North Carolina Criminal Law Blog

Law enforcement officers have long been authorized to search a person incident to the person’s arrest. But the precise scope of that authority has shifted over time. The most recent major case in this area was Arizona v. Gant, 556 U.S. 332 (2009), which placed new limits on an officer’s ability to search a motor vehicle incident to the arrest of an occupant. Whether Gant has any impact on an officer’s authority to search hand luggage like purses and backpacks has been the subject of considerable controversy. The issue is important given the ubiquity with which men as well as women carry backpacks, satchels, crossbody slings, and many other types of bags. This post discusses searches of such items incident to arrest.

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Riley v. California, 573 U.S. 373 (2014), holds that the contents of a cell phone may not be searched incident to arrest, but allows for the possibility that the phone itself may be seized incident to arrest. This post addresses when such a seizure is permissible and how long it may last.

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In Arizona v. Gant, 556 U.S. 332 (2009), the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that an officer may “search a vehicle incident to a recent occupant's arrest only when the arrestee is unsecured and within reaching distance of the passenger compartment” or it is “reasonable to believe evidence relevant to the crime of arrest might be found in the vehicle.” Gant involved an arrest for driving with a suspended license, and the Court concluded that was “an offense for which police could not expect to find evidence in the passenger compartment” of the arrestee’s car. But what about DWI? If an officer arrests a driver for DWI and secures the driver in the officer’s cruiser, may the officer search the driver’s vehicle because it is reasonable to believe that evidence of impaired driving will be found in the vehicle? Yes, at least on the facts before it, ruled the Court of Appeals of North Carolina in State v. Martinez, __ N.C. App. __, 795 S.E.2d 386 (2016). This post summarizes Martinez and considers searches incident to DWI arrests more broadly.

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In Arizona v. Gant, 556 U.S. 332 (2009), the Supreme Court ruled that a motor vehicle may be searched incident to the arrest of a recent occupant “only if [1] […]

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The Supreme Court ruled in Riley v. California that cell phones can’t be searched incident to arrest. Jessie explained in yesterday’s post that Riley applies to cases that were pending […]

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Yesterday, the Supreme Court heard two cases regarding whether law enforcement officers may search a suspect’s cell phone incident to arrest. Generally, the answer to that question in North Carolina […]

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In a post last week, I mentioned that it looks increasingly likely that Supreme Court will grant certiorari in a case considering cell phone searches. In this post, I’ll support […]

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Is it reasonable to believe that the car an impaired driver is operating contains evidence of the DWI? That’s the question law enforcement officers must answer in a post-Gant world […]

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This topic was divided in two parts. This is Part II. Part I was posted yesterday. In yesterday’s blog post, I discussed the United States Supreme Court in 2009 ruling […]

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This blog post is divided in two parts. This is Part I. Part II will be posted tomorrow. The United States Supreme Court in 2009 issued a ruling in Arizona […]

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