Cole

The People appeal an order suppressing evidence and dismissing a charge of possession of marijuana against Jessie Ronnie Cole, Jr.

In January 1971 Los Angeles Police Officer Lee Prentiss saw Cole driving a Plymouth with 1969 Michigan license plates and without external evidence of 1970 or 1971 registration. Officer Prentiss stopped Cole and asked him for his driver’s license and vehicle registration. Cole produced his driver’s license and a vehicle registration for an Oldsmobile. Prentiss asked him to step out of the car. When the car door opened, Prentiss noticed that the vehicle identification plate was not secured where it should be, and he also noticed a partially smoked marijuana cigarette on the floor of the vehicle on the driver’s side. He arrested Cole for possession of marijuana, and when he picked up Cole’s wallet from the seat of the car Cole said, *550 “You might as well take the other joints, too,” and showed him other marijuana cigarettes in a compartment in the wallet.

The trial court concluded that Officer Prentiss had no reasonable cause to stop Cole’s car, ordered the evidence of the marijuana suppressed, and dismissed the charge. The issue on appeal…