Q: How should my friend proceed with his case?
My friend was involved in a traffic stop after being accused of threatening someone with a gun. He says he gave the police consent to search for a gun (none was found) but not to open any bags or containers. The police found drugs in a bag while conducting the search. He is currently being charged with possession. The charge of assault was dropped. Is it possible for this case to be dismissed?
A: It appears that your friend gave limited consent to the police to search the interior of his car which was ignored by the police during the actual search. I would be curious to know the description of the bag in which the drugs were located. Large enough to have contained a firearm? If not, then he has grounds to attack the search as having exceeded the scope of his consent. As a practical matter, it may be difficult to establish that he did limit the scope of the search, as the police officers might not quite remember the limitation placed on the search. Hopefully the police were wearing body-worn cameras which recorded the conversation
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