Opinion ID: 728738
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Heading: The Exigent Circumstances Justification for Warrantless Entries

Text: 43 Having established the basic principles that inform our application of the Fourth Amendment to the instant matter, we next turn to the case law specifically addressing the circumstances under which warrantless entries into private homes are permitted. As noted above, we are compelled to start with the general rule that such warrantless entries are presumptively unreasonable. Payton v. New York, 445 U.S. 573, 586, 100 S.Ct. 1371, 1380, 63 L.Ed.2d 639 (1980). In stating this rule, the Payton Court reasoned that neither history nor this Nation's experience requires us to disregard the overriding respect for the sanctity of the home that has been embedded in our traditions since the origins of the Republic. 445 U.S. at 601, 100 S.Ct. at 1387-88 (footnote omitted). 44 However, Payton 's general rule is not without exceptions. Indeed, the Payton Court itself recognized, without considering the issue, that exigent circumstances may justify a warrantless entry into a home. 445 U.S. at 583, 100 S.Ct. at 1378. Subsequent cases have addressed the types of situations that might present such exigent circumstances. While it is not possible to articulate a succinct yet exhaustive list of circumstances that qualify as exigent, we have previously characterized the situations in which warrantless entries are justified as lying within one of four general categories: (1) hot pursuit of a fleeing felon, (2) imminent destruction of evidence, (3) the need to prevent a suspect's escape, and (4) a risk of danger to the police or others. United States v. Johnson, 22 F.3d 674, 680 (6th Cir.1994). Before returning to our analysis of the instant matter, it is instructive to review some prior cases that have considered the nature and scope of these various exigencies. In particular, we find that certain cases involving the hot pursuit and risk of danger exceptions aid our resolution of this matter. 45 The hot pursuit justification for warrantless entry into a house derives primarily from the Supreme Court cases of Warden, Maryland Penitentiary v. Hayden, 387 U.S. 294, 87 S.Ct. 1642, 18 L.Ed.2d 782 (1967), and United States v. Santana, 427 U.S. 38, 96 S.Ct. 2406, 49 L.Ed.2d 300 (1976). In Hayden, upon being informed by witnesses that an armed robber had entered a home minutes earlier, the police pursued the suspect into the home without first attempting to secure a warrant. Hayden, 387 U.S. at 297, 87 S.Ct. at 1645. Because [s]peed here was essential in order to find a suspected felon, armed, within the house into which he had run only minutes before the police arrived, the Court concluded that the warrantless entry was reasonable. 387 U.S. at 299, 87 S.Ct. at 1646. The Court reasoned that [t]he Fourth Amendment does not require police officers to delay in the course of an investigation if to do so would gravely endanger their lives or the lives of others. 387 U.S. at 298-99, 87 S.Ct. at 1646. 46 Similarly, in Santana, the Court upheld a warrantless entry into a home where the defendant, a suspect in an ongoing drug transaction, had been standing in the doorway with a brown paper bag in her hand, but had retreated into the vestibule as police officers pulled up to her house and shouted police while exiting their vehicle. Santana, 427 U.S. at 40, 43, 96 S.Ct. at 2408, 2410. The Court found that the officers' entry through the open door of the defendant's house constituted hot pursuit, and thus was permitted both under Hayden and in light of the officers' realistic expectation that any delay would result in destruction of evidence. 427 U.S. at 42-43, 96 S.Ct. at 2409-10. Moreover, because the defendant was exposed to public view in the doorway of her house, the Court found that she was not in an area where she had any expectation of privacy. 427 U.S. at 42, 96 S.Ct. at 2409. Noting that public warrantless arrests were permitted under United States v. Watson, 423 U.S. 411, 96 S.Ct. 820, 46 L.Ed.2d 598 (1976), the Santana Court reasoned that it would be anomalous to allow a suspect to evade a lawful public arrest simply by fleeing into a private residence. 427 U.S. at 42, 96 S.Ct. at 2409. 47 Turning next to the risk of danger exigency, we discover that the Supreme Court has most frequently cited this rationale for warrantless entries in cases where the Government is acting in something other than a traditional law enforcement capacity. For example, in Michigan v. Tyler, 436 U.S. 499, 509, 98 S.Ct. 1942, 1950, 56 L.Ed.2d 486 (1978), the Court recognized that [a] burning building clearly presents an exigency of sufficient proportions to render a warrantless entry 'reasonable.'  