Court Opinion

ID: 9791642
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 02:15:06.142429+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:37:37.557652
License: Public Domain

OPINION
ZLAKET, Justice.
The court of appeals, with one judge dissenting, held that the trial court abused its discretion in granting defendant’s motion to suppress. State v. Evans, 172 Ariz. 314, 836 P.2d 1024 (Ct.App.1992). We disagree and vacate the appellate court’s opinion.
Defendant was stopped for a traffic violation on January 5,1991. At the time, he had a suspended driver’s license. Neither of these offenses, however, precipitated his eventual arrest. The police officer testified at the suppression hearing that he would not have placed defendant under arrest if a computerized records check had not indicated the existence of an outstanding misdemeanor arrest warrant in his name.
While making the arrest, the officer found part of a marijuana cigarette on defendant’s person. A subsequent search of his vehicle revealed a bag of marijuana hidden under the passenger seat. Defendant was charged with possession, a class 6 felony.
The computerized record was in error. In fact, the arrest warrant had been quashed by the issuing justice court several weeks earlier. For some reason, it was not expunged from the computer. At the suppression hearing, there was conflicting evidence concerning whether this mistake was caused by the court staff or law enforcement employees. The trial court apparently concluded that it made little difference who was at fault. Relying on State v. Greene, 162 Ariz. 383, 783 P.2d 829 (Ct.App.1989), which applied the exclusionary rule where police personnel were negligent in maintaining computer records, the judge granted defendant’s motion to suppress the evidence seized during the arrest. Thereafter, the state dismissed the charges without prejudice and brought this appeal.
The court of . appeals ruled that the evidence should not have been suppressed. The majority concluded that Greene did not apply because the mistake here, more probably than not, was made by justice court employees instead of law enforcement personnel. The appeals court relied primarily on Michigan v. Tucker, 417 U.S. 433, 94 S.Ct. 2357, 41 L.Ed.2d 182 (1974) and United States v. Leon, 468 U.S. 897, 104 S.Ct. 3430, 82 *203L.Ed.2d 677 (1984) in holding that “the exclusionary rule is intended to deter police misconduct and not to punish errors of judges and magistrates,” and therefore should not have been utilized in this case. 172 Ariz. at 317, 836 P.2d at 1027.1
We do not agree that the trial court abused its discretion under the facts present ed. We are unable to follow the lead of the court of appeals in dismissing conflicting inferences raised by evidence on the issue of whether fault rested with the justice court, the police, or both. See id. at 316 n. 1, 836 P.2d at 1026 n. 1. Testimony at the suppression hearing failed to clearly establish whether a telephone call from the court to the police, advising that the warrant had been quashed, was made but not entered in the record, or was never made at all. The trial judge was concerned about this gap in the proof, as evidenced by his questions during the hearing. He ultimately made no express finding with respect to responsibility for the error, apparently concluding that it did not matter. But even assuming, as did the appellate court majority, that responsibility for the error rested with the justice court, it does not follow that the exclusionary rule should be inapplicable to these facts.
Tucker is of little value here. In that case, the court was dealing with alleged violations of the 5th, 6th and 14th amendments arising from the failure of police to have given “Miranda warnings” as part of an interrogation that antedated the decision in Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966).
Lem is also not helpftd. There, officers obtained evidence on the basis of a facially valid search warrant issued by a neutral magistrate. The warrant was later held invalid because it had been issued on an insufficient showing of probable cause. Such a situation is distinguishable from one like this, where no warrant at all was in existence at the time of the arrest. See State v. Peterson, 171 Ariz. 333, 830 P.2d 854 (Ct.App.1991), cert. denied, — U.S.-, 113 S.Ct. 465, 121 L.Ed.2d 373 (1992); see also 1 Wayne R. LaFave, Search and Seizure § 1.3(g) at 77 (1986). This warrantless arrest, based entirely as it was on an erroneous computer entry, was plainly illegal.
The state argues that the police could have arrested defendant for various traffic violations, and this inevitably would have resulted in the discovery of the contraband. The record clearly establishes, however, that no arrest would have occurred in the absence of the flawed computer record. At most, defendant would have received a traffic citation.
The “good faith” analysis advanced by the state is of questionable application here. This case is not about the motives of the police. The fact that the arresting officer acted in good faith is irrelevant. 2 Wayne R. LaFave, Search and Seizure § 3.5(d) at 24 (1986); see also People v. Fields, 785 P.2d 611 (Colo.1990). The arrest was not the result of “a reasonable judgmental error” concerning facts which might constitute probable cause. A.R.S. § 13-3925(C)(1). It was the result of negligent record keeping. Whether the erroneous computer record was the fault of police or justice court personnel should be of no consequence even though, as we have noted, evidence on this point was by no means as clear as the state now suggests.
This is also not a case involving a mere “technical violation.” A.R.S. § 13-3925(C)(2). Defendant was arrested on the basis of a nonexistent warrant, not one that was “later invalidated due to a good faith mistake.” Id. See also United States v. Whiting, 781 F.2d 692 (9th Cir.1986) (summarily rejecting extension of Lem’s good faith exception to warrantless searches).
We cannot support the distinction drawn by the court of appeals and the dissent between clerical errors committed by law enforcement personnel and similar mistakes by court employees. We are concerned here *204with the performance of purely ministerial functions, not the exercise of judicial discretion. While it may be inappropriate to invoke the exclusionary rule where a magistrate has issued a facially valid warrant (a discretionary judicial function) based on an erroneous evaluation of the facts, the law, or both, Leon, 468 U.S. 897, 104 S.Ct. 3430, 82 L.Ed.2d 677 (1984), it is useful and proper to do so where negligent record keeping (a purely clerical function) results in an unlawful arrest. Such an application will hopefully serve to improve the efficiency of those who keep records in our criminal justice system.
The dissent laments the “high costs” of the exclusionary rule, and suggests that its application here is “purposeless” and provides “no offsetting benefits.” Such an assertion ignores the fact that arrest warrants result in a denial of human liberty, and are therefore among the most important of legal documents. It is repugnant to the principles of a free society that a person should ever be taken into police custody because of a computer error precipitated by government carelessness. As automation increasingly invades modern life, the potential for Orwellian mischief grows. Under such circumstances, the exclusionary rule is a “cost” we cannot afford to be without.2
Even assuming that deterrence is the principal reason for application of the exclusionary rule, we disagree with the court of appeals that such a purpose would not be served where carelessness by a court clerk results in an unlawful arrest. It also seems to us an anomalous rule, indeed, that would prohibit the use of evidence illegally seized pursuant to the clerical error of a police department clerk, but would permit it if the same mistake was made instead by a court clerk.
We hold that the trial judge did not abuse his discretion, and we vacate the court of appeals’ opinion.
FELDMAN, C.J., MOELLER, V.C.J., and CORCORAN, J., concur.

