Oregon v. McCarthy
Annotate this CaseDefendant Charles McCarthy moved to suppress evidence that law enforcement officers obtained during a warrantless search of a truck. Defendant had been driving the truck when officers stopped it for a traffic violation. During the stop, the officers developed probable cause to believe that the truck contained contraband. Although the stop occurred on a weekday afternoon near the county courthouse and the officers had mobile phones and a computer, the officers did not attempt to contact a magistrate to obtain a warrant to search the truck. Instead, they searched it without a warrant. At the time of the search, the truck was lawfully parked in a parking lot and defendant had been arrested. In his motion to suppress, defendant argued that the warrantless search was unconstitutional. The state argued the warrantless search of the truck was justified under the “automobile exception” to the warrant requirement. The trial court rejected the state’s argument, reasoning that the automobile exception was premised on the existence of exigent circumstances, and the state had failed to prove that exigent circumstances existed at the time the officers searched the truck. The state appealed, and the Court of Appeals reversed on the ground that, under Oregon v. Brown, 721 P2d 1357 (1986), exigent circumstances were presumed to exist if a vehicle was mobile when it was stopped by the police, regardless of whether there was an actual exigency after that point. Applying Brown’s “ ‘per se exigency rule,’” the Court of Appeals held that all the state was required to show was that the truck was mobile at the time it was stopped by the officers and that the officers had probable cause to search it. The Oregon Supreme Court overruled Brown’s per se exigency rule and held that, in order to justify a warrantless seizure or search of a vehicle based on exigent circumstances, the state had to prove that exigent circumstances actually existed at the time of the seizure or search. Because the state did not do so here, the Supreme Court concluded the trial court correctly granted defendant’s motion to suppress.
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