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In opinions spanning four decades, North Carolina’s appellate courts have suppressed chemical analysis results in impaired driving cases based on statutory violations related to their administration. When the violation consists of the State’s failure to advise a defendant of her implied consent rights, the appellate courts’ jurisprudence has been straightforward and consistent: The results of an implied consent test carried out without the defendant having first been advised of her implied consent rights are inadmissible. Indeed, the court of appeals reaffirmed that principle last June in State v. Williams, __ N.C. App. ___, 759 S.E.2d 350 (2014), holding that the State’s failure to re-advise the defendant of his implied consent rights before conducting a blood test under the implied consent statutes required suppression of the test results. A court of appeals opinion issued in the waning hours of 2014 indicates, however, that the rule is subject to at least one exception.

The United States Supreme Court held in Missouri v. McNeely, 133 S. Ct. 1552 (2013), that the natural dissipation of alcohol in the bloodstream does not constitute an exigency in every impaired driving case that justifies a warrantless, nonconsensual blood draw. In so holding, the court rejected the state’s call for a categorical rule—based solely on the evanescent nature of alcohol—that would authorize warrantless blood draws over a defendant’s objection whenever an officer has probable cause to believe the defendant has been driving while impaired. Some states have continued to argue, however, that nonconsensual warrantless blood draws in impaired driving cases are categorically permissible based on implied consent laws enacted by their state legislatures. Two state supreme courts recently rejected such arguments, holding that implied consent statutes in Nevada and Idaho that do not allow a driver to withdraw consent to testing are unconstitutional. That reasoning might be applied to invalidate the provision of North Carolina’s implied consent law that categorically allows the warrantless testing of unconscious drivers.

Courts across the country continue to wrestle with whether and how the Supreme Court’s opinion in Missouri v. McNeely, 569 U.S. ___, 133 S. Ct.  1552 (2013), affects the lawfulness […]

The first two posts in this series (here and here) discussed opinions from state supreme courts in Arizona and Minnesota considering, post-McNeely v. Missouri, 133 S.Ct. 1552 (2013), whether a […]

Yesterday’s post discussed challenges to implied consent laws raised by defendants following the Supreme Court’s decision last spring in Missouri v. McNeely, 133 S.Ct. 1552 (2013). The post summarized the […]

The United States Supreme Court held last term in Missouri v. McNeeIy, 133 S. Ct. 1552 (2013), that the natural dissipation of alcohol in a person’s bloodstream does not constitute […]

I’m eagerly awaiting the Supreme Court’s ruling in Missouri v. McNeely. I want to know whether the exigency created by the dissipation of alcohol in the body, without more, permits […]

WRAL news reported last week that a Selma police officer had been placed on administrative leave after he allegedly handcuffed an emergency room nurse who refused to withdraw blood from […]

Jeff wrote earlier this week about the court of appeals’ opinion in State v. Osterhoudt (August 21, 2012).  Jeff’s post dealt with the court’s substantive analysis of whether the police […]

Two earlier posts (here and here) explore whether North Carolina’s implied consent statutes or the U.S. Constitution require that notice of implied consent rights be provided in language that a […]