State v. Johnson

In State v. Johnson, 177 Wis. 2d 224, 501 N.W.2d 876 (Wis. App. 1993), the Wisconsin Court of Appeals reversed the defendant's conviction because the evidence against him was derived from an illegal search. Officers patrolling an apartment building in a high crime area stopped and frisked the defendant and, finding no drugs or weapons, asked him to produce identification. He told them that it was in his girlfriend's apartment in the building. One of the officers then accompanied the defendant to the apartment. When the defendant went inside, the officer followed him. The officer "did not ask for Johnson's permission to enter, and Johnson did not ask him to come in." Johnson, 501 N.W.2d at 877. Rejecting the state's argument that, because there was no credible testimony that the defendant objected to the police entry, he impliedly consented to it, the court held that consent "'cannot be found by a showing of mere acquiescence.'" Id. at 880.