Opinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own. Bias May be Implicit in Current Law on Search and Seizure Friday, March 1st, 2019 Beth Karp 48 latin woman opening the front door, white inside Over the past several years, questions about racial bias in law enforcement have commanded a great deal of public attention. Defendant filed a motion to suppress, arguing that the factual allegations did not support a search of the vehicles located outside the residence. A search warrant must be based on probable cause and describe with particularity the areas to be searched (see People v Rainey, 14 NY2d 35, 38 [1964]). Supreme Court explained that in New York, a search warrant must list "each specific area of the building, area or vehicle to be searched" and "[p]robable cause must be shown in each instance." We first held that the underlying warrant for the residence lacked sufficient factual allegations to authorize a search of the residence (Dumper, 28 NY2d at 298). While this Court has not yet had the opportunity to answer it, the question is certainly not a novel one for courts. You can explore additional available newsletters here. The question before us Williams, 2019 U.S. App. Recent Case : 926 F.3d 369 (7th Cir. Counts 5 through 9 rested in large part on the physical evidence seized from the two vehicles. are best promoted by applying State constitutional standards" (Johnson, 66 NY2d at 407) and when the "constitutional protections we have enjoyed in this State have in fact been diluted by subsequent decisions of a more recent Supreme Court (Scott, 79 NY2d at 504 [Kaye, C.J., concurring]). . This jurisdictional rule is grounded in the principle of federalism (see Long, 463 US at 1041, quoting Minnesota v National Tea Co., 309 US 551, 557 [1940] ["'It is fundamental that state courts be left free and unfettered by us in interpreting their state constitutions. The touchstone of the constitutional protection for privacy, under Article 1, Section 12 of the State Constitution, is whether a person has a reasonable expectation of privacy (see Scott, 79 NY2d at 488). In that case, police saw drugs in the home when they were investigating a burglary and later obtained a warrant for the home and the van (id. Supreme Court granted the motion to suppress, and the Appellate Division affirmed. Get free summaries of new New York Court of Appeals opinions delivered to your inbox! . . at 825; see People v Langen, 60 NY2d 170, 180-181 [1983] [applying Ross and declining to adopt a different rule under the New York State Constitution]). The issue in Hansen was whether there was probable cause for the search warrant directed at "two separate target locations discretely described," namely a residence and an "automotive van wherever located" (id. The majority's rejoinderthat the absence of any discussion of the State Constitution "does not render our repeated citations to [it] meaningless" (majority op at 18)makes a parallel citation the equivalent of principled state constitutional discourse. . United States v Pennington, 287 F3d 739, 745 [8th Cir 2002]; United States v Percival, 756 F2d 600, 611-613 [7th Cir 1985]). Even were we to put aside the contrary reasoning of Hansen and Dumper, the dissent never addresses the fundamental tenets of our search warrant jurisprudence: it is the magistrate, and not the police officer, who determines the scope of the search conducted pursuant to a warrant (Hanlon, 36 NY2d at 559; P.J. The Chevrolet, parked in the backyard behind two fences, was unregistered. . at 822 [emphasis added]). at 126-127). at 37). Justia makes no guarantees or warranties that the annotations are accurate or reflect the current state of law, and no annotation is intended to be, nor should it be construed as, legal advice. Against a backdrop of increasing national attention to police violence, the Supreme Court on Thursday issued an opinion in a closely watched criminal-procedure case that clarifies the meaning of the term "seizure.". One man, mature FBI agent working on a case in dark office. Our statement in that case, unrelated to specific facts before the Court, that "a warrant to search a building does not include authority to search vehicles at the premises" (id. The Justices Search help & Tips - Supreme Court of the United States more specific results. Mr. Gordon relies primarily on New York precedent; the People look instead to federal caselaw for guidance. Defendant sought to suppress all evidence seized from the Nissan and Chevrolet. Citing Rainey, we [*3]reiterated that under our precedent, the "scope of the search has been carefully limited" and "probable cause must be shown in each instance" (id.). Applying Ross, I would likewise hold that, where a warrant authorizes a search of the entire premises for items that could be found in a vehicle on those premises, it is reasonable to search a vehicle parked thereon, just as it would be for other containers found on the premises. Disclaimer: Justia Annotations is a forum for attorneys to summarize, comment on, and analyze case law published on our site. . R. v. Valentine, involved a traffic stop on Highway 401, where drugs were later found. 