which prescribes the methods of enforcing rights or obtaining redress for their invasion; as distinguished from the substantive law which gives or defines the right.” Id. at 1203. The issue before this Court is a strict constitutional law question involving the fundamental right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures. Therefore, the issue is one that must be addressed under the principles of conflicts between substantive laws, which require this Court to evaluate which state has the most interest in the outcome.
Here, California possessed the greater interest in the validity of the canine sniff in question. The canine sniff took place in California and involved a package shipped by California residents. While this Commonwealth has an interest in
We find persuasive the reasoning of the Superior Court in Commonwealth v. Bennett, 245 Pa.Super. 457, 369 A.2d 493 (1976). In Bennett, the Superior Court held that evidence obtained during a drug investigation in New Jersey pursuant to a wiretap authorized by a New Jersey court on a telephone terminal located within New Jersey could be used to support a search warrant in Pennsylvania. The wiretap, which was authorized by New Jersey law, would have violated the Pennsylvania Wiretap Act. Nonetheless, the Superior Court determined that the information was competent evidence to support a Pennsylvania search warrant. The court stated:
It is, of course, obvious that the courts of this Commonwealth have absolutely no power to control the activities of a sister state or to punish conduct occurring within that sister state. The legislature of New Jersey has determined that wiretapping, in appropriate circumstances and for proper cause shown, will be permitted within its borders. Thus, the information involved in the appeal before us was obtained by the New Jersey Police under a legal authorization.... If the legislature of a sister state or foreign jurisdiction determines that wiretapping will be permitted within its borders, we will not, under the present laws of Pennsylvania, question that decision.
Thus we hold that if the courts of a sister state determine that a canine sniff is not a search in that state, the propriety of a sniff initiated by that state‘s officers and conducted within that state‘s borders must be evaluated under the laws of that state. Appellate courts in several other states have addressed this issue and reached similar results. In Frick v. Oklahoma, 634 P.2d 738 (Okla.Crim.App.1981), the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals determined that wiretap evidence legally obtained in Virginia through court authorization was admissible in an Oklahoma court even though wiretapping was unlawful in Oklahoma. The court reasoned that “[i]n the present case, then, the authorization for disclosure should have come from the Virginia court which authorized the drug investigation during which officers overheard the conversations involving the appellant. And that court did issue such authorization.” Id. 634 P.2d at 740. Similarly, the Supreme Court of Washington determined that Washington‘s Privacy Act did not apply to a defendant‘s statements taken by California police and recorded without defendant‘s knowledge or consent, as permitted by California law. Washington v. Brown, 132 Wash.2d 529, 940 P.2d 546 (1997), cert. denied, ___ U.S. ___, 118 S.Ct. 1192, 140 L.Ed.2d 322 (1998). The court allowed the statements to be admitted in a capital murder trial in Washington despite the fact that similar action in Washington might have violated the Privacy Act. The court reasoned that there was no state interest to be advanced by suppressing the recorded statements because no Washington state officer violated the Privacy Act and no one‘s statutory privacy interests were infringed. “The effect of suppression would have been to keep highly probative and lawfully obtained evidence from the jury.” Id. 940 P.2d at 577.
NIGRO, J., files a dissenting opinion in which FLAHERTY, C.J., joins.
NIGRO, Justice, dissenting.
Since I find that Pennsylvania, rather than California, law should apply to evaluate the legality of a California canine sniff leading to a prosecution in this Commonwealth, I must respectfully dissent. As noted by the Majority, while a canine sniff does not constitute a search under California law, this Court has found that a canine sniff is a search under the
In the first instance, I agree with the trial court that this case presents a question that is procedural in nature. The Majority, in rejecting the position that the instant matter is one of procedural law, cites Blacks Law Dictionary which defines procedural law as “that which prescribes the methods of enforcing rights or obtaining redress for their invasion.” In my view, this definition clearly encompasses the question here of whether evidence derived from a California canine sniff is admissible in a prosecution brought in the courts of this Commonwealth. As the Superior Court stated in Commonwealth v. Dennis:
It is a fundamental principal of the conflicts of laws that a court employs its own procedural rules. That is true in both civil and criminal cases, but especially in criminal cases as a sort of corollary to the local nature of substantive criminal law.... The law of evidence, including the admissibility of specifically offered evidence, has traditionally been characterized as procedural law.
Dennis, 421 Pa.Super. 600, 616, 618 A.2d 972, 980 (1992), appeal denied, 535 Pa. 654, 634 A.2d 218 (1993) (Pennsylvania Court would apply Pennsylvania law to determine if probable cause existed for a search warrant issued in New Jersey to search defendant‘s New Jersey home and thus, whether evidence derived from search was admissible at trial in Pennsylvania).
Under these principles, Pennsylvania law is clearly applicable.
The Majority, however, finds that the issue presented by this case is a matter of substantive law. As a result, the Majority borrows the conflict of law analysis applicable to substantive questions of civil law, which essentially evaluates which state has the greater interest in the outcome of a particular litigation, and applies it to the instant matter involving a conflict of laws in the criminal context. The Majority‘s approach, however, fails to consider this Court‘s decision in
It is a basic proposition of conflict of laws in criminal cases that ‘the question of jurisdiction and that of governing substantive law always receive the same answer. The governing law is always that of the forum state, if the forum court has jurisdiction.’
Id. at 578, 470 A.2d at 67 (quoting Leflar, Conflict of Laws: Choice of Law in Criminal Cases, 25 CASE WESTERN RES. L. REV. 44, 47 (1974)) (trial court committed no error in applying the law of the forum, Pennsylvania, in criminal prosecution). Since neither the Majority or the parties advance the argument that Pennsylvania lacks jurisdiction over the instant prosecution, and in light of the Majority‘s conclusion that the issue must be framed as one of substantive law, it is certainly troubling that the Majority fails to harmonize its rationale and result in this case with the proposition announced in Ohle. This Court‘s statement in Ohle, in my view, clearly lends support to the application of Pennsylvania law.1
Nonetheless, even under the conflict of law analysis employed by the Majority, I must also disagree with the Majority‘s sweeping conclusion that “Pennsylvania has no interest in a canine sniff search conducted in California‘s borders, even if the results are later used in the Pennsylvania courts.” (empha-
Certainly, the Commonwealth has a strong interest in ensuring that the authority of Pennsylvania law, especially that law which stands to safeguard individual rights, is not weakened or undermined in any way. Under the Pennsylvania Constitution as interpreted in Johnston, it is clear that had this dog sniff occurred in Pennsylvania, the evidence obtained as a result could not properly be introduced against Appel-
For these reasons, I would reverse the Order of the Superior Court applying California law to evaluate the propriety of the canine sniff and reinstate the Order of the trial court applying Pennsylvania law and suppressing the evidence.
FLAHERTY, C.J., joins this dissenting opinion.