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Name: People v. Walker
Case #: H029017
Opinion Date: 10/11/2006
Court: CA Court of Appeal
District 6 DCA
Citation: 143 Cal.App.4th 1183
Summary

Appellant let a campus security officer, Payne, into his room after Payne found him smoking marijuana. He showed Payne a bag of marijuana, which he said he had purchased legally at a cannibus club, and a medical release form which authorized its use. Payne then searched the room, finding additional packaged marijuana and $1800. Payne called police. When they arrived, they asked if there was consent to search the room. Payne told them that he had received consent but that it wasn’t necessary because of the waiver appellant had signed in his housing contract. The officers entered the room and seized the evidence. The appellate court held that Payne did not have actual authority to consent to the search by police, so the entry into the dormitory room was not reasonable. However, the suppression motion should have been denied because the seized contraband was not subject to the exclusionary rule because it would have been inevitably discovered. The contraband would inevitably have been discovered when the university contacted the police to report that drugs had been found in the dormitory.