State v. Miller

In State v. Miller, 227 Conn. 363, 375, 630 A.2d 1315 (1993), the defendant was arrested for robbery and conspiracy to commit robbery in Hartford by three West Hartford police officers. Following the defendant's arrest, the West Hartford police officers impounded the defendant's car and took it to their police department garage. The police conducted a warrantless search and discovered a gun suspected of being used in the crimes for which the defendant was charged. The defendant appealed from the judgment of conviction and claimed that the West Hartford police officers had acted outside their jurisdiction and had performed an investigation, stakeout, Terry stop and warrantless seizure of the defendant's automobile. Id. at 368-69. The defendant claimed that the extraterritorial police action violated article tenth, 1, article first, 7, and article first, 9, of the Connecticut constitution. In Miller, the Court stated that it need not determine whether the Terry stop was invalid because "no evidence flowed from it and, therefore, the subsequent prosecution of the defendant was not tainted by the Terry stop. . . . Accordingly, any illegality in the stop would not require dismissal of the charges against the defendant or a reversal of his conviction." Id. at 370.