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The other night my friend picked me up and we went to our college campus to pick up a 20 sack, we pick it up and start to pull out of the campus when a cop drives by, turns around and pulls us over. At this point i put the sack inbetween my seat and the door so the cop wont beable to see it and when the cop comes up to the door he says "Your lights werent on did you just forget to turn them on" My friend starts babbling because he was nervous and then out of no where another cop comes up from my side and opens the door and sees the weed laying there. Is that even legal for them to just open the door liek that? After that they took us out of the car and searched it and found my bowl which was in my book bag and then they arrested us. Basically my question is is what the cops did illegal and is there anyway i can get out of this completly since they searched without permission? We have to go to a court date Wednesday for possesion of marijuanna and peraphernalia

Well first off, its your trunk that they need permission to search. Anything that is in the natural visual sight of the car, so the interior or cab or whatever you want to call it, is fair game. I took a criminal justice class and we had a big discussion about this. I don't know if he is allowed to open your door, but it is possible that when he surveyed the car that he saw something which would give him the right to open the door. (They are allowed to do that to like assess a threat of a driver and shit) Anyway, I hate to tell you that you are kinda SOL when it comes to this, but on the bright side...if its your first offense they might be willing to drop the possession and just hit you with the paraphernalia offense with community service or something. Good luck. Hope I was helpful.

Looks like you're in quite a mess, but don't worry, I think that you can get through this. If what you say is true then this is a classic example of "illegal search and seizure". The police cannot open the door and search your car unless they have reason to believe that you have broken the law. If you can prove that this was a case of illegal search and seizure then all evidence the police had obtained through the illegal search gets thrown out and it cannot be used against you.

However, if the police can prove that they had good reason to search the car then it could be a whole other story. They could use your friends frantic babbling as a piece of evidence (keep in mind, it is VERY important what your friend said and how he said it, it could make or beak you). They could also claim to have seen it lying on the floor (they ARE allowed to peek in the car, but not the open the door). They could try any number of things, and knowing the crooked cops I would wager that they would make something up just to get you convicted.

My advice: get a good lawyer and you MAY be able to win this, but it's a tough call. Remember, just because you're in the right doesn't mean that you will win the case, the jury may find you guilty regardless of whether their activity was legal or not. It all depends, there are FAR too many variables to properly predict this. Best of luck, pray the jury are a bunch of stoners