State v. Howard

The question in this case is whether Article I, section 9, of the Oregon Constitution prohibits the police from engaging in a warrantless search of garbage that a sanitation company had picked up in the regular course of business and turned over to the police. The Court of Appeals held that, because defendants did not retain a possessory or privacy interest in the garbage once the sanitation company picked it up, the trial court correctly denied defendants’ motion to suppress the evidence resulting from the search. State v. Howard/Dawson, 204 Or App 438, 129 P3d 792 (2006). We allowed review…