Dorsey v. State

Thompson, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. James Allen Dorsey and Walker Gladden, Jr., the appellants, complain of a conviction for larceny in the Criminal Court of Baltimore before Judge Meyer M. Cardin sitting without a jury. At the oral argument it was conceded by appellants that the only issue involved was the legality of the search and seizure of the stolen merchandise. At 8:47 p.m. on April 27, 1966, Officer Edmund Bellack of the Baltimore City Police Department received a call to go to 1701 N. Appleton Street in Baltimore City.

Upon arrival, he received a report from the owner that the Neighborhood Cleaners had been broken into and a television set and a quantity of clothes, all valued at $700, had been stolen. At 12:30 a.m. the next morning, the officer received information from Elizabeth Crawley, who resided at 1704 N. Appleton Street, that she saw two men (whom she later identified as Gladden and Dorsey) carrying clothes in cellophane and paper bags and something resembling a suitcase into the first floor apartment of 1702 N. Appleton Street. On this information, Officer Bellack and other officers went to the apartment at 1702 to investigate the crime. Appellant Gladden admitted the officers into the apartment but refused their request for permission to search the premises.

After the officers observed a ticket from the Neighborhood Cleaners on the floor, they talked to Rona Jordan, who was also on the premises and who gave them oral permission to search the premises after stating that she paid the rent for the apartment out of her welfare check. Gladden told the officers he wanted to call a lawyer and was permitted to leave the apart ⁴² ment. The officers searched the apartment as well as the cellar, the latter being used in common by the two tenants in the apartment structure. A television set and a large quantity of clothing with the Neighborhood Cleaners’ tags attached were found in the cellar, together with the appellant Dorsey, who was hiding under the cellar steps.

They arrested Dorsey, seized the clothes and television set, after which Mrs. Jordan signed the written statement consenting to the search. Rona Jordan testified that the police asked her if they could search her house and she replied “yes.” However, she denied giving the police officers specific permission to search the cellar. She also stated that before she signed the written statement giving the police permission to search she was told that if she didn’t sign, they were going to take her to jail and take her children. She further indicated that she did not know Gladden or Dorsey were in the apartment until the morning the apartment was searched, and that the use of the basement comes with the rental of the apartment.

Gladden testified that while the apartment was not his permanent address, he lived there “off and on” and contributed toward the rent. Mrs. Crawley, the State’s principal identification witness, testified that she lived next door to appellant Gladden, saw him every day, and considered him a neighbor. She further testified that she saw Dorsey with Gladden at the apartment on two occasions. It is, of course, well settled that a search of premises can survive constitutional inhibition only upon a showing that the surrounding facts bring it within one of the exceptions to the rule that a search, to be reasonable, must rest upon a valid search warrant.

Stoner v. California, 376 U.S. 483. Thus, a search by permission of the person entitled to constitutional protection from an unreasonable search is lawful. Carter v. State, 236 Md. 450; Gross v. State, 235 Md. 429 ; Stewart v. State, 1 Md. App. 309 . Assuming that Mrs. Jordan did consent to the search of the apartment, the question remains as to whether her consent could bind either or both of the appellants, and whether the search and seizure of the incriminating evidence, as to them, was under the circumstances of this case a constitutional search.

On the record before us — meager though it be — we hold that ⁴³ Gladden was not only legitimately on the premises at the time the police undertook their search, but that, for purposes of his Fourth Amendment guarantee against unreasonable search and seizure, he was a joint occupant of the premises with Mrs. Jordan, having clear standing to object to a search without a warrant. See Jones v. United States, 362 U.S. 257 ; Belton v. State, 228 Md. 17 . In Nestor v. State, 243 Md.