©2012 Brian S. Batterton, Attorney, PATC Legal & Liability Risk Management Institute (www.llrmi.com) On July 31, 2012, the First Circuit Court of Appeals decided the United States v. Symonevich [i] and held that a passenger in an automobile, which he does not own, has no reasonable expectation of privacy in an object that he places under the front seat.  The facts of Symonevich, taken directly from the case, are as follows: Massachusetts State Trooper Sweeney, was patrolling and observed a broken side tail light on the green Subaru in which Symonevich was traveling. Sweeney pulled his police cruiser up behind the Subaru and initiated [...]

©2012 Brian S. Batterton, Attorney, PATC Legal & Liability Risk Management Institute (www.llrmi.com) On August 6, 2012, the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals decided the United States v. Lumpkins [i] which serves as an excellent lesson regarding the law pertaining to overdue rental cars and the rental car company’s authority to consent to a search of an overdue rental car.  The facts of Lumpkins, taken directly from the case, