Tomorrow's Argument in Hudson v. Michigan
SCOTUS BLOG
By Jesse Panuccio
On Monday the Court will hear arguments in Hudson v. Michigan, No. 04-1360, which asks whether evidence seized pursuant to a valid warrant but subsequent to a Fourth Amendment knock-and-announce violation need be excluded from trial.
On the afternoon of August 27, 1998, seven Detroit police officers approached the home of Booker T. Hudson seeking to execute a valid search warrant for narcotics and weapons. Upon reaching the door, several officers shouted, "Police, search warrant," but did not actually knock on the door. After waiting only three to five seconds (a time period that Officer Jamal Good described as lasting "about how long it took me to go in the door"), the officers opened the unlocked door and proceeded into the home. Officer Good testified that this rapid entry was motivated by a concern for officer safety (a concern prompted by his previous experiences of having been shot at during narcotics raids). Upon entering, the officers found Hudson sitting in the living room and several other people running throughout the house. On Hudson's person, the police discovered five rocks of crack cocaine. Elsewhere in the house police found numerous baggies of cocaine and a loaded revolver.
Hudson was charged in the Wayne County Circuit Court with possession of cocaine with intent to deliver and with possession of a firearm during commission of a felony. Hudson moved to suppress the evidence found in his home on the ground that the failure to knock and announce before entering violated the Fourth Amendment and Michigan law. While the motion was pending, the Michigan Supreme Court held, in People v. Stevens, that the inevitable discovery exception to the exclusionary rule applies to evidence seized subsequent to a Fourth Amendment knock-and-announce violation. The Stevens court reasoned that the "evidence would have been discovered despite any police misconduct" and construed Supreme Court precedent to require a "causal relationship between the violation and the seizing of the evidence to warrant the sanction of suppression"--a condition not met in most knock-and-announce violations. At Hudson's suppression hearing, however, the trial court ruled in the defendant's favor following the prosecution's concession that the officers ran afoul of the knock-and-announce requirement. The state successfully appealed to the Michigan Court of Appeals, arguing that Stevens required reversal of the trial court's order. Hudson filed an application for leave to appeal to the Michigan Supreme Court, asserting that Stevens was wrongly decided. The Michigan high court reaffirmed Stevens and denied the application. Hudson returned to the circuit court for a two-day bench trial and was acquitted of the intent-to-distribute charge and the firearms charge, but was convicted of possession of cocaine. The judge sentenced Hudson to eighteen months' probation. The Michigan Court of Appeals affirmed the conviction and the Michigan Supreme Court again denied Hudson's application for leave to appeal. Hudson filed a petition for certiorari, which the U.S. Supreme Court granted on June 27, 2005.
Professor David Moran of Wayne State University will argue the case for the petitioner. Timothy Baughman will argue on behalf of the state, and will share time with David Salmons from the Solicitor General's office, who is arguing as amicus curiae in support of the respondent. |