2021 NY Slip Op 01093 No such connections were made here. Although some Federal Courts of Appeals have interpreted the Fourth Amendment in a manner that might permit the search here, we decline to follow suit. Opinion by Judge Wilson. You're all set! Contrary to the assertion of the dissent, this issue has been preserved and developed by both parties throughout the course of this litigation, which is perhaps why the People themselves have not argued that Mr. Gordon's contentions are unpreserved. Even were we writing on a blank slate, we would not adopt the rule advocated by the People. Residents say the street crime unit was an intimidating and sometimes violent presence in the city. Every federal circuit court of appeals and every state high court that has addressed the questionuntil todayconcluded that vehicles are no different than other containers that might be found on premises, and, thus, heeding the directive from the United States Supreme Court that there is no constitutional distinction between types of containers, held that vehicles parked on the premises may reasonably be searched if they may contain the object of the search. Shield to look into the matter. The warrant further described the premises to include an "attached carport," "a cement driveway," "a cement walkway that leads to the front door," and a "chain link fence." 690) and decisional law"]). However, the constitutional mandate of particularity of the place to be searched may not be circumvented by implication as the People urge. D E C I S I O N. LEONEN, J.: To be valid, searches must proceed from a warrant issued by a judge.1 While there are exceptions to this rule, warrantless searches can only be carried out when founded on probable cause . I write and consult on federal criminal law and criminal justice. I see no persuasive rationale why, if a bicycle and a car are parked next to each other on a driveway, it is reasonable to search the bicycle's closed basket but unreasonable to search the car's trunk. The parties dispute the proper standards for evaluating the sufficiency of the warrant application and whether the search of the vehicles conformed to the warrant's directives. The application contained no mention of the existence of the vehicles ultimately searched, much less evidence connecting them to any criminality. Seventh Circuit Holds that Evidence Gathered Through an Unlawful Search of a Home May Be Admissible Under the Independent Source Doctrine Even if Tainted Evidence Is Described in the Warrant Application. Moreover, every other state high court that has addressed this issue has, like the federal courts, held that a warrant authorizing a search of the entire premises permits the police to search vehicles located thereon [FN5]. Our prior decisions, relied upon by Mr. Gordon and the courts below, depended upon both the State and Federal Constitutions as well as the Criminal Procedure Law. L. Rev. Home - Supreme Court of the United States Docket Search Chief Justice's Year-End Reports on the Federal Judiciary Today at the Court - Wednesday, Feb 22, 2023 The Court will convene for a public session in the Courtroom at 10 a.m. LEXIS 20262 (2d Cir. His sole contention was that the search of the vehicles was outside the scope of the search permitted by the warrant, noting that the vehicles were not in an attached garage and thus not part of the home. "This rule applies equally to all containers" (id. However, we held that the police lacked sufficient evidence to search a vehicle that had been seen coming and going from the residence. ILLEGAL SEARCH AND SEIZURE: RECENT DC COURT OF APPEALS DECISION February 27, 2019 11:07 am | Comments Off The Court of Appeals in Posey v. US, decided on February 21, 2019, reversed the trial's court denial of the suppression motion and thus vacated the conviction. Video, 68 NY2d at 307 [noting that Hanlon "imposed a specific, nondelegable burden on the magistrate which required that (the magistrate), not the police, determine probable cause"]). For example, "a warrant that authorizes an officer to search a home for illegal weapons also provides authority to open closets, chests, drawers, and containers in which the weapon might be found" (Ross, 456 US at 821). Video, Inc., 68 NY2d 296, 305-306 [1986]). Warrants "interpose