Opinion ID: 3202267
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Community Caretaking Doctrine

Text: The community caretaking doctrine originated in the United States Supreme Court‟s decision in Cady v. Dombrowski, 413 U.S. 433 (1973). In Cady, Chicago police officer Chester Dombrowski, while on a visit to Wisconsin, reported to local authorities that he had been involved in an automobile accident. Under the mistaken impression that Chicago police officers were required to carry their service revolvers at all times and having found no revolver on Dombrowski‟s person, one of the responding officers looked for the weapon in the front seat and glove compartment of his disabled vehicle but found nothing. Id. The vehicle was then towed to a privately owned garage, where it was left in an unsecured area. Id. After Dombrowski was arrested for drunken driving and taken to a local hospital, one of the officers returned to the vehicle without a warrant to search again for the revolver in order “to protect the public from the possibility that [it] would fall into untrained or perhaps malicious hands.” Id. at 443. In the trunk of the vehicle, the officer found and seized numerous items that linked Dombrowski to a recent homicide, id. at 437, and ultimately these items were used as evidence to obtain his conviction for first-degree murder, id. at 438-39. Dombrowski argued these items were illegally seized in violation of the Fourth Amendment and should have been excluded from evidence. Rejecting Dombrowski‟s constitutional argument, the United States Supreme Court upheld the warrantless search of Dombrowski‟s vehicle as reasonable because it was undertaken pursuant to the officer‟s “community caretaking functions, totally divorced from the detection, investigation, or acquisition of evidence relating to the violation of a criminal statute.” Id. at 441. The Court also emphasized the lesser expectation of privacy associated with motor vehicles, explaining: Because of the extensive regulation of motor vehicles and traffic, and also because of the frequency with which a vehicle can become disabled or involved in an accident on public highways, the extent of police-citizen contact involving automobiles will be substantially greater than police-citizen contact in a home or office. . . . .... The Court‟s previous recognition of the distinction between motor vehicles and dwelling places leads us to conclude that the type of caretaking “search” conducted here . . . was not unreasonable solely because a warrant had not been obtained. Id. at 441, 447-48; see also id. at 442 (“The constitutional difference between searches of and seizures from houses and similar structures and from vehicles stems both from the ambulatory character of the latter and from the fact that extensive, and often noncriminal -8- contact with automobiles will bring local officials in „plain view‟ of evidence, fruits, or instrumentalities of a crime, or contraband.”).7 The United States Supreme Court has not revisited the community caretaking doctrine since its decision in Cady.8 However, an overwhelming majority of lower federal courts and state courts have consistently described and applied the doctrine as an exception to the Fourth Amendment‟s warrant requirement.9 This widespread adoption 7 There is a split of authority among state and federal courts as to whether the community caretaking doctrine should extend beyond the context of automobiles to residences. Macdonald v. Town of Eastham, 946 F.Supp.2d 235, 241-42 (D. Mass. 2013) (collecting cases); Gregory T. Helding, Stop Hammering Fourth Amendment Rights: Reshaping the Community Caretaking Exception with the Physical Intrusion Standard, 97 Marq. L. Rev. 123, 140-48 (2013) (collecting and analyzing state and federal cases). We need not concern ourselves with that issue because this appeal involves only a parked vehicle. 8 The Supreme Court has twice applied Cady to hold that reasonable warrantless inventory searches of impounded vehicles are permissible. See Colorado v. Bertine, 479 U.S. 367, 372 (1987); South Dakota v. Opperman, 428 U.S. 364, 368-69, 375-76 (1976). 9 See United States v. Cervantes, 703 F.3d 1135, 1140 (9th Cir. 2012) (considering “whether the impoundment and subsequent inventory search of [the defendant‟s] vehicle were justified by the community caretaking exception to the Fourth Amendment‟s warrant requirement”); Ray v. Twp. of Warren, 626 F.3d 170, 174-77 (3d Cir. 2010) (describing the community caretaking doctrine as an exception to the warrant requirement but refusing to apply it to justify warrantless searches of homes); Lockhart-Bembery v. Sauro, 498 F.3d 69, 75 (1st Cir. 2007) (observing that the question is not “whether there was a seizure” because, “under the community caretaking doctrine, police action can be constitutional notwithstanding the fact that it constitutes a seizure”); United States v. Coccia, 446 F.3d 233, 237-38 (1st Cir. 2006) (stating that there are exceptions to the warrant requirement, “including the community caretaking exception”); United States v. Garner, 416 F.3d 1208, 1213 (10th Cir. 2005) (discussing the community caretaking exception to the warrant requirement); United States v. Johnson, 410 F.3d 137, 144-45 (4th Cir. 2005) (applying the “community caretaking exception” to uphold a warrantless search of a vehicle‟s glove compartment); Williams v. State, 962 A.2d 210, 216 (Del. 2008) (recognizing the “„community caretaker‟ or „public safety‟ doctrine” as an “exception” to the warrant requirement); Hawkins v. United States, 113 A.3d 216, 221-22 (D.C. 2015) (recognizing the community caretaking exception and adopting a four-part test to determine whether the exception applies); People v. Luedemann, 857 N.E.2d 187, 198-99 (Ill. 2006) (“[T]he „community caretaking‟ doctrine is analytically distinct from consensual encounters and is invoked to validate a search or seizure as reasonable under the [F]ourth [A]mendment.”); State