Who has the authority to refuse or consent to a vehicle search?

[Gfactor]

@Contrapuntal

Gfactor,

Why does the meter man have to come inside? Meters are on the outside so that no one has to be home for the meter to be read. Most meters today are wireless and can be read from the street.

Does lying to the cops make one an apparent authority? Would that search be upheld?

How do either of these scenarios jibe with Little Nemos’?

@Little Nemo

like the police showing up at my house when I’m not home and asking the meter man if they can search it

**pravnik **said:

The meter man actually can consent to the search of your home, if the officers reasonably believe that he’s a person with authority to consent to the search.

(Emphasis added).

I was trying to come up with a scenario that would support a reasonable belief. Obviously, the meter man can’t be outside in his uniform reading the meter and convincingly claim that he has authority to consent to a search. What’s needed is meter man pretending to be someone else or having other indicia of authority such that no further inquiry is required (maybe he’s got a key, for starters). In other words we aren’t talking about just any meter reader.

1. I’m not sure meters are outside everywhere. They weren’t always so. For example, in Howard County Maryland,

The Meter Department reads over 65,000 water accounts for billing purposes. Of those meters 72% are installed inside of a residence or commercial building. The remaining meters are installed in a meter vault, in the ground, located near the property line.

http://www.co.ho.md.us/DPW/u_meters.htm

2. At the end of my post, I discussed the possibility of an outside meter.

3. The cases don’t seem to be concerned about whether the person has actual authority. They seem focused on the understanding of the person’s authority and whether the conclusion was reasonable based on what the officer knew at the time the consent was given. That’s because that’s the test for apparent authority:

As Stoner demonstrates, what we hold today does not suggest that law enforcement officers may always accept a person’s invitation to enter premises. Even when the invitation is accompanied by an explicit assertion that the person lives there, the surrounding circumstances could conceivably be such that a reasonable person would doubt its truth and not act upon it without further inquiry. As with other factual determinations bearing upon search and seizure, determination of consent to enter must “be judged against an objective standard: would the facts available to the officer at the moment . . . `warrant a man of reasonable caution in the belief’” that the consenting party had authority over the premises? Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 21 -22 (1968). If not, then warrantless [497 U.S. 177, 189] entry without further inquiry is unlawful unless authority actually exists. But if so, the search is valid.

http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?navby=search&court=US&case=/us/497/177.html

So there’s this two-pronged test:

1. Is it reasonable to conclude, based on what the officer sees and hears, that the person has authority to give consent?

If it is, then the person has apparent authority. If it isn’t then,

2. Does the person really have the authority to consent?

If he does, then the search is valid, based on actual authority, even though the officer shouldn’t have believed that the person had authority.

Lying isn’t part of the test. If the person lies convincingly, and there is nothing to suggest that he doesn’t have authority to consent.

[Contrapuntal]

Thanks for the info.

It’s pretty scary to me that someone can lie to the police and validate a search of my property.

I was thinking of electric meters, so perhaps my thinking was off.