SCOTUSblog has named a cert petition filed by the Maryland Public Defender “petition of the day“!! Here are the issues:
1. Under the exception to the warrant requirement announced in Arizona v. Gant, 556 U.S. 332, 343 (2009), permitting a vehicular search incident to a recent occupant’s arrest “when it is reasonable to believe evidence relevant to the crime of arrest might be found in the vehicle,” what quantum of particularized suspicion is required by the Fourth Amendment to justify the search?
2. May the unquantified experience of the arresting officer, alone, supply the necessary particularized suspicion to justify the vehicular search?
Wisconsin, which has trimmed the Fourth Amendment down to more like a Three and a Half Amendment, follows a per se rule requiring no particularized suspicion. See State v. Smiter, 2011 WI App 15. Under this rule, a belief is reasonable, and an officer may search a vehicle, when the recent occupant’s offense of arrest is a non-traffic infraction that could generate physical evidence. On Point will keep you posted on this petition.
Here’s hoping our Maryland comrades get their cert petition granted–even (or especially) without an amicus brief! See post below.
