Georgia v. Randolph: What to Do With a Yes from One Byt Not from Two? - Nathan A. Wood

• Jurisdiction: United States,Federal
• Publication year: 2007
• Citation: Vol. 58 No. 4

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Georgia v. Randolph: What to do With a Yes from One but not from Two?

In Georgia v. Randolph,¹ the United States Supreme Court held that when an officer asks two physically present occupants of the same shared residence for permission to search, that search is unreasonable under the Fourth Amendment² to the United States Constitution when one occupant denies permission to search, though the other consents.³ In so holding, the Court created a new standard in which "widely held social expectations" dictate whether it is reasonable to assume an occupant has the authority to consent to a search.⁴

I. Factual Background

Scott and Janet Randolph just could not get along. On the morning of July 6, 2001, Janet Randolph called the police and complained that her husband had taken their son away. When the police arrived on the scene, she also complained that her husband's cocaine habit was causing them financial troubles. When Scott Randolph returned shortly thereafter, he had a different story. He told the police that he and Janet had separated a few weeks prior to this incident and that she had taken their son to Canada for more than a month. He further explained that he only took their son to a neighbor's house for fear that she would take him out of the country again. He also denied using cocaine and accused Janet of drug abuse.⁵

One of the officers then accompanied Janet Randolph to retrieve the child, and upon their return, she again complained that her husband was abusing drugs. However, this time, she mentioned that there was evidence of drug-use in the house. At this point, the officer asked Scott Randolph if he could search the house. Scott Randolph plainly refused. The officer then asked Janet Randolph for permission to search, and she readily consented.⁶

Janet Randolph then led the police upstairs, and while searching in Scott Randolph's bedroom, the officer noticed a section of a drinking straw with a powdery residue on it. Suspecting the residue was cocaine, the officer went to his car to get an evidence bag and to call the district attorney's office. When the officer called, the district attorney said to stop the search and get a warrant. The officer then returned to the house, at which time Janet Randolph withdrew her consent to the search. At that point, the police took both the straw and the Randolphs to the police station. Later, the police obtained a warrant and returned to the house where they found further evidence of drug-use. Scott Randolph was subsequently indicted for possession of cocaine.⁷

Randolph moved to suppress the evidence, arguing that in light of his express refusal, his wife's consent could not authorize the warrantless search of his house.⁸ The trial court denied the motion, finding that Janet Randolph had "common authority" to allow the search.⁹ On appeal, the Georgia Court of Appeals reversed, and the Georgia Supreme Court sustained the reversal.¹⁰ The United States Supreme Court "granted certiorari to resolve a split of authority on whether one occupant may give law enforcement effective consent to search shared premises, as against a co-tenant who is present and states a refusal to permit the search."¹¹

II. Legal Background

A. Overview

One of the fundamental protections afforded by the United States Constitution, the Fourth Amendment safeguards "[t]he right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures."¹² In interpreting the Fourth Amendment, the Supreme Court has determined that as a general rule, a warrantless search of a person's home carries the presumption of unreasonableness.¹³ There are, however, a few "jealously and carefully drawn" exceptions to this rule.¹⁴ One such exception is that police may search a suspect's house if they receive voluntary consent from either the suspect himself¹⁵ or, in his absence, a third-party occupant who has common authority over the residence.¹⁶ The validity of these third-party consents has been the subject of controversy among legal commentators and lower courts, but it has not been extensively analyzed by the Supreme Court.¹⁷ Prior to the case at bar, the Supreme Court had fleshed out only a modest amount of analysis on the subject in a handful of cases.¹⁸

B. Early Cases: An Absence of Judicial Analysis on Third-Party Consent

Prior to the 1960s, the Supreme Court heard very few cases involving a third-party's consent to a warrantless search, and in these cases, it only inferentially broached the subject without much analysis, if any.¹⁹ For example, in Weeks v. United States,²⁰ the Court seemed to imply that a warrantless search could not be made reasonable by consent from a neighbor or a boarder.²¹ In Weeks the police went to search a defen- dant's home and were told by a neighbor where the key was. Finding the key, the police entered, searched the defendant's home, and found evidence against him. Later that same day, the police returned to search for more evidence against the defendant and were admitted by a boarder. In both searches, the police entered without a warrant.²² The Court held that the searches violated the Constitution, but in so holding, the Court did not mention the consent given by the neighbor or the boarder.²³ It seems obvious that neither a neighbor nor a boarder would have authority to consent to the search of another person's house, and perhaps that is why the Court did not address these third-party consents in its analysis. Consequently, it can only be assumed that the Court determined that neither the neighbor nor the boarder had authority to consent to the searches.