v. Crawford, 659 N.W.2d 537, 543 (Iowa 2003) (“Implicit in any community caretaking case is the fact that there has been a seizure within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment. Otherwise there would be no need to apply a community caretaking exception.”); In re J.M.E., 162 P.3d 835, 839 (Kan. Ct. App. 2007) (describing the community caretaking doctrine as an “exception” to the Fourth Amendment); Poe v. Commonwealth, 169 S.W.3d 54, 56-59 (Ky. Ct. App. 2005) (recognizing the community caretaking exception); Wilson v. State, 975 A.2d 877, 891 (Md. 2009) (recognizing that the community caretaking doctrine functions as an exception and enunciating a test for its application); Commonwealth v. Fisher, 13 N.E.3d 629, 632-34 (Mass. App. Ct. 2014) (discussing the purpose, application, and importance of the community caretaking doctrine as an exception to the warrant requirement); People v. Slaughter, 803 N.W.2d 171, 180 (Mich. 2011) (describing the community caretaking doctrine as an exception to the warrant requirement); Trejo v. State, 76 So. 3d 684, 689 (Miss. -9- of the community caretaking doctrine as an exception to the warrant requirement reflects the reality that modern society expects police officers to fulfill various responsibilities. See Ullom v. Miller, 705 S.E.2d 111, 120 (W.Va. 2010) (“[L]aw enforcement personnel are expected to engage in activities and interact with citizens in a number of ways beyond the investigation of criminal conduct. Such activities include a general safety and welfare role for police officers in helping citizens who may be in peril or who may otherwise be in need of some form of assistance.”). Police officers wear many hats: criminal investigator, first aid provider, social worker, crisis intervener, family counselor, youth mentor and peacemaker, to name a few. They are charged with the duty to protect 2011) (recognizing “the community caretaking exception” to the warrant requirement); State v. Graham, 175 P.3d 885, 890 (Mont. 2007) (“The community caretaker doctrine . . . is a recognized exception to the Fourth Amendment‟s and [the Montana Constitution‟s] prohibitions against unreasonable searches and seizures.”); State v. Bakewell, 730 N.W.2d 335, 338 (Neb. 2007) (“[W]e hereby adopt the community caretaking exception to the Fourth Amendment.”); State v. Rincon, 147 P.3d 233, 237 (Nev. 2006) (adopting the community caretaking exception to the Fourth Amendment); State v. Boutin, 13 A.3d 334, 337-38 (N.H. 2010) (discussing prior New Hampshire cases applying the community caretaking exception); State v. Edmonds, 47 A.3d 737, 752 (N.J. 2012) (“The community-caretaking doctrine is an exception to the warrant requirement . . . .”); State v. Ryon, 108 P.3d 1032, 1041 (N.M. 2005) (acknowledging that its earlier description of community caretaking as a form of consensual encounter “was wrong” and cautioning that certain prior decisions should “not be viewed as limiting the community caretaker exception to voluntary or consensual police-citizen encounters”); State v. Smathers, 753 S.E.2d 380, 384 (N.C. Ct. App. 2014) (recognizing the community caretaking doctrine as an exception to the Fourth Amendment warrant requirement); State v. Dunn, 964 N.E.2d 1037, 1042 (Ohio 2012) (recognizing “the community-caretaking/emergency-aid exception to the Fourth Amendment warrant requirement”); Coffia v. State, 191 P.3d 594, 597-98 (Okla. Crim. App. 2008) (discussing the community caretaking exception to the Fourth Amendment); State v. Wood, 149 P.3d 1265, 1267-68 (Or. Ct. App. 2006) (describing an Oregon statute as a community caretaking exception to the warrant requirement); State v. Deneui, 775 N.W.2d 221, 235 (S.D. 2009) (recognizing and applying the community caretaking exception); Wright v. State, 7 S.W.3d 148, 151-52 (Tex. Crim. App. 1999) (en banc) (describing Cady as recognizing “a community caretaking function of law enforcement as a reasonable exception to the Fourth Amendment‟s warrant requirement” and acknowledging “the existence of the community caretaking function in Texas”); Provo City v. Warden, 844 P.2d 360, 363-65 (Utah Ct. App. 1992) (upholding a “seizure” as reasonable under the Fourth Amendment based on the community caretaking doctrine); State v. Ford, 998 A.2d 684, 689 (Vt. 2010) (recognizing “community caretaking” as a separate “exception” to the Fourth Amendment warrant requirement); Knight v. Commonwealth, 734 S.E.2d 716, 720 (Va. Ct. App. 2012) (“Virginia recognizes a „community caretaker‟ exception to the Fourth Amendment warrant requirement.”); State v. Kinzy, 5 P.3d 668, 676 (Wash. 2000) (en banc) (“The community caretaking function exception recognizes that a person may encounter police officers in situations involving not only emergency aid, but also involving a routine check on health and safety.”); Ullom v. Miller, 705 S.E.2d 111, 120 (W. Va. 2010) (“The „community caretaker‟ doctrine is a widely recognized exception to the general warrant requirement of the Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution.”); State v. Kramer, 759 N.W.2d 598, 603-06, 608-12 (Wis. 2009) (discussing and applying the community caretaking exception). - 10 - people, not just from criminals, but also from accidents, natural perils and even self-inflicted injuries. We ask them to protect our property from all types of losses—even those occasioned by our own negligence. They counsel our youth. They quell disputes between husband and wife, parent and child, landlord and tenant, merchant and patron and quarreling neighbors. Although they search for clues to solve crime, they also search for missing children, parents, dementia patients, and occasionally even an escaped zoo animal. They are society‟s problem solvers when no other solution is apparent or available. State v. Matalonis, 875 N.W.2d 567, 576-77 (Wis. 2016) (quoting Ortiz v. State, 24 So. 3d 596, 607 n.5 (Fla. Dist. Ct. App. 2009) (Torpy, J., concurring and concurring specially)).