Case Summaries: Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals - February, 2020

This post summarizes published criminal decisions from the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals in February, 2020. Decisions of interest to state practitioners will be posted on a monthly basis. Previous summaries of Fourth Circuit criminal and related decisions can be found here. Search warrants for blood and vehicle “black box” were (1) supported by probable cause and (2) were sufficiently particular; any errors fell within Leon good faith U.S. v. Blakeney, 949 F.3d 851 (Feb. 6, 2020). In this Maryland case, the defendant drove across a median and crashed into oncoming traffic, killing his passenger. The impact of the collision tore the defendant’s car in two, with the front-end and engine completely separated from rest of the car. The defendant was found sitting in the driver’s seat with a blank stare. He resisted emergency medical services as first responders tried to remove him from the car. One emergency medical worker reported to a law enforcement officer that the defendant seemed to be under the influence of alcohol and PCP. Investigators smelled a strong odor of alcohol on the passenger side of the defendant’s car. An investigator called the magistrate to obtain a telephonic search warrant for the defendant’s blood. Hospital testing revealed the defendant had a blood-alcohol content of 0.07. A few weeks later, investigators applied for a warrant to search the “black box” of the defendant’s vehicle—the event data recorder, which recorded the operation and condition of the car at the time of the wreck and immediately before. The data [...]