Hey Officer, Didn't Someone Teach You to Knock? the Supreme Court Says No Exclusion of Evidence for Knock-and-announce Violations in Hudson v. Michigan - David Carn

• Publication year: 2007

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Hey Officer, Didn't Someone Teach You To Knock? The Supreme Court Says No Exclusion of Evidence for Knock-and-Announce Violations in Hudson v. Michigan

In Hudson v. Michigan,¹ the United States Supreme Court held in a 5-4 decision that evidence discovered by police after a knock-and-announce violation will not necessarily be excluded in court.² The majority opinion, written by Justice Scalia, stated that exclusion is only appropriate where the interests protected by the knock-and-announce requirement are implicated and that hiding evidence from the government is not one of those interests.³ The Court further held that the substantial social costs of excluding evidence discovered upon knock-and-announce violations outweigh the deterrent effects of the exclusionary rule against police misconduct and, therefore, the application of the exclusionary rule against knock-and-announce violations is unjustified.⁴

The dissent, written by Justice Breyer, claimed that the majority relied on misunderstandings of law⁵ and strongly asserted that exclusion of evidence is, and has always been, the only effective deterrent against knock-and-announce violations.⁶ Justice Kennedy concurred in part and in the judgment,⁷ but expressed reservations that a demonstration of a widespread pattern of knock-and-announce violations would be cause for grave concern.⁸

The decision has important implications for both the government and citizens. On the one hand, less incriminating evidence will be excluded at trial. But on the other hand, there is a possibility that Fourth Amendment rights will be completely disregarded at the doors of both criminals and those innocently implicated in a necessarily imperfect law enforcement system.

I. Factual Background

Police obtained a warrant to search the home of Booker Hudson for drugs and firearms, and in executing the warrant, they waited three to five seconds after announcing their presence to enter the residence through the unlocked front door.⁹ Inside the home, they found large quantities of drugs and a loaded gun between the cushion and armrest of the chair in which Hudson was sitting.¹⁰ Hudson alleged that three to five seconds was not a reasonable wait time under the Fourth Amendment knock-and-announce requirement¹¹ and moved to suppress the incriminating evidence.¹² The trial court granted his motion, but the Michigan Court of Appeals reversed, citing a number of Michigan Supreme Court cases that held "suppression is inappropriate when entry is made pursuant to [a] warrant but without proper 'knock and announce.'"¹³ The Michigan Supreme Court denied Hudson's leave to appeal, and he was convicted of drug possession. The court of appeals rejected Hudson's renewed Fourth Amendment claim, and the Michigan Supreme Court again declined review.¹⁴ The United States Supreme Court granted certiorari¹⁵ and held that the exclusionary rule does not necessarily apply to evidence seized upon a violation of the knock-and-announce rule.¹⁶

II. Legal Background

A. The Knock-and-Announce Requirement

The knock-and-announce principle was adopted from English common-law,¹⁷ embraced by early American courts and state constitutions,¹⁸ and codified by federal statute in 1917.¹⁹ In 1995 the Court in Wilson v. Arkansas²⁰ held that the requirement of officers to knock and announce their presence in execution of a warrant is an element of the reasonableness inquiry under the Fourth Amendment.²¹ The knock-and-announce requirement is currently codified at 18 U.S.C. Sec. 3109.²²

Under the knock-and-announce requirement, when executing a warrant, officers must knock, announce their presence, and wait a reasonable amount of time before forcing entry.²³ The requirement protects three main privacy interests: (1) permitting persons the opportunity to comply and peaceably admit officers into their homes, thus reducing the risk of violence;²⁴ (2) preventing unnecessary destruction of property; and (3) allowing occupants the opportunity to "prepare themselves," by, for example, "pull[ing] on clothes or get[ting] out of bed."²⁵ These interests underlie the greater policy set forth in the Fourth Amendment for citizens to be secure in their homes against unreasonable searches and seizures.²⁶

B. The Exclusionary Rule

The federal exclusionary rule was announced in the 1914 case Weeks v. United States,²⁷ where evidence seized in a warrantless search of the defendant's home was excluded at trial.²⁸ In formulating the rule, the Court relied heavily on language from its 1886 decision in Boyd v. United States.²⁹ The Court in Boyd considered the harm from Fourth Amendment violations to be not so much the actual "breaking of his doors" or the "rummaging of his drawers," but more importantly, the infringement upon the citizen's personal liberties and securities.³⁰ Weeks added that not only should these essential liberties be protected, but the tendency of government officials to infringe upon them should be deterred.³¹ Thus, the policies behind the formation of the exclusionary rule included protecting citizens' personal rights and deterring police misconduct.

