Court Opinion

ID: 9957681
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2024-04-04 20:02:10.166249+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T08:18:33.603832
License: Public Domain

IN THE SUPERIOR COURT OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE

STATE OF DELAWARE,                                      )
                                                        )
          v.                                            )
                                                        )      I.D. No. 2308015527
DASHAWN GROCE A.K.A. FRIEND,                            )
                                                        )
                         Defendant.                     )

                                              ORDER

                                     Submitted: April 1, 2024
                                      Decided: April 4, 2024

                      Upon Defendant’s Amended Motion to Suppress
                                       DENIED

          Before the Court is an Amended Motion to Suppress filed by Defendant
Dashawn Groce (hereinafter “Defendant”) seeking suppression of evidence obtained
in the course of a warrantless administrative search of his home. For the reasons
that follow, Defendant’s Amended Motion to Suppress is DENIED.
          1.     Defendant’s Amended Motion to Suppress1 was filed on March 11,
2024, and the State’s response was filed on April 1, 2024.
          2.     Defendant argues that 11 Del. C. § 4321(d), which addresses
warrantless searches of probationers, is unambiguous and allows searches only of
probationers’ persons, not of their homes.
          3.     The State agrees that 11 Del. C. § 4321(d) is unambiguous but argues,
contrary to the defense, that the statute authorizes searches of probationers’ homes

1
    Defendant initially filed a draft version of the motion in error on March 8, 2024.
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as well as their persons. The State argues in the alternative that, should the Court
find the statute ambiguous, available legislative history establishes the General
Assembly’s intent to codify the then-current practice of allowing probation officers
to search probationers’ homes as well as their persons.
       4.     In an earlier decision, State v. Young,2 the Court dealt with the precise
issue raised by Defendant here. There, the Court determined that the statute in
question, 11 Del. C. § 4321(d), is ambiguous.          The Court then held that the
legislative history of the statute demonstrates that the General Assembly’s intent was
to authorize searches of individual probationers’ homes as well as their persons,3 and
that the principles of stare decisis also support the interpretation of the statute that
the Delaware Supreme Court and other courts have followed for decades, i.e., that
the statute authorizes warrantless searches of probationers’ homes as well as their
persons.4
       5.     Because Defendant’s motion, like the motion decided in Young, raises
only legal, not factual issues, and because the arguments set forth in Defendant’s
motion are nearly identical to those submitted by the defendant in Young, the Court
finds that argument or other hearing is not necessary to the decision of this motion.
Accordingly, for the same reasons given by this Court in Young, the Court finds that
the search of Defendant’s home was authorized by 11 Del. C. § 4321(d), and the
Court therefore finds that the evidence discovered as a result of that search should
not be suppressed.
       Wherefore, for the foregoing reasons, Defendant’s Amended Motion to
Suppress is DENIED.

2
  2024 WL 386216 (Del. Super. Jan. 31, 2024).
3
  Id. at *9.
4
  Id.
                                                2
     IT IS SO ORDERED.

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oc: Prothonotary
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