. It is unnecessary to analyze here the purposes to be served by the exclusionary rule. We note only that deterrence of police misconduct is but one of the reasons that have been advanced in support of its use. See, e.g., Mapp v. Ohio, 367 U.S. 643, 655, 81 S.Ct. 1684, 1691, 6 L.Ed.2d 1081 (1961); Weeks v. United States, 232 U.S. 383, 392, 34 S.Ct. 341, 344, 58 L.Ed. 652 (1914).

. In fact, the evidence suggests that this cost is insubstantial. As one commentator notes, "[t]o date, the most careful and balanced assessment of all available empirical data shows ‘that the general level of the rule’s effects on criminal prosecutions is marginal at most.’ " 1 Wayne R. LaFave, Search and Seizure § 1.3(c) at 52 (1986) (quoting T. Davies, A Hard Look at What We Know (and Still Need to Learn) About the “Costs” of the Exclusionary Rule: The NIJ Study and Other Studies of “Lost” Arrests, 1983 Am.B.Found.Research J. 611, 622); see also Peter F. Nardulli, The Societal Cost of the Exclusionary Rule: An Empirical Assessment, 1983 Am.B.Found.Research J. 585, 606-07; Peter F. Nardulli, The Societal Costs of the Exclusionary Rule Revisited, 1987 U.Ill.L.Rev. 223, 238-39.