State v. Gaskins
Annotate this CaseUpon stopping Defendant for an expired license plate, a police officer smelled marijuana and confiscated a marijuana blunt from Defendant. After arresting Defendant for the possession of marijuana the police searched the passenger compartment where a locked safe was held. An officer opened the safe without a search warrant. Based upon the evidence of the search, Defendant was charged with possession of marijuana with intent to deliver, failure to affix a drug tax stamp, and knowingly transporting a revolver in a vehicle. The district court denied Defendant’s motion to suppress the evidence obtained from a search of the locked container and convicted him of the charges. The Supreme Court reversed, holding that the warrantless search of the safe was not a valid search incident to Defendant’s arrest because Defendant could not access anything inside the vehicle or the locked safe when the search occurred.
Some case metadata and case summaries were written with the help of AI, which can produce inaccuracies. You should read the full case before relying on it for legal research purposes.
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.