Jersey Court Rejects Federal “Good Faith” Exception to the Warrant Requirement
In the recent case of State v. Handy, the Appellate Division held that evidence seized during the arrest of the defendant must be suppressed where a dispatcher incorrectly informed the arresting officer that there was a warrant outstanding for the arrest of the defendant. This is a departure from federal law, under which evidence will not be suppressed if the officer acted under a “good faith” reliance on a defective search warrant.
In this case, when defendant was confronted by the police officer, he told the officer that his name was “Germaine Handy” (which he spelled for the officer), and that his date of birth was March 18, 1974. The officer then called in the name to his dispatcher, and the dispatcher advised the officer that there was an outstanding warrant for the defendant. The officer then arrested defendant, and during a search of the defendant’s person incident to the arrest, he discovered marijuana and crack cocaine. While defendant was being transported to headquarters, the dispatcher informed the officer that there was a discrepancy in the warrant, in that it listed the individual’s date of birth as March 14, 1972.
The officer later discovered another discrepancy that was not reported by the dispatcher – the spelling of the name of the person on the warrant was “Jermaine O. Handy.” During the suppression hearing, the State did not offer any evidence that the defendant in this matter was the same person who was listed on the warrant. The motion judge who heard the motion to suppress held that the dispatcher’s behavior was unreasonable; however, the judge did not suppress the evidence because the arresting officer’s actions in arresting and searching the defendant were reasonable in light of the information that was provided to him.
In analyzing the legal issues raised in this case, the Appellate Division first noted that New Jersey, unlike the federal courts, does not recognize a “good faith” exception to the exclusionary rule. The exclusionary rule provides that evidence seized in violation of a defendant’s constitutional right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures cannot be used by prosecutors at trial. However, even in New Jersey, evidence seized by police pursuant to a defective warrant will not be excluded if police acted in an objectively reasonable manner based on the facts known to the officer at the time of the search.
The Appellate Division then noted that the United States Supreme Court has examined, on two prior occasions, the issue of whether the exclusionary rule applies when someone other than the arresting officer acted unreasonably. In Arizona v. Evans, the exclusionary rule was held not to apply where a court clerk failed to update the computer system to reflect that the warrant issued for the defendant had been quashed. In Herring v. United States, the Supreme Court held that the exclusionary rule did not apply where a warrant clerk, who was a law enforcement employee, failed to update the database to reflect that the warrant had been recalled.
The Appellate Division distinguished the facts of this case by noting that this case did not involve a past clerical error; rather, this case involved a dispatcher’s failure to report significant discrepancies to the officer between the warrant and the information provided by the defendant at the time of his arrest. Had these discrepancies been reported to the officer, the officer would have attempted to verify whether the warrant was for this defendant prior to, rather than after his arrest. Because the officer would not have been able to verify the warrant, the arrest and subsequent search would never have taken place.
The Appellate Division noted that one of the most significant rationales behind the exclusionary rule is to deter police from conducting unreasonable searches and seizure. Based on the facts of this case, where a dispatcher completely failed to report significant discrepancies between the warrant and the information provided by the arrestee, there is significant deterrent value in applying the exclusionary rule in order to ensure that in future cases, dispatchers will take greater care in providing officers with correct information.
This case illustrates that there are often significant defenses that can be raised in a criminal matter that may result in charges being dropped or a conviction being reversed. Both the United States Constitution and the Constitution of New Jersey provide protection to citizens from unreasonable and illegal searches and seizure; therefore any criminal defendant in New Jersey should consult with a New Jersey criminal defense lawyer on the applicability of defenses such as the exclusionary rule.
