California v. Carney

Petitioner
State of California
Respondent
Charles R. Carney
Petitioner's Claim
That the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution is not violated when a police officer conducts a warrantless search of a mobile home.
Chief Lawyer for Petitioner
Louis R. Hanoian
Chief Lawyer for Respondent
Thomas F. Homann
Justices for the Court
Harry A. Blackmun, Warren E. Burger (writing for the Court), Sandra Day O'Connor, Lewis F. Powell, Jr., William H. Rehnquist, Byron R. White
Justices Dissenting
William J. Brennan, Jr., Thurgood Marshall, John Paul Stevens
Place
Washington, D.C.
Date of Decision
13 May 1985
Decision
The warrantless search of a motor mobile home does not violate the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
Significance
The decision established that motor mobile homes may not receive the heightened protection from warrantless police searches to which stationary homes areentitled. Instead, motor mobile homes are more akin to automobiles, which police may search without a warrant and with probable cause.
Is It a Car or a Home?
The Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution protects persons from unreasonable searches and seizures by the government. The U.S. Supreme Court has heldthat the amendment generally requires police to obtain a search warrant froma magistrate before conducting a search, and that state governments, in addition to the federal government, must follow the amendment. There are many exceptions to the warrant requirement for police searches, and one of the issuesthat arises in the context of police searches is precisely what may be searched without a warrant.
The premises of a dwelling is a place that receives the most Fourth Amendmentprotection. Generally, law enforcement personnel must obtain a search warrant from a magistrate before conducting a search of a home. By contrast, a police officer need not obtain a search warrant before searching an automobile. This rule, created by courts shortly after the invention of the automobile andcommonly called the automobile exception, is in place because motorized vehicles are mobile and can be quickly moved from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, thwarting the enforcement of criminal laws. Prior to the U.S. Supreme Court'sdecision in California v. Carney, the question remained as to whethermobile dwellings, such as a boat, camper, or motor home, should be afforded the same protection as stationary homes, or whether they should be treated asautomobiles.
On 31 May 1979, in San Diego, California, Robert Williams, an agent for the Drug Enforcement Agency, observed Charles Carney escort a boy into a Dodge Mini Motor Home. The mobile motor home was parked in a parking lot, and Williamswas watching the motor home because he had received information that the home was being used as a site for exchanging sex for marijuana. After 75 minutes, Williams saw the boy leave the home. A short time later, DEA agents stoppedthe boy, who told them that he had received marijuana from Carney and that he had, in return, allowed Carney to engage in sexual contact with him.
The agents and the boy returned to the camper and the agents instructed the boy to knock on the door. Carney answered the door and then stepped outside. Without obtaining Carney's consent or a search warrant from a magistrate, an agent went inside Carney's mobile home. When the agent spotted marijuana, plastic baggies, and a weight scale, Carney was placed under arrest and charged with possession of marijuana for sale.
At a preliminary hearing in the case, Carney asked the court to suppress themarijuana evidence, arguing that it had been obtained in violation of his Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable searches. The search was illegal, Carney maintained, because the motor home was his dwelling and the law enforcement officers had failed to obtain a warrant or his permission. Carney also claimed that there were no exigent circumstances requiring quick action, an exceptional circumstance that allows law enforcement officers to conduct warrantless searches of homes. Carney's motion was denied by the magistrate. Just prior to trial, Carney renewed his request to the judge in Superior Court, butthe request was again denied. Carney proceeded to plead no contest, to the charges, and the superior court judge placed him on probation for three years.
Carney appealed the probation order to the California Court of Appeals, arguing that the trial judge should have declared the search illegal and excludedthe marijuana evidence. The appeals court disagreed with Carney, but the California Supreme Court agreed. California's highest court found the search to be illegal, because the primary use for mobile homes is "to provide the occupant with living quarters." Because it was Carney's home, the court declared, the officers should have obtained a warrant from a magistrate, or Carney's permission, before searching the mobile home.
It Is a Car
The state of California appealed the decision to the U.S. Supreme Court, which reversed the decision by a vote of 6-3. Chief Justice Burger, writing for the majority, noted at the outset the long-standing rule allowing warrantlesssearches of motorized vehicles. Citing U.S. Supreme Court precedent, Carroll v. United States (1925) Burger stated that a vehicle's "capacity to be`quickly moved'" was the reason for allowing warrantless searches of automobiles. Burger went on to observe that the mobility of the automobile was onlythe initial justification for the rule. Since the Carroll case, the Court also had decided in South Dakota v. Opperman (1976) that another reason for the rule was because persons have a lesser expectation of privacy in motorized vehicles. This result in Opperman, Burger explained, stemmed from long-standing, widely known government regulations of the automobile,"which necessarily lead to reduced expectations of privacy."
Applying these rules to Carney's case, the majority found that Carney's motorhome was "readily mobile," that the motor home had a valid license to operate on public roads, and that it was subject to government regulations. Furthermore, Carney's motor home "was so situated [in a parking lot] that an observer would conclude that it was being used not as a residence, but as a vehicle." These factors contributed to the Court's conclusion that the privacy afforded to a mobile home under the Fourth Amendment did not prohibit warrantless searches. Allowing police to conduct warrantless searches on mobile homes thatare being used for transportation "ensure[s] that law enforcement officialsare not unnecessarily hamstrung in their efforts to detect and prosecute criminal activity, and that the legitimate privacy interests of the public are protected." By determining first whether a mobile home is in fact mobile and whether it is being used for transportation, law enforcement personnel may fulfill the "essential purposes" of the automobile exception, "while assuring that the exception will acknowledge legitimate privacy interests."
As a final matter, the Court addressed the issue of whether the particular search conducted in Carney's case was reasonable. Citing the "fresh, direct, uncontradicted evidence" that Carney was dispensing marijuana from his motor home, Burger declared that the agents "had abundant probable cause to enter andsearch the vehicle . . . notwithstanding its possible use as a dwelling place."
It Is a Home
Justice Stevens, joined by Justices Brennan and Marshall, dissented. Stevensobserved that the Court had two recent, applicable precedents that tugged itin different directions: Payton v. New York (1980) and United States v. Ross (1982). In Payton, the Court decided that searches of the home generally must be accompanied by a search warrant. In Ross, theCourt affirmed the right of police to conduct warrantless searches of vehicles, provided the search was supported by probable cause. By opting to use theRoss case as its most relevant precedent, Stevens wrote, the Court had "abandoned the limits on the [automobile] exception imposed by prior cases."
Not only was the case wrongly decided, Stevens insisted, it was not worthy ofthe Court's review. Stevens decried the Court's increased interest in FourthAmendment cases. "Unless an order suppressing evidence is clearly correct,"Stevens lamented, "a petition for certiorari is likely to garner the four votes required for a grant of plenary review." In the face of an ever-expanding Court docket, the Court had decided to accept the case to establish "arule for searching motor homes that is to be followed by the entire Nation"when it could have let stand a single state high court decision.
Stevens opened the dissent's analysis by stating the general rule on search warrants: unless the circumstances fit an exception recognized by the Court, police must obtain a search warrant before conducting a search. On the discrete topic of the expectation of privacy in mobile motor homes, Stevens said that the owners of motor homes have "a substantial and legitimate expectation ofprivacy when they dwell within."
Having established an expectation of privacy, Stevens examined the facts of the case and concluded that the circumstances did not justify the failure of the police to secure a search warrant. The motor home was parked in a lot withits windows covered by curtains, and when the agents entered the motor homethe window blinds were drawn, making it unlikely that the occupant was preparing to drive it away. Moreover, it was parked in a parking lot just a few blocks away from a courthouse "where dozens of magistrates were available to entertain a warrant application." All of these factors, combined with a lack ofexigent circumstances, left Stevens wondering "why [the agents] eschewed thesafe harbor of a warrant."
Stevens rejected the argument that the bare mobility of a motorized vehicle excuses a warrantless search that is supported by probable cause. Citing United States v. Chadwick (1977), Stevens argued that the simple mobility of a vehicle is not sufficient justification for a warrantless search. In Chadwick, the Court held that the warrantless search of luggage was illegal. "If `inherent mobility' does not justify warrantless searches," Stevens declared, "it cannot rationally provide a sufficient justification for the search of a person's dwelling place."
Stevens closed the dissenting opinion by analyzing the characteristics of themobile home. The motor home "was designed to accommodate a breadth of ordinary living," and "the mode of construction should have indicated to the officers that it was a vehicle containing mobile living quarters." Stevens refusedto believe that law enforcement officers would not be able to determine whether a particular vehicle contained living quarters. "Although it may not be acastle," Stevens lectured,

