Re-examining Implied Consent After McNeely, Part II

Yesterday’s post discussed challenges to implied consent laws raised by defendants following the Supreme Court’s decision last spring in Missouri v. McNeely, 133 S.Ct. 1552 (2013). The post summarized the Arizona Supreme Court’s holding that, independent of the state’s implied consent law, the Fourth Amendment requires an arrestee’s consent to be voluntary to justify a warrantless blood draw. Applying that standard, the court in State v. Butler, 302 P.3d 609 (Ariz. 2013) (en banc), determined that the trial court did not err in suppressing evidence of a blood draw from a juvenile arrested for impaired driving. Today’s post discusses a recent opinion from the Minnesota Supreme Court applying the same standard, but reaching a different result. State v. Brooks, __ N.W.2d ___, 2013 WL 5731811 (Minn. October 23, 2013). The Minnesota State Supreme Court in a case decided last month considered whether the police violated the defendant’s Fourth Amendment rights when they took blood and urine samples from him pursuant to the state’s implied consent laws without a search warrant. Facts. The defendant was arrested for impaired driving three times within a six month period. Each time, he was read Minnesota’s implied consent advisory, which informs drivers that Minnesota’s law requires them to take a chemical test, that refusing to take a test is a crime, and that drivers have the right to talk to a lawyer before deciding whether to take a test. The defendant also was advised of his right to consult an attorney, a right that he exercised [...]