Fbi Explains High Court’s New Ruling On Automobile Search

by Joel Hendon⁽¹⁷⁰⁾ Red Star

http://hebronics.org/index.html

For almost 3 decades, most police officers had followed former court rulings pertaining to the right to search a suspect’s auto after they had arrested a person in the vehicle. This had been acceptable in a great number of court rulings.

On April 29, 2009, the U.S. Supreme court narrowed this formerly acceptable practice to be allowed only when: “police may search a vehicle incident to a recent occupant's arrest only if the arrestee is within reaching distance of the passenger compartment at the time of the search or it is reasonable to believe the vehicle contains evidence of the offense of the arrest.” (FBI Law enforcement bulletin-April 2011)

This case which made it’s way to the U.S. Supreme Court was Arizona vs. Gant. The Tucson police arrested Gant for driving with a suspended license. After handcuffing him and locking him in the rear seat of he patrol car, the officers searched his car and found cocaine in his jacket in the back seat. When the cocaine was presented in court, Gant’s attorneys claimed that the search was illegal and violated his Fourth Amendment rights. When it reached the Arizona Supreme Court, they ruled in his favor saying that the search was not justified by the Fourth Amendment in this case.

After the case was appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, the Arizona court ruling was upheld and they ruled that since the arrestee was locked in the back seat of the patrol car, he was certainly not within reach of his vehicle’s passenger compartment and there was no reason to suspect that there would be evidence in the automobile which would be pertinent to his being arrested for driving with a suspended license.

The ruling concerning one being in reach of the passenger compartment of his vehicle is allowed for the safety of the officer(s) to avoid any possibility of the arrestee gaining access to a weapon. There have been exceptions allowed to the rule, particularly if parties other than the one arrested are occupants of the vehicle. Here is a quote concerning a court case having allowed the search.

For example, in United States v. Davis, the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the search of the passenger compartment of a vehicle incident to arrest of the driver when the three remaining, unsecured, and intoxicated occupants "were standing around a vehicle redolent of recently smoked marijuana." According to the court, the facts presented in this case are "textbook examples of '[t]he safety and evidentiary justifications underlying Chimel's reaching distance rule....'"). (Ibid)

The other admissible reason for a search is when there is reasonable expectations of evidence related to the arrest. This is such as arrests for drug violations, when it is even likely that there may be evidence in the vehicle which would pertain to the arrest.

There are numerous details of these arrest - search probabilities which can be read at these two links. The FBI April Bulletin and the FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin 2009 Page down to page 24 in this latter bulletin.

Article submitted Wednesday, April 20, 2011 & read 4 times.

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