Brown v. State

Delaplaine, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. This appeal was taken by Albert Brown, of Baltimore, from his conviction by the Criminal Court of Baltimore on the charge of having lottery materials in his possession. Code 1951, art. 27, sec. 429. In April, 1954, several officers of the Southwestern District of the Police Department of Baltimore City had ²⁸⁴ under surveillance the two-story brick dwelling at 2623 Puget Street in the Cherry Hill section of the city south of the Patapsco River, as a place where lottery activities were probably being carried on.

After the police obtained information which led them to believe that a' lottery was being carried on in that house, Sergeant Serio obtained a search warrant commanding him, with the necessary and proper assistants, to enter and search the premises, and also to enter and search a 1952 Buick automobile, bearing Maryland license No. BG-21-05, owned by Silas Hopkins, Homewood Avenue, and to search all persons found in the premises and in the automobile, who are actively engaged in lottery activities, for lottery books and any other paraphernalia used in the operation of a lottery, and to seize the. same; and also to arrest two described colored men and a described colored woman and any other persons found in the premises and in the automobile who are actively engaged in lottery activities. On May 3, 1954, Officer Bushrod was detailed to watch the house. Seeing appellant get out of an automobile and. enter the house, he signaled to Sergeant Serio and Officers Gross and Lewinski, who immediately arrived in a police car just as appellant had emerged from the house and was walking toward the automobile parked- in front of the house. Appellant, seeing the police car, turned and ran.

The officers, dressed in plain clothes, jumped out of their car. Sergeant Serio and. Officers Gross and Bushrod started in pursuit of appellant, while. Officer Lewinski guarded the automobile in which a woman was sitting.

The three officers chased appellant south on Puget Street, firing one shot in the air, which, according to the officers, made appellant run faster. They saw him drop an envelope which contained lottery slips. They followed him across a lot in the rear of Puget Street, and caught him when he stumbled and fell on the railroad tracks. The officers brought appellant back to the- house at 2623 Puget Street.

Inside the house Sergeant Serio ²⁸⁵ showed him the search warrant. While appellant was sitting on a couch looking at the warrant, he threw three envelopes under the couch, but the officers detected him, and on opening the envelopes found that they contained lottery slips and money. The officers asked appellant whether there were any lottery slips in the automobile in front of the house. One of the officers testified that appellant said: “She’s got a brown bag between her legs.

The lottery in that bag belongs to me. Let her go. She is a married woman, and I don’t want to get her in any trouble.” Another officer testified that appellant said: “Yes, sir, I am responsible for this. This is all my lottery.

She is just out for the ride.” On entering the automobile, the officers found alongside the woman a bag containing 111 lottery slips, with 1,489 numbers showing 11 stations, and also $70.72 in cash. Appellant and Madeline Montgomery were jointly indicted, but the latter pleaded guilty. Appellant pleaded not guilty and asked for trial by jury. Upon the jury’s verdict of guilty on the fifth count of the indictment, the Court sentenced appellant to serve a term of nine months in the Maryland House of Correction and to pay a fine of $1,000: Appellant contended that the search of the automobile and the seizure of the bag of lottery slips were illegal, and therefore the trial judge should not have admitted the lottery slips in evidence.

His argument was based upon the Bouse Act, Code Supp., 1954, art. 35, sec. 5, which makes inadmissible in the trial of misdemeanors any evidence procured by any illegal search or seizure or any search and seizure prohibited by the Maryland Declaration of Rights. His complaints were (1) that the police did not have any warrant for-his arrest; and (2) that the search warrant authorized the officers to search a Buick, but not a Dodge. The common law