Criminal Procedure Case Brief/Opinion: Arizona v. Gant Facts: In Arizona v.

Gant, law enforcement officers arrested Gant for driving with a suspended license. Officers approached Gant after he had just exited his car and was walking towards a friend's house. The officers handcuffed and locked Gant in the back of their police car. Then the officers conducted a warrantless search of Gant's vehicle. During the search, they discovered cocaine in the pocket of a jacket found in the passenger compartment. Gant moved to suppress the evidence of the cocaine, arguing that the search of his vehicle violated his rights under the Fourth Amendment. Gant asserted that Chimel v. California permits officers to conduct warrantless searches only if the officers have reason to believe that the search will protect the officers from harm or prevent the destruction of evidence. Neither of the rationales for conducting warrantless searches existed at the time of the search because Gant was unable to reach a weapon nor destroy evidence located in his vehicle. In response, the State argued that the search was lawful because New York v. Belton established a clearly defined rule that permits officers to search a vehicle incident to an arrest without a warrant. The Supreme Court of the United States granted certiorari to decide whether an exception to the Fourth Amendment permitted a warrantless search of Gant's vehicle after officers arrested and secured Gant in the back of a patrol car. The Court held that the warrantless search of Gant's vehicle after officers secured Gant away from the vehicle violated his rights under the Fourth Amendment. The Court reasoned that the search incident to arrest exception only permits searches of the passenger compartment if "the arrestee is within reaching distance of the passenger compartment at the time of the search." The Court discussed how Belton created confusion among the lower courts regarding whether the search-incident-to-arrest exceptions requires that the arrestee be able to gain access

to the vehicle at the time of the search. The majority of courts interpreted Belton to create a bright-line rule through which officers may search the passenger compartment incident to an arrest even if the arrestee could not gain access to the vehicle. However, the Court rejected this interpretation of Belton and held that Belton must be limited to those circumstances where the officers need to conduct a search for their safety or to prevent the destruction of evidence. As a result, the court created the new rule that officers may search the vehicle incident to an arrest only when the arrestee is within reaching distance of the passenger compartment at the time of the search, or the vehicle contains evidence of the offense of the arrest. Justice Scalia concurred with the majority, however, he disagreed with the majority's narrowing of Belton. He also criticized how the majority extended Belton into an artificial new rule. In contrast to the majority, Scalia interpreted Belton to automatically permit an officer to search the passenger compartment incident to a lawful arrest of the vehicle's recent occupant. Scalia argued that the court should overrule Belton and put forth the standard that a vehicle search incident to arrest is only reasonable when the vehicle may contain evidence of the crime for which the arrest was made, or of another crime for which the officers have probable cause. My analysis: I agree with Scalia and argue that the Supreme Court should have explicitly overruled Belton. The rule that the majority put forth changed the search incident to arrest exception found in Belton, but by not directly stating that they were overruling precedent, the Court created more confusion for officers, lawyers, and law students trying to learn and apply the rules. I also agree with Scalia that the Court should have produced a new rule which permits officers to search a vehicle incident to an arrest only when the officers believe that the vehicle contains evidence of the crime for which the passenger was arrested. In contrast to Scalia, I don't

believe that the Court needs to extend their holding to also permit officers to search the vehicle if they have probable cause that the vehicle contains evidence of another crime. The Court already held in Carroll v. US that officers are permitted to search a vehicle without a warrant if they have probable cause. Although officers may still conduct a thorough search of the vehicle through an inventory search, limiting the holding in Gant to only permitting searches of the vehicle for evidence of the crime for which the passenger was arrested, provides a safeguard that officers will not conduct excessive searches to look for evidence. After officers arrest the passenger, officers may conduct an inventory search of the car without suspicion and without a warrant. The rationale behind the inventory search is to protect the officer from false claims and protect the passenger's valuables. In order to conduct an inventory search, officers must arrest the passenger and prepare to impound the vehicle. Inventory searches are heavily regulated and direct officers in the type of search they may conduct. As a result, although inventory searches enable officers to bypass Gant and eventually search the vehicle, the strict guidelines and time that an inventory search takes may deter an officer from proceeding with the arrest and search, and thus maintaining the passenger's rights to privacy and property.