The US Supreme Court ruled on Arizona v. Gant three days ago. Ken Wallentine from Xiphos published an excellent article that describes the case and its effect on law enforcement.
Officer Safety Concerns
From a police use of force standpoint, my concern is some officers will sacrifice safety for the investigation. Arizona v. Gant allows a search if the arrestee is within reaching distance of the passenger compartment. Some officers might be willing to risk the close proximity of the suspect to the car just so they can get the search in.
This is a flawed strategy. Securing suspects under arrest or detention is a fundamental safety tactic in policing. Several police shooting videos show that controlling suspect’s actions are critical to staying safe and stopping deadly force incidents before they happen. Supervisors and trainers should reinforce this fact to officers.
Opportunites
Although no one in law enforcement labels this case a victory for us, it does give administrators and trainers some opportunities:
- Policies and procedures
If you don’t have clear policies or procedures about searches, administrators should use this case as motivation to establish them. - Training
Many officers got away with poor articulation of searches because of the wide latitude provided by Belton. Since this has changed, provide updated training to get all the officers current on legal searches. - Expansion or better utilization of the canine unit
K9 units can be utilized to provide probable cause to search vehicles in drug cases but they have to be at the traffic stop within a reasonable amount of time. If you don’t have a K9 unit this case could provide the reason to get one or to expand an existing K9 unit to reduce their response times to traffic stops.
This case has not made our job as police officers easier but as the officers did before Belton in 1981, we will continue to do the best we can and the smart administrators will take advantage of the leverage this case might bring.
Related posts:
- Ongoing Selection: A key to high performing specialized units Every specialized unit like SWAT or K9 encounters this problem....
{ 5 comments… read them below or add one }
Good summary of this sir. I think that it is going to cause a lot of officers to reconsider the value of the consent search; and hopefully as you said it will be a motivation towards the use of more drug canines. I think it is unfortunate as search-incident was always a great tool in my toolbox; but it’s not like I don’t have other options.
I wrote a post on the meaning of Gant’s new test relative to New York law. I was particularly interested because I wanted to know how it would relate to New York’s interpretation its State Constitution which has been stricter on the police than SCOTUS’ Belton decision. I wanted to know whether the Gant decision made the Supreme Courts SILA rules stricter than, more lenient than, or the same as New York’s existing law. I concluded that even after the Gant decision, their rules are still more lenient than New York’s and therefore New York SILA jurisprudence will probably not be affected by Gant. The link follows:
http://schlissellaw.wordpress.com/2009/04/27/after-gant-is-new-yorks-car-search-rule-stricter-more-lenient-or-juuuust-right/
Two words:
“inventory search”
Tom, so therefore any evidence would eventually be found anyway? True. I guess it’s more about the timing then.
An inventory is not a search. It is a documentation of personal property left inside a vehicle. Of course if you find evidence of a crime during the inventory, you can charge the suspect.