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Does the Fourth Amendment Allow for a Forced Blood Draw after a DUI? – Part II

4/22/13

By: Sun Choy
In a previous post, I posed this question in light of the oral argument in Missouri v. McNeely. This week, the Supreme Court answered by holding that requiring a warrant under the Fourth Amendment “must be determined case by case based on the totality of the circumstances” confronting the officer. In doing so, the Court rejected the government’s bright-line test in favor of the familiar “totality of the circumstances” test. The Court was aware of the different levels of technology available to officers across the county and noted that “technological developments that enable police officers to secure warrants more quickly, and do so without undermining the neutral magistrate judge’s essential role as a check on police discretion, are relevant to an assessment of exigency.”
What I take away from this decision is that officers must be able to articulate a “plausible justification” for failing to obtain a warrant before drawing blood. If the evidence shows that the particular warrant process of the jurisdiction would not have “significantly increase[d] the delay before the blood test,” the Fourth Amendment would be violated.