The Supreme Court has released its opinion in Missouri v. McNeely. This is a case about a Missouri officer's decision to conduct a warrantless blood
draw in a DUI arrest. Unfortunately, the four separate opinions issued
by the justices raise more questions than they answer. The warrantless
blood draw here was found to be a violation by the Missouri's highest
court and this finding was upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court.
The biggest takeaway from the Court’s majority and two supporting
opinions is that in the future every case will be judged on its own merits.
While this provides substantial flexibility to both law enforcement officials
and judges, it fails to create a bright line rule that officers might
rely on when out making traffic stops. The only thing clear from the Court’s
Wednesday ruling is that none of the justices were willing to go so far
as to say that officers investigating drunk driving cases must always
obtain a warrant before conducting a blood draw. Officers are instead
left to conclude that getting a warrant is the best outcome and the only
way to ensure that a drunk driving arrest is not later tossed out of court
beacuse of a constitutional concerns.
The majority opinion, written by Justice Sonia Sotomayor, found that the
natural dissipation of alcohol in a defendant’s system does not
serve as sufficient justification to ignore constitutional warrant requirements.
Justice Sotomayor wrote that officers should generally get a warrant before
conducting such a test. Emergencies that permit a deviation from this
general rule can only be decided on a case-by-case basis, though officers
should be careful and understand that these circumstances are rare and
that most cases allow for plenty of time to obtain a warrant.
In this case, the majority sided with Missouri’s Supreme Court, which
threw out a warrantless blood test obtained after an officer puled over
Tyler McNeely on suspicion of drunk driving. Justice Sotomayor wrote that
though there would be some cases that could arise where delays may justify
a blood test without judicial authorization, she did not believe that
this was often the case and that a small delay would not seriously hamper
the ability of the government to prosecute drunk drivers in the future.
In a curious alliance, Justice Sotomayor had the backing of Justices Scalia,
Kennedy, Ginsburg and Kagan. Justice Thomas was the only justice to completely
dissent, saying that he believed the dissipation of alcohol in the bloodstream
created an emergency that did not require a warrant.
Chief Justice Roberts agreed with the outcome of the case, but criticized
the vagueness of the majority’s opinion. Robert’s wrote that
a police officer reading the opinion would have no idea what the Fourth
Amendment requires of him. Though his critique was stinging, Roberts failed
to come up with a better solution. Roberts’ rule stated that if
there is time to secure a warrant then the arresting officer must secure
one. If, however, an officer can reasonably conclude there is not enough
time to secure a warrant without compromising the results of the test,
then a warrantless blood draw can proceed. Clear as mud.
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