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State v. Peek5/3/2000
uthorizing the search of the body of Michael Anderson Peak for items of evidence to include:
1. Blood;
2. Saliva;
3. Hair, to include pubic hair.
I pray the Court issue a warrant authorizing the search and seizure of the above-described items in such manner and quantity that they might be tested for comparison to the swabbings and pubic hair combings previously collected as evidence and that the search be made within seventy-two (72) hours.
This the 6 day of August , 1996.
Det. Bill Phillips Chattanooga Police Department
We will now review the search warrant affidavit to determine whether it establishes probable cause.
All of the information in the search warrant affidavit came from either law enforcement officers, named victims of sexual assaults, or citizen informants. Thus, their credibility did not need to be established. United States v. Ventresca, 380 U.S. 102, 111, 85 S.Ct. 741, 747, 13 L.Ed.2d 684 (1965) ("Observations of fellow officers of the government engaged in a common investigation are plainly a reliable basis for a warrant applied for by one of their number."). Our supreme court explained in Stevens the reasons why information received from a citizen is credible:
n ordinary citizen who reports a crime which has been committed in his presence, or that a crime is being or will be committed, stands on much different ground than a police informer. He is a witness to criminal activity who acts with an intent to aid the police in law enforcement because of his concern for society or for his own safety. He does not expect any gain or concession in exchange for his information. An informer of this type usually would not have more than one opportunity to supply information to the police, thereby precluding proof of his reliability by pointing to previous accurate information which he has supplied.
989 S.W.2d at 294 (quoting State v. Smith, 867 S.W.2d 343, 347 (Tenn. Crim. App.1993)).
This court was presented with a situation nearly identical to that of the instant case in State v. Baker, 956 S.W.2d 8 (Tenn. Crim. App.), perm. app. denied (Tenn. 1997), in which the defendant was a suspect in a rape case which had occurred in Tipton County, and officers had obtained a search warrant to collect "a quantity of blood, saliva and pubic and head hairs from the person of Bobby Rydale Baker . . . suitable for testing." Id. at 13. The victim in Baker had been awakened at approximately 3:00 a.m., by an intruder who had entered her residence through a back bedroom window, disabled the telephone, and discarded on the floor of the bedroom a cigarette which he had been smoking. He placed a knife to the victim's throat as she was sleeping in her bed, threatened to kill her if she did not cooperate, and then sexually assaulted her. The victim's two children, ages eleven months and two years, as well as a friend's ten-year-old child, were also in the residence but slept through the attack. The intruder left the residence though the back door. Investigating officers found a footprint in the rear bedroom. Because of a heavy dew, officers discovered tracks of footprints leading to the window which was the point of entry as well as leading from the back door of the residence. Aided by one of the officers who was a certified tracking instructor, they followed the footprints to the residence of the defendant's aunt and uncle. One witness, who knew the defendant, had seen him in the neighborhood the morning of the rape. Another witness had seen the defendant running "shirtless" from the victim's residence, while another had seen him knocking on the window at the residence of one of his
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