United States v. Dale Juan Osife

We must decide whether the Fourth Amendment permits police to search an automobile after arresting its recent occupant, even when evidence related to the crime is unlikely to be found.

I

On January 4, 2003, Dale Osife got out of his pickup truck in the parking lot of a grocery store in Phoenix, Arizona. He urinated on the ground next to his truck and then walked into the store. A woman standing in the parking lot called the police, and two officers came to the scene in a patrol car. They noticed a pool of fluid next to the driver’s side door of Osife’s truck. Osife came out of the store, walked up to his pickup truck, and opened the door on the driver’s side. One of the officers saw him take what looked like a plastic bag out of the pocket of his pants and place it on the driver’s seat inside the truck. The officer approached him and told him about the report of his public urination, which Osife denied. A few minutes later, the woman who had telephoned the police returned and identified Osife as the man whom she had seen urinating. At that time Osife was still standing next to the open door of his truck. The police officer placed Osife under arrest for indecent exposure,…