Legal Question in Criminal Law in California

Re: Possesion for sale of marijuana

I want to correct something I said in my earlier response.

Your permission to search the car most likely did not give the police authority to search inside your passenger's purse. Her own actions may have justified the search, but my earlier answer that your permission was probably enough was mistaken.

This correction does not affect the rest of my answer because, as I explained, even if the search was illegal it violated only your passenger's rights and not yours. You can't assert her rights vicariously, so the evidence can be used against you regardless of whether the search was legal.

Re: Possesion for sale of marijuana

YOu need a lawyer to help you through this. If you don't call me, call someone. (310) 806-9237

Re: Possesion for sale of marijuana

As Mr. Iadevaia says, you need a lawyer. Fortunately, it sounds like you are in a very good position.

If the police really had no justification for stopping the car, then all the evidence they obtained -- either directly or indirectly -- as a result of the stop must be excluded from trial unless the prosecutor can prove that the evidence would inevitably have been discovered anyway. That is a winning argument, especially if the police actually admit that they had no valid reason to stop the car.

Having no reason to stop the car is one thing, but having a pretextual reason is another. If the police wanted to search the car for drugs but pulled you over for a traffic violation, then the stop is legal so long as you actually did commit the violation (or if the officers reasonably but mistakenly believed you did). If that is what happened then you are not entitled to have the evidence excluded.

The search of your passenger's handbag was probably legal, but I would need to know more facts before I could say for certain. Valid permission to search a car usually authorizes a search of any containers, etc., which are in the car. I believe a purse would fall within this rule, but her expectation of privacy re: her purse might lead a judge to the opposite conclusion.

Even if the police had no right to search the purse, though, the search violated only her rights and not yours. She can complain about the evidence found inside, but you can't.

The court does not have to accept your explanation for the presence of the marijuana and the scale. You may be able to prove your version of events later, but just saying you had a prescription -- or even showing the paper on which it was written -- is not enough to get the case dismissed now.

Nothing you have said supports your claim that the police used hearsay testimony against you, so my guess is that you miunderstand the concept. (Hearsay is difficult thing to understand, so don't feel bad about this.) I note, though, that testimony about what you told the officers and/or about what your doctor prescribed likely *would* be deemed hearsay and would not be admissible.