Bailey, J.
Will Thomas (“Thomas”) … convicted of Dealing in a Narcotic Drug … raises one issue for our review, which we restate as whether the trial court abused its discretion when it admitted into evidence heroin recovered from Thomas after a warrantless arrest following a traffic stop.
… acting on information obtained from an informant, a joint task force of officers from the City of Marion Police Department and the Grant County Sheriff’s Office engaged in surveillance of a white Dodge Caravan … Around 3:30 p.m., Byron Christmas (“Christmas”) and Thomas, who matched physical descriptions provided by the informant, got in the van and left the parking lot of the hotel. …
Officer Martin conducted a traffic stop of the van. … Thomas was seated in the front passenger’s seat. … Officer Martin spoke with Christmas while Detective Stefanatos spoke with Thomas. …
During their conversation, Officer Martin obtained Christmas’s written permission to search the van. …
After the police dog alerted to the presence of narcotics, the officers had Christmas and Thomas exit the vehicle and conducted a pat-down search for officer safety. Christmas and Thomas were each asked whether they would consent to a strip search at the police station, and were informed that officers would seek a search warrant if they declined to consent. Christmas agreed, and Thomas declined.
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Thomas was transported to the Marion Police Department and placed in an interview room. While seated in the interview room, officers observed Thomas take something from a jacket pocket and put it into his mouth. Thomas refused to open his mouth, and police forced his mouth open. The officers retrieved a small plastic baggie with 8.5 grams of a gray, crumbly, rock-like substance that would later be identified as heroin.
… A jury trial was conducted on November 30 and December 1, 2015. At the conclusion of the trial, the jury found Thomas guilty of Dealing in a Narcotic Drug and not guilty of Battery.
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Thomas argues on appeal that police lacked the requisite probable cause to arrest, detain, move, and subsequently search him after the traffic stop. …
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Without a warrant, “an arrest or detention for more than a short period” must be justified by probable cause. Overstreet v. State, 724 N.E.2d 661, 662 (Ind. Ct. App. 2000) (citing Woods v. State, 547 N.E.2d 772, 778 (Ind. 1989)), trans. denied. …
The United States Supreme Court has “distinguished between the search of a vehicle and a personal search ‘because of the unique, significantly heightened protection afforded against searches of one’s person.’” United States v. Moore, 390 Fed. Appx. 503, 507 (6th Cir. 2010) (quoting Wyoming v. Houghton, 526 U.S. 295, 301 (1999)). …
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… Refusing to consent to a personal body search does not create probable cause to believe he was the individual holding the drugs. … Here, there was no contraband in the vehicle, and under circumstances like these the probable cause arising from a drug dog’s alert to a larger area like a car does not permit a fishing expedition into the pockets of each of the car’s occupants.
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… There was no probable cause to arrest or search Thomas. … But a strip search was not inevitable but for the unlawful arrest of Thomas, and we decline the State’s invitation to broaden the scope of nonconsensual, lawful strip searches in this manner.
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In the absence of probable cause to detain Thomas, the police detention and transportation of Thomas to the Marion Police Department was unconstitutional. … We accordingly conclude that the trial court abused its discretion when it did not exclude the heroin from evidence.
Reversed.
Najam, J., and May, J., concur.