By Michael Hill
Correspondent
New Jersey law enforcers welcome the State Supreme Court’s recent decision making it easier again to search cars.
“I think for law enforcement it was long over due. It’s something we look for, guidance from the courts, and this decision really puts us on the right path to where we should be in the state of New Jersey to protect rights of individuals,” said Mahwah Police Chief, James Batelli.
By a slim majority in 2009, the court upheld police searching cars without a warrant when they had probable cause to believe the car contained evidence and they could demonstrate some “exigent” or pressing circumstance — such as safety concerns, or worries that the evidence would disappear while applying for a warrant.
“The Pena-Flores decision was flawed. It was unrealistic to think that law enforcement could get warrants at 2 o’clock in the morning on weekends, on holidays and that’s what it wanted,” said Batelli.
Last week, the court reversed itself. It ruled that police could search without a warrant just based on probable cause, taking searches back to the federal standard.
Writing for the majority, Justice Barry Albin said, “The exigent-circumstances standard set forth in Pena-Flores is unsound in principle and unworkable in practice.”
“This is designed to make certain that searches are done promptly when they’re to be done and that people don’t have to necessarily be arrested, taken back to a police station until a warrant can be obtained,” said Assistant Attorney General Ron Susswein.
In demonstrations, Mahwah Police Officer Russell Read demonstrates how to apply the court’s latest ruling. This was his probable cause to search.
“I smell an odor of marijuana coming from inside the vehicle. Have you been smoking anything tonight? No? Is there a reason why that greenish-brown vegetation in the center console is there?” he asked.
Based on that, Officer Read says he does not have to apply and wait for a warrant — he has probable cause to search.
“The federal standard is the way we should be conducting our business,” Read said.
“They stripped privacy protections from all New Jerseyans,” said Senior Staff Attorney for ACLU NJ Alexander Shalom.
The NJ ACLU says the state Attorney General challenged the 2009 decision with another case and New Jersey’s highest court gave the Attorney General a road map for what it had to do to reverse that 2009 decision. As the court’s makeup changed, the Attorney General brought another case.
“And the state came back before the court in this Witt case having not done what they were told they needed to do. Instead, they said, ‘We’re really afraid things could get bad.’ They didn’t show things had gotten bad. They had these speculative conclusions of gloom and doom of what would happen. None of it had happened, but they said it could be bad. And that’s what the court wound up accepting,” Shalom said.
The vote was 5 to 2. One of the dissenting justices said her colleagues – the majority – were taking the wrong turn.
Justice Jaynee LaVecchia wrote, “One can only wonder why the state and the majority of this Court find it appropriate to turn from the progressive approach historically taken in this state to privacy and constitutional rights of motorists. I cannot join this backward step.”
In an apparent shot at the Attorney General’s office, Justice LaVecchia also wrote, “Persistence has paid off.”
“Frankly from an advocates’ perspective, whether intended or now, that’s a compliment,” said Susswein.
The decision of the state’s highest court applies to vehicle searches after September 24.