Vinston v. State

The police arrested appellant and seized his automobile. There was no testimony bearing on the appellant’s location relative to the car at the time of the arrest and seizure. We must, therefore, assume that the search incident to arrest doctrine has no applicability to this case.

This case is governed by Coolidge v. New Hampshire, 403 S.W. 2d 443 (1971), which held that the police must obtain a warrant when they intend to seize an object outside the scope of a valid search incident to arrest. Warrantless searches are presumed to be unreasonable.

The State attempted to justify the seizure by…