CRIMINAL PROCEDURE I

Professor Moskovitz

Spring, 2004

MIDTERM EXAM

75 minutes, closed book

To: My law clerk

From: Lettie Lefti, Esq.

Dan Dork (D) has been charged with sale of marijuana and possession of an unlicensed handgun. I moved to suppress 50 marijuana cigarettes Officer Copp (C) found in a picnic basket and a gun he found in a car.

At the hearing on the motion to suppress, Copp testified as follows:

Question: Officer Copp, how did you happen to find the marijuana and gun?

Answer: I was driving in Golden Gate Park, when a lady flagged me down. She was very upset. She said that she just caught her teenaged daughter smoking marijuana. Her daughter told her that she bought it from a man sitting on a S.F. Giants blanket on the grass on the north side of Stow Lake, which is in the Park. I asked her for her name, but she said she didn’t want to get her daughter in trouble, and she walked away.

Question: What did you do next?

Answer: I drove to the north side of Stow Lake. I saw a guy sitting on an S.F. 49’ers blanket, with a straw picnic basket next to him. It was the defendant, Mr. Dork, though I had never seen him before. About 10 feet away was a car with the radio on and the front door open. Dork went over to the car, reached in, and changed the radio station. He said something to a woman walking by. She nodded, and they went over to his blanket. Dork reached into the basket and took something out and gave it to her, and she gave him some money. She walked over to a grove of trees. I followed her, and I saw her light up a joint of marijuana. I recognized the smell of the smoke.

Question: Then what?

Answer: I went back to find Dork. He was up the road about 20 feet from the car and blanket, talking to a man. I went over to him and told he was under arrest for selling marijuana. I locked him in my patrol car. Then I went back and opened the picnic basket, where I found 50 marijuana cigarettes. I then stuck my head in Dork’s car and looked around. On the back seat was a loaded handgun.

Will the court grant my motion?