{"id":2728,"date":"2010-09-06T17:16:17","date_gmt":"2008-12-01T05:43:36","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"-0001-11-30T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2008-12-01T05:43:36","slug":"en-US","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/fourthamendment.com\/?p=2728","title":{"rendered":"PA: Regular guest did not have to be staying there when he was entering it that day regularly to get drugs to sell on the street"},"content":{"rendered":"

Defendant who “stayed the weekend” sometimes and helped out the occupant with her bills had standing to challenge a search of the premises. The fact he had not spent the night before was not determinative. It was apparent he could come and go at will. The warrantless entry, however, was based on exigent circumstances. Commonwealth v. Bostick<\/a>, 2008 PA Super 233, 958 A.2d 543 (2008):<\/p>\n

[*P18] It is apparent from the court’s remarks that it accepted the Commonwealth’s argument that Appellant had to establish that he was staying on the premises as an overnight guest at the time the incident occurred in order to establish a reasonable expectation of privacy. However, we can find no Pennsylvania case that supports this proposition. Instead, it appears that in several federal cases (e.g., Fields, Rhiger, and Pollard), the court did not find this factor, i.e., whether Appellant was an overnight guest at the time of the incident, to be dispositive of the issue of a reasonable expectation of privacy. 8 Even in Ferretti, where we determined that the defendant had no reasonable expectation of privacy, we found it relevant that the appellant had not “in the past or recently” stayed overnight on the premises, Ferretti, 577 A.2d at 1381, thereby giving rise to the implication that in Pennsylvania, staying overnight at the time of the search or arrests is not a dispositive factor in establishing a reasonable expectation of privacy. Rather, it is incumbent on the suppression court to consider the totality of the circumstances in each case when addressing the issue of a reasonable expectation of privacy in the searched premises.<\/p>\n

[*P19] We conclude that the totality of the circumstances of record in this case reveal that, although Appellant may not have been staying at the residence on the day of the arrests, he stayed overnight there on the weekends, contributed to the household bills (albeit a small amount), received mail there, ate meals there, and had laundry done there on occasion. Police surveillance on the day of the incident also gives rise to the inference that Appellant had free entry into the residence as he “had been going in and out of the property the entire time of the surveillance.” N.T. Hearing at 31. Certainly, Appellant was also involved in illegal activities conducted on the premises. See Govens, 632 A.2d at 1319. Under these circumstances, we conclude that Appellant was more than a “casual visitor” who had both a subjectively and objectively reasonable expectation of privacy in the searched premises.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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