State v. Johnson

SAND, Justice.

This is an appeal by the defendant, Neil Johnson [Johnson], from a jury verdict of guilty for theft of property. Johnson alleges that the trial court erred by failing to suppress the State’s introduction into evidence of a blue, portable air compressor because the deputy sheriff obtained the air compressor as the result of a warrantless search and seizure.

In December 1978 a blue, twin-cylinder air compressor belonging to Marc Nelson [Nelson] was stolen from Nelson’s father’s garage in Bottineau, North Dakota. Sometime in October 1979 Mrs. Carl Kroeplin told a Mrs. Williams that…