Maryland’s second highest court has ruled that police legally can search a passenger in a car – even if the passenger is not believed to be involved in any wrongdoing.
“It is the whole of the passenger compartment that is subject to search … regardless of whether [a passenger] has been placed under arrest,” Maryland Court of Special Appeals Judge Arrie Davis wrote in an opinion released Monday.
The decision stems from a Dec. 2, 2003, traffic stop made by Baltimore County police.
At about 2:45 p.m., an officer observed a gold Honda traveling down Dartford Road that had its front license plate placed on the dashboard within the vehicle instead of on the vehicle’sfront grille.
The officer stopped the vehicle for the minor traffic violation and, during a routine check, realized the vehicle’s driver, Lakisha Conyers, was operating the car on a suspended license.
The officer placed Conyers under arrest and asked the car¹s passenger, James Davis Purnell, to exit the vehicle.
The officer then searched Purnell’s coat, which was inside the car, and removed a bag containing 12 individualized yellow bags of crack cocaine and three bags of marijuana from the car.
Purnell objected to the search, calling it a violation of his constitutional rights.
But Baltimore County Circuit Judge Vicki Ballou-Watts ruled the search was admissible, causing Purnell to challenge that decision.
“The search in this case was not required for the purpose of officer safety, nor was it necessary to prevent evidence of the crime from being destroyed,” wrote Purnell¹s public defender Stacy McCormack.
The Court of Special Appeals said it acknowledged Purnell posed no threat to destroy evidence and was not under arrest.
However, since Conyers had been arrested, the incident gave the officers’ probable cause to search the entire vehicle, the judges ruled.
