Under the totality of the circumstances, which began when an anonymous 911 caller reported that a vehicle had run her off the road, police officer had reasonable suspicion that the driver was intoxicated so that officer’s traffic stop complied with the Fourth Amendment.
SCOTUS
Fernandez v. California, No. 12-7822, __ U.S. __ (Feb. 25, 2014).
When one occupant had consented to officers’ home entry and the other had refused consent, after officers arrested the objecting occupant and then returned an hour later and again obtained the first occupant’s consent, the officers’ entry was legal.
Salinas v. Texas, No. 12-246, __ U.S.__ (June 17, 2013).
Plurality opinion concludes that, if an individual not in custody is voluntarily answering police questions and refuses or fails to answer an incriminating question, he must expressly invoke his privilege against self-incrimination when the question is asked in order to object at trial that the state’s characterizing his silence as evidence of guilt violates the privilege; opinion does not resolve whether at trial the state can use the silence as evidence of guilt if the defendant properly invokes the Fifth Amendment during the questioning.
Alleyne v. United States, No. 11-9335, __ U.S. __ (June 17, 2013).
“[A]ny fact that increases the mandatory minimum [sentence] is an ‘element’ that must be submitted to the jury.”
Maryland v. King, No. 12–207, __ U.S. __ (June 3, 2013).
When officers make an arrest supported by probable cause to hold for a serious offense and they bring the suspect to the station to be detained in custody, taking and analyzing a cheek swab of the arrestee’s DNA is, like fingerprinting and photographing, a legitimate police booking procedure that is reasonable under the Fourth Amendment.