Court Opinion

ID: 9434614
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:52:35.410464+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:23:42.643699
License: Public Domain

Justice O’Connor,
concurring in part.
I join all but footnote 4 of the Court’s opinion. Although the opinion is a logical extension of the holding of New York v. Belton, 453 U. S. 454 (1981), I write separately to express my dissatisfaction with the state of the law in this area. As Justice Scalia forcefully argues, post, at 627-629 (opinion concurring in judgment), lower court decisions seem now to treat the ability to search a vehicle incident to the arrest of a recent occupant as a police entitlement rather than as an exception justified by the twin rationales of Chimel v. California, 395 U. S. 752 (1969). That erosion is a direct consequence of Belton’s shaky foundation. While the approach *625Justice Scalia proposes appears to be built on firmer ground, I am reluctant to adopt it in the context of a case in which neither the Government nor the petitioner has had a chance to speak to its merit.