This question came in from an officer in Indiana: would the single purpose container doctrine allow cops to search a vehicle’s hidden compartment? The answer starts with what a single purpose container actually is, and then works back to the compartment.
What is a single purpose container?
All right guys, welcome to another roadside chat. Today’s question is from an officer in Indiana: would the single purpose container doctrine allow cops to search a vehicle’s hidden compartment?
So the first thing we want to learn is, what is a single purpose container?
A single purpose container is this doctrine that basically says some containers, by their shape, by their manner under the circumstances, the way that they’re kept, what they’re packaged in, things on the outside are so telling of what the contents are that a reasonable officer would know that only contraband is inside. Okay, that’s a roundabout way. So in other words, a single purpose container is a container that announces its contents in a manner that only contraband is inside.
Why can’t you search a container on probable cause alone?
Why this is important. This is important because under the Fourth Amendment, in order to search a container you have to have usually probable cause plus search incident to arrest, probable cause plus motor vehicle, probable cause plus consent, probable cause plus exigency. In other words, there is no such thing as searching a container based off of probable cause alone. It doesn’t exist. It’s a unicorn.
So single purpose container doctrine basically saves some of these searches. It allows it, because the way that the Supreme Court looks at it is that a single purpose container would not have any privacy interest and so forth.
Let me give you an example of a single purpose container. A drug package, right, a brick of cocaine. It’s wrapped up in, you know, paper or duct tape and so forth. Can you see inside of it? No. But do you know that it’s packaged in a way that only contraband is inside? Yes. Therefore you don’t need any other reason to search it.
Is a cooler that smells like marijuana a single purpose container?
But don’t be fooled, because sometimes you’ll have probable cause that a container has contraband inside, but it’s not a single purpose container, because it could have something else.
So for example, there’s a case involving a cooler, and the cop smelled the marijuana emanating from the cooler, and the cop opened the cooler and found marijuana. But the problem is, under this situation the cooler was not near the guy. It wasn’t search incident to arrest. It wasn’t part of a motor vehicle. The problem is that there was no other reason to get into the cooler, because it was not a single purpose container. The cooler could have other things in it. Non-contraband. Baloney sandwich, Capri Suns. You get my point. Not just marijuana.
Can police search a car’s hidden compartment as a single purpose container?
All right, so now we get to the cop’s question: would the single purpose container doctrine allow cops to search a vehicle’s hidden compartment? In other words, could the hidden compartment be viewed as a single purpose container?
The answer is most likely not. I don’t have any cases on it, I haven’t seen it, but I don’t really see courts, or at least prosecutors, applying the single purpose container to hidden compartments of a vehicle. And here’s for good reason.
Why not just use the motor vehicle exception?
Frankly, you don’t need the single purpose container doctrine to save the day for these searches. Why? Because the cop is going to have probable cause anyway. And if you have probable cause plus motor vehicle, that is the motor vehicle exception. Why not just use that? Forget the whole more complicated argument about single purpose container.
So that’s really the answer here. We don’t need the single purpose container to even search the hidden compartment, because if you have probable cause, you have probable cause, and just use the motor vehicle exception.
I’m going to start working on the format of these videos. Just repeat the question, do a better job repeating the question like we do here, a little bit of a better reminder what the question is as we talk about it. And as we get more, I’ll even try to put some quotes in here from cases and so forth. Just realize I do the best job I can with the time I have, but we’re getting better, because you guys are giving me some great feedback about these. You’re loving them, I like making them.
All right, that’s all I got for you. Until next time, my friends, stay safe.
The short version
- A single purpose container is a container that announces its contents in a manner that only contraband is inside.
- There is no such thing as searching a container based off of probable cause alone. It doesn’t exist. It’s a unicorn.
- A brick of cocaine wrapped in paper or duct tape: can you see inside of it? No. But do you know that it’s packaged in a way that only contraband is inside? Yes.
- The cooler could have other things in it. Non-contraband. Baloney sandwich, Capri Suns. Not just marijuana.
- Could a hidden compartment be viewed as a single purpose container? Most likely not. I don’t have any cases on it, I haven’t seen it.
- Frankly, you don’t need the single purpose container doctrine to save the day for these searches. The cop is going to have probable cause anyway.
- If you have probable cause plus motor vehicle, that is the motor vehicle exception. Why not just use that?
Related from Blue to Gold
- Illinois Courts on Marijuana Odor and Probable Cause
- Colorado Courts on Cannabis, K-9s, and Car Searches
- Is Florida’s Plain Smell Doctrine Getting Vaporized?
This article is an edited transcript of Roadside Chat Ep. #131. It is legal training, not legal advice. Check your state law and your agency policy, because both can be more restrictive than the Fourth Amendment.
