Court Says Rattle No Excuse For Search Noise In Bottom Of Driver’s Mug Led Law Officers To Discover Illegal Drugs

A rattle from an Ada County man’s mug while he was being cited for driving with an open container of alcohol did not justify a search of the cup’s removable bottom, the Idaho Supreme Court ruled Monday.

The court’s 4-1 decision reversed 4th District Judge Robert Newhouse’s denial of a motion to suppress evidence found in Dennis Reimer’s mug - a glass vial and four small plastic bags of methamphetamine.

Reimer pleaded guilty to one count of possession of methamphetamine with intent to distribute after his Feb. 5, 1993, arrest. But he reserved the right to appeal Newhouse’s denial of his motion to suppress the evidence.

Reimer had been stopped in Garden City on a seizure warrant for civil forfeiture based on the use of the truck in a methamphetamine transaction. But he argued on appeal that seizure of the plastic mug as evidence of an open container violation and removal of the cup’s bottom compartment for inspection amounted to a warrantless search conducted without probable cause.

Prosecutors, however, said Reimer no longer had a reasonable expectation of privacy in the concealed compartment once the mug was lawfully seized as evidence that he was driving with alcohol in an open container.

In reversing Newhouse’s decision, Chief Justice Charles McDevitt wrote for the Supreme Court’s majority that prosecutors provided no explanation of “how the rattling sound of a solid object hidden inside the sealed compartment of a mug in any way relates to an ‘open container’ violation.”