Police using a drug dog at a home’s front door was a Fourth Amendment search.
Criminal
Lagrone v State, No. 49A05-1203-CR-135, __ U.S. __ (Ind. Ct. App., Mar. 26, 2013).
Police placement of a GPS device in a package opened by UPS did not violate the Fourth Amendment, but police use of a “parcel wire” to monitor the opening of the package once defendant had taken it into his home was an illegal search under the Fourth Amendment; police could not enter the home without a warrant under the “exigent circumstances” exception because the exigent circumstances – the wire’s alert that the package was opening – were the result of their Fourth Amendment violation.
Crider v. State, No. 91S05-1206-CR-306, __ N.E.2d __ (Ind., Mar. 21, 2013).
Defendant’s waiver of the right to appeal could not prevent his challenging on appeal the trial court’s erroneous imposition of consecutive habitual offender enhancements not agreed to in the bargain.
Dye v. State, No. 20S04-1201-CR-5, __ N.E.2d __ (Ind., Mar. 21, 2013).
“[T]he State is not . . . permitted to support [an] habitual offender finding with a conviction that arose out of the same res gestae that was the source of the conviction used to prove [defendant] was a serious violent felon.”
Bethea v. State, No. 18S05-1206-PC-304, __ N.E.2d __ (Ind., Mar. 12, 2013).
Overrules cases holding that an element of a charge dismissed by plea agreement cannot be used as an aggravating sentencing factor, and holds that instead elements or conduct involved in dismissed charges may be used in sentencing unless the parties provide otherwise in their plea agreement.