Likewise, in Camara v. Municipal Court, 387 U.S. 523, 87 S.Ct. 1727, 18 L.Ed.2d 930 (1967), the Court noted a limit to its holding that warrants are required for administrative searches: 48 Since our holding emphasizes the controlling standard of reasonableness, nothing we say today is intended to foreclose prompt inspections, even without a warrant, that the law has traditionally upheld in emergency situations. See North American Cold Storage Co. v. City of Chicago, 211 U.S. 306, 29 S.Ct. 101, 53 L.Ed. 195 (seizure of unwholesome food); Jacobson v. Commonwealth of Massachusetts, 197 U.S. 11, 25 S.Ct. 358, 49 L.Ed. 643 (compulsory smallpox vaccination); Compagnie Francaise de Navigation a Vapeur v. Louisiana State Board of Health, 186 U.S. 380, 22 S.Ct. 811, 46 L.Ed. 1209 (health quarantine); Kroplin v. Truax, 119 Ohio St. 610, 165 N.E. 498 (summary destruction of tubercular cattle). On the other hand, in the case of most routine area inspections, there is no compelling urgency to inspect at a particular time or on a particular day. 49 387 U.S. at 539, 87 S.Ct. at 1736. 50 Finally, in Welsh v. Wisconsin, 466 U.S. 740, 742-43, 753-54, 104 S.Ct. 2091, 2093-94, 2099-2100, 80 L.Ed.2d 732 (1984), the Court surveyed the various exigencies it had previously recognized, and concluded that none applied to a warrantless entry into a home in search of an apparently inebriated driver who had swerved his automobile off the road and then walked away from the scene. The Court summarily rejected most of the State's appeals to exigent circumstances: 51 The State attempts to justify the arrest by relying on the hot-pursuit doctrine, on the threat to public safety, and on the need to preserve evidence of the petitioner's blood-alcohol level. On the facts of this case, however, the claim of hot pursuit is unconvincing because there was no immediate or continuous pursuit of the petitioner from the scene of a crime. Moreover, because the petitioner had already arrived home, and had abandoned his car at the scene of the accident, there was little remaining threat to the public safety. Hence, the only potential emergency claimed by the State was the need to ascertain the petitioner's blood-alcohol level. 52 466 U.S. at 753, 104 S.Ct. at 2099. 53 Turning to the State's claimed need to preserve evidence, the Welsh Court found that this exigency was not sufficiently compelling under the facts of the case to justify a warrantless entry into a home. 466 U.S. at 754, 104 S.Ct. at 2100. The Court's determination rested primarily on the minor, noncriminal nature of the traffic offense the entering police officers were investigating. 466 U.S. at 746, 754, 104 S.Ct. at 2095-96, 2100. 4 The Court reasoned that the seriousness of the underlying offense affects the weight of the governmental interest being served by the intrusion; because this interest is at an ebb in arrests for minor offenses, the government usually should be allowed to make such arrests only with a warrant. 466 U.S. at 750, 104 S.Ct. at 2098. Thus, the Court concluded that an important factor to be considered when determining whether any exigency exists is the gravity of the underlying offense for which the arrest is being made. 466 U.S. at 753, 104 S.Ct. at 2099. 54 We readily acknowledge the hazards of venturing sweeping generalizations about the fact-specific inquiries called for under the Fourth Amendment. Nevertheless, several underlying principles emerge from our survey of the case law regarding exigent circumstances. First, the cases finding exigent circumstances uniformly cite the need for prompt action by government personnel, and conclude that delay to secure a warrant would be unacceptable under the circumstances. See, e.g., Santana, 427 U.S. at 43, 96 S.Ct. at 2410; Hayden, 387 U.S. at 299, 87 S.Ct. at 1646; Schmerber v. California, 384 U.S. 757, 770-71, 86 S.Ct. 1826, 1835-36, 16 L.Ed.2d 908 (1966). 55 Next, when considering whether exigent circumstances are present, the Court has frequently adopted a balancing approach, weighing the governmental interest being served by the intrusion against the individual interest that would be protected if a warrant were required. For example, the Welsh Court relied on this balancing of interests approach in concluding that, because the government's interest is necessarily less compelling in cases involving minor offenses, the gravity of the underlying offense is an important factor to be considered when determining whether any exigency exists. Welsh, 466 U.S. at 750-53, 104 S.Ct. at 2098-99. 56 This balancing of interests approach derives principally from the Supreme Court's decision in Camara, supra. Having concluded that warrants are required for administrative inspections, the Camara Court next had to articulate a probable cause standard that would provide meaningful protections without defeating the legitimate aims of such inspections. Noting that different governmental interests are served when public officials conduct criminal investigations versus administrative inspections, the Court reasoned that a specially tailored showing of probable cause would suffice in the administrative context: 57 Unlike the search pursuant to a criminal investigation, the [administrative] inspection programs at issue here are aimed at securing city-wide compliance with minimum physical standards for private property. The primary governmental interest at stake is to prevent even the unintentional development of conditions which are hazardous to public health and safety.... In determining whether a particular inspection is reasonable--and thus in determining whether there is probable cause to issue a warrant for that inspection--the need for the inspection must be weighed in terms of these reasonable goals of code enforcement. 58