In Amos v. United States,²⁴ the Court again skirted the issue of whether and in what circumstances a third party can give valid consent to a search.²⁵ In Amos two deputy tax-collectors went to the defendant's house to search for evidence of untaxed whiskey sales. When the collectors arrived, they met the defendant's wife at the door and told her they had come to search for evidence. She then opened the door for the collectors and allowed them to search. Neither of the collectors had a warrant at the time of the search.²⁶ Holding the search to be invalid on other grounds, the Court reserved the question of whether the wife could consent to a search that would be valid against her husband.²⁷ In fact, the Supreme Court would not examine the issue of third-party consent with any real scrutiny for another forty years.²⁸

C. The Beginnings of a Third-Party Consent Analysis

The Supreme Court first shed some light on its views of third-party consent in the 1961 case of Chapman v. United States.²⁹ In Chapman police responded to a call from a landlord who smelled an "'odor of mash'" (a smell associated with distilling alcohol) emanating from the house he was renting to the defendant.³⁰ The police and the landlord knocked on the door and heard no response. Subsequently, at the direction of the landlord, the police entered through an unlocked window and found evidence of an illegal distillery in the house. The police had no warrant at the time of the search.³¹ Arguing that the search was valid, the Government contended that property law granted the landlord the right to bring police officers and enter the house in order to "'view waste.'"³² In response, the Court held that the search was unreasonable, stating that "subtle distinctions" in property law should not be the sole controlling force in Fourth Amendment analysis.³³ The landlord, therefore, could not give a valid consent to search his tenant's home without some further consent from the tenant himself.³⁴ While "subtle distinctions" in property law were not dispositive in this case, it seems the distinction between a landlord-tenant relationship and a co-occupant relationship determined whether the consent was valid. Essentially, this holding reveals that property law does not control but may influence whether or not a third-party validly consented to a search.

Three years after Chapman was decided, in Stoner v. California³⁵ the Supreme Court held that consent from a hotel manager was not sufficient to allow a search of a hotel guest's room.³⁶ In Stoner the police were searching for the defendant on the suspicion that he had robbed a food market. Following a lead but without a warrant, they approached the night clerk of a hotel and asked if Joey L. Stoner was staying there. The clerk answered yes but said that he was not in at the time. Then, the police explained to the clerk why they were looking for Stoner and asked for permission to search his room. The clerk courteously obliged and unlocked Stoner's door for the police to search. Upon thoroughly searching the room, they found evidence of the food market robbery, which was used against Stoner at trial.³⁷ The Court determined that this search was unreasonable, holding that the clerk had no authority to consent to a search of the defendant's room because the clerk was not an agent that could waive the defendant's constitutional right against warrantless searches for him.³⁸

D. Third-Party Consent Examined Fully

In the 1971 case of Coolidge v. New Hampshire,³⁹ the Supreme Court briefly examined the validity of a third-party's consent and touched on policy supporting the conclusion that such consent is valid.⁴⁰ In Coolidge the police suspected the defendant of murdering a young girl. In response to a tip from a neighbor that Coolidge had been out on the night of the girl's murder, the police visited him at his house. They questioned him and asked if he owned any guns, and in what appeared to be a show of complete cooperation, he brought out three guns. The next day, he went with the police to take a lie detector test, and while he was there, other police officers visited the Coolidge's household. When they reached the door, Mrs. Coolidge answered, and they asked her if her husband owned any guns; they were not the officers who first interviewed Coolidge, and they did not...