a motor home is usually the functionalequivalent of a hotel room, a vacation and retirement home, or a hunting andfishing cabin. These places may be as spartan as a humble cottage when compared to a majestic mansion, but the highest and most legitimate expectations of privacy associated with these temporal abodes should command the respect ofthis Court.

Impact
From a legal perspective, the Carney case was remarkable for its decisiveness. The majority of the Court placed motor mobile homes in the same legal category as passenger vehicles, giving them minimal protection from warrantless searches. As a result of the holding, a law enforcement officer may, without a search warrant, enter and search a mobile home. However, the officer must have probable cause to believe that the home contains evidence of a crimeor a suspected criminal.
The Carney ruling put motor homes outside the protections offered by Payton v. New York. In that case, the Court held that police must havea warrant to enter a dwelling to make a routine felony arrest. Thus, if a person living in a camper or motor home is wanted for a felony, the police may enter the abode at will.
Related Cases

• Carroll v. United States, 267 U.S. 132 (1925).
  
• South Dakota v. Opperman, 428 U.S. 364 (1976).
  
• United States v. Chadwick, 433 U.S. 1 (1977).
  
• Payton v. New York, 445 U.S. 573 (1980).
  
• United States v. Ross, 456 U.S. 798 (1982).

Warrantless Searches
The issue of warrantless searches has most often come up in relation to searches of automobiles. The Supreme Court treats cars in a special category withregard to the Fourth Amendment, and has allowed law-enforcement officers greater latitude in searches of automobiles than for other types of personal property. Justifications for this view include the fact that a car can easily bemoved, and that the expectation of privacy is lower when one is in one's car.
Opponents of warrantless searches hold that such searches constitute an unduly lax regard of the Fourth Amendment, which may lead to increased police power to search other types of property--including one's home.
Is this as it should be? On the one hand, smoking marijuana while driving a vehicle is clearly more dangerous than when one is sitting at home. On the other hand, the right of police officers to stop a car for perceived violationsof the law does not in itself imply that the driver should expect a lesser degree of privacy. After all, police can also see evidence of a violation at one's home--e.g., watering one's grass on a day when such is restricted due todrought--and this does not give officers the right to search for evidence ofother violations.
Sources
West's Encyclopedia of American Law. St. Paul, MN: West Group, 1998.