the detached and independent judgment of a neutral Magistrate between the interested viewpoint [*4]of those engaged in ferreting out crime and potential encroachments on the sanctity and privacy of the individual" (People v Hanlon, 36 NY2d 549, 558 [1975]). Siegal, one of the top white collar attorneys in the country and a former federal prosecutor, has uncovered yet another 4th Amendment violation, this one in the Eastern District of New York. N.Y. July 9, 2019) Officers with the New York City Police Department (NYPD) arrested Williams for speeding, reckless driving, and unauthorized use of a rental car. This is a BETA experience. (c) A designated or described person"]). We explained: "The observations of the police were that this van had made 'trips in and out carrying at least one other person in addition to the driver', and that it was 'the sole vehicle observed entering and leaving these premises on a regular basis'. In People v Sciacca (45 NY2d 122 [1978]), we held that a warrant authorizing a search of a defendant's van does not permit a forcible warrantless entry into another person's locked buildinga garagein order to execute the warrant (id. The majority's response to the analysis of Ross conducted by all the federal circuit courts and other state courts that have considered the issue is to express "skeptic[ism]," with an added footnote that explains that the Supreme Court in Ross did not disturb the fundamental principle that searches must be bound by probable cause (majority op at 6 and n 1). Indeed, the cases cited by defendant predate the "dawn of active New York State constitutionalism" in the 1980s, before which the "state constitutional protection against unreasonable searches and seizures mostly lay judicially dormant" (Robert M. Pitler, Independent State Search and Seizure Constitutionalism: The New York State Court of Appeals' Quest for Principled Decisionmaking, 62 Brook L Rev 1, 103, 213 [1996]). The items that could be seized in the raid were listed as; "Records, documents and materials that memorialize or reflect financial transactions between Kayla and its source(s) of cash, including, but not limited to contracts, receipts, invoices, letter, bank statements, notes, ledgers, cash receipt journals or records cash shipment records, and/or cash delivery records". Read more. In this area of constitutional law, we have set forth principles that would be unduly weakened by the People's preferred rule (see People v Johnson, 66 NY2d 398, 407 [1985]). The majority disagrees with every federal court and state high court, and posits that the Fourth Amendment prohibits the search of the vehicles here (majority op at 20). Adopting the People's position would lead to the incongruous result that proof that a vehicle had an ongoing connection with a property would be insufficient to justify a search, while a warrant application that makes no mention of the vehicle would somehow provide greater cause to search that vehicle. Of the 63 cases heard by the U.S. Supreme Court during the 2019-2020 term, there were several criminal and civil law cases that could affect the investigative and employment interests of the law enforcement community. Decided on February 18, 2021 The importance of upholding our preservation rule that requires a defendant to make a specific state constitutional argument is buttressed by United States Supreme Court precedent concerning an independent state ground for purposes of that Court's jurisdiction (see Michigan v Long, 463 US 1032, 1044 [1983]). The items that could be seized in the raid were listed as; Why You Need To Take A Look At New RMD Rules: Theyre Flexible, UBS Fuels The Next Decade Of Black Innovation With $3 Million Commitment, This Week In Credit Card News: Visa, Mastercard Pause Crypto Push; Tracking Gun Purchases, Borrowers Receive Student Loan Forgiveness Approval Emails After Court Green-Lights Settlement, Biden May Propose Using Net Investment Income Tax Revenues To Shore Up Medicare, Student Loan Forgiveness: 6 Big Takeaways From Landmark Supreme Court Hearing, Athlete Investors Cant Save Tonals Falling $500 Million Valuation, Mintz, Levin,Cohn, Ferris, Glovsky and Popeo. Acting pursuant to the authority to search the "entire premises," the police canvassed both apartments and the shed, retrieving from the latter a check writer and set of blank checks believed to have been used in the suspect's check-forging activities. LARRY SABUCO MANIBOG, Petitioner vs. PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES, Respondent. It's difficult to have a case without evidence. Indeed, the observed pattern, as described in the affidavit, was for Mr. Gordon to proceed from the residence to the street and back, without