North Carolina’s Warrantless Search Conditions

In North Carolina, probationers, post-release supervisees, and parolees are subject to warrantless searches—sometimes by a probation-parole officer, sometimes by law enforcement officers. The statutory conditions that apply to each type of offender and officer are not identical. Today’s post collects them all in one place. Before getting into any of the complicated issues about the constitutionality of a warrantless search of a supervised offender, a sensible starting point is a careful look at the language of the search condition itself. Probationers. Since 2009, all supervised probationers are subject to two warrantless search conditions, one for searches by a probation officer, and the other for searches by law enforcement officers. These are regular conditions of probation. That means they apply by default in every supervised probation case (felony or misdemeanor; community or intermediate; post-conviction, conditional discharge, or deferred prosecution) unless the judge says otherwise. The probation officer search condition, G.S. 15A-1343(b)(13), allows for warrantless searches by a probation officer at reasonable times of the probationer’s person and of his or her vehicle and premises while the probationer is present. The search must be “directly related to the probation supervision.” The statutory condition does not say whether the officer must have any particular level of suspicion before conducting the search, although reasonable suspicion would suffice, United States v. Knights, 534 U.S. 112 (2001), and there is some support in the case law for suspicionless searches, see Samson v. California, 547 U.S. 843 (2006) (upholding a suspicionless warrantless search of a parolee); United States [...]