C. Initial Broad Application of the Exclusionary Rule

Shortly after Weeks, the Supreme Court began expanding the application of the federal exclusionary rule. In Silverthorne Lumber Co. v. United States,³² state officials illegally seized evidence from an office and used it to form a cause of action against the defendants. The Government acknowledged the illegal seizure, but nonetheless insisted upon using the evidence obtained.³³ The Court held that the illegally seized evidence could not be used, stating that the purpose of the exclusionary rule is "not merely [that] evidence [illegally] acquired shall not be used before the Court but that it shall not be used at all."³⁴ The Court reaffirmed Silverthorne nine years later in Nardone v. United States,³⁵ and referring to excludable evidence, penned the popular phrase "fruit of the poisonous tree."³⁶

In 1961 the Court in Mapp v. Ohio³⁷ extended the exclusionary rule to the states through the Fourteenth Amendment.³⁸ Mapp suggested a very broad application of the exclusionary rule to Fourth Amendment violations.³⁹ The Court in Mapp, citing both Boyd and Weeks, also highlighted the importance of the exclusionary rule as the only effective deterrent against constitutional violations by the government.⁴⁰ The Court noted that at the time of its decision, half of the states formerly opposed to the exclusionary rule had since adopted it because they found alternative deterrents to have been "worthless" and "futile" and to have "completely failed" in practice.⁴¹ Thus, according to the Court in Mapp, the exclusionary rule was the only effective restraint against constitutional violations by the government.⁴²

Almost ten years later, in Whiteley v. Warden,⁴³ the Court cited Mapp and suggested a reflexive application⁴⁴ of the exclusionary rule to Fourth Amendment violations.⁴⁵ The broad language in Mapp and its application in Whiteley gave huge power, initially, to the exclusionary rule.

D. Restricting the Application of the Exclusionary Rule

Not long after Mapp, the Supreme Court began restricting the application of the exclusionary rule. In United States v. Calandra⁴⁶ the Court held that the rule is a remedy, not a personal right, and should only be applied as a deterrent against police misconduct.⁴⁷ Therefore, according to the Court, evidence should not be excluded where there is little deterrent effect.⁴⁸ In United States v. Leon⁴⁹ and Arizona v. Evans,⁵⁰ the Supreme Court rejected the reflexive application of the exclusionary rule suggested by Mapp and Whiteley.⁵¹ In both cases, the Court held that whether the exclusionary rule applies is a different issue from whether the police violated a person's Fourth Amendment rights.⁵² Most recently, in Pennsylvania Board of Probation & Parole v. Scott,⁵³ the Court held that the exclusionary rule should only be used if its benefit of deterrence outweighs its "'substantial social costs.'"⁵⁴ Such costs include preventing effective truth-seeking by courts and allowing the guilty to go free.⁵⁵ Thus, the recent trend in the Court's application of the exclusionary rule shows a non-reflexive application of the rule to constitutional violations and a balancing of the rule's social costs with its benefits as a deterrent.

E. Exceptions to the Exclusionary Rule

The exclusionary rule's application has been restricted through a number of exceptions. Two principle exceptions are (1) the attenuation exception and (2) the inevitable discovery exception.⁵⁶

1. The Attenuation Exception. Attenuation occurs when the causal connection between the illegal government conduct and the discovery of evidence is so remote as to "dissipate the taint" from the illegal conduct.⁵⁷ This concept was briefly noted in Nardone.⁵⁸ Almost twenty-five years later, the Court in Wong Sun v. United States⁵⁹ used the attenuation analysis to include a defendant's statement that was sufficiently attenuated from the government's illegal conduct. Wong Sun had been arrested illegally, but he voluntarily returned to the police days after being released and gave a statement.⁶⁰ The Court held that the statement was admissible because the connection between the voluntary statement and the illegal arrest "'had become so attenuated as to dissipate the taint.'"⁶¹

The Supreme Court has also held that interests relating to the exclusionary rule, as well as those protected by the Fourth Amendment, are factors in the attenuation analysis.⁶² In United States v. Cecco-lini,⁶³ a police officer was on break inside a store and engaged in casual conversation with an employee when he discovered an envelope full of money and gambling slips. The officer asked the employee to whom the envelope belonged, and the employee told the officer that Ceccolini had left it with her and given her instructions to give it to someone. Five months later, Ceccolini denied...