detouring to any vehicles parked at the residence. Your 4th Amendment Rights The 4 th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution guarantees freedom from unreasonable search and seizure . About; License; Lawyer Directory; Projects. Thus, Mr. Gordon preserved the argument that, notwithstanding United States v Ross and related federal circuit court decisions, our state law remains the same as we articulated in our decisions in Hansen, Dumper, Sciacca, and Rainey. Defendant did not support that argument with any state constitutional analysis. A majority of this Court, however, answers that question in the negative. Attached to the third party's apartment was a shed. . Ross itself does not govern the situation here, and we are skeptical of the wisdom of the federal appellate cases extending it [FN1]. Two cases recently argued before SCOTUS could narrow or expand warrantless searches - and they could reach back to what police are doing now Feb 2, 2018 2018 started off with a double-feature in the U.S. Supreme Court starring the Fourth Amendment and police authority to search and seize. Our conclusion that the officers in this case exceeded the scope of the warrant finds support both in our prior cases and in the Criminal Procedure Law (CPL) (see Hanlon, 36 NY2d at 559 ["(P)robable cause (must be) demonstrated as a matter of fact in the manner prescribed by statute (CPL art. Supreme Court granted Mr. Gordon's motion to suppress. Discipline in this area benefits not only the Supreme Court in determining its own jurisdiction, but also this Court in establishing a respected body of state constitutional law. But the location of that search was an im-pounded vehiclenot a home"'a constitutional differ-ence'" that the opinion repeatedly stressed. at 299). The officers stopped the man, subjected him to a patdown search, and then inspected the interior of the vehicle for other weapons. It is a matter of preserving rights whichall of us enjoy, and there is nobetter place to enforce those rights than in a court of law. In the appropriate case, Dumper may be relevant in assessing how we would decide that issue, but it is not relevant here. Two subsequent cases did. against unreasonable searches and seizures." This case concerns the "seizure" of a "person," which can take the form of "physical force" or a "show of authority" that "in some way restrain[s] the liberty" of the person. In Illinois v. Caballes, 543 U. S. 405 (2005), this Court held that a dog sniff conducted during a lawful traffic stop does not violate the Fourth Amendment's proscription of unreasonable seizures. Because a driveway and a backyard located within the curtilage are part of the "entire premises," there was no constitutional impediment to the police search of the two vehicles. "[I]t is highly awkward, if not impossible, to use a case as the basis for an argument about the meaning of the state constitution if it is unclear from the case itself whether the case is even about the state constitution" (James A. Gardner, The Failed Discourse of State Constitutionalism, 90 Mich L Rev 761, 783 [1992]). Yesterday, Judge Feuerstein issued anorderconfirming that information gained from the search would not be admissible. The search, like at least two others conducted at locations associated with President Biden, was undertaken with the cooperation of the president and his legal team. By Glenn Thrush,Michael D. Shear and Maggie Haberman. . We delineated an "independent body" of search-and-seizure law under the State Constitution, and we have explained that, because the state and federal provisions contain similar language and share a common history, any divergence in meaning must derive from a "noninterpretive analysis" focused on "circumstances peculiar to New York" (People v Harris, 77 NY2d 434, 438-439 [1991]). The State appealed that decision. We then concluded that even if the affidavit had been sufficient to support a search of the residence, the warrant failed "in any event [to] justify a search of the automobile which had just been driven into the driveway" (id. The Court held first that . Those cases rested on both the New York and U.S. Constitutions as well as the Criminal Procedure Law to require a greater degree of protection for searches of vehicles than is now required under the federal circuit court law cited by the People. Our Court has never adopted a "fixed analytical formula for determining when the proper protection of fundamental rights requires resort to the State Constitution" (Scott, 79 NY2d at 491). The legislature's instruction that a warrant may direct a search of "one or more of the following" strongly suggests that a warrant which directs the search of only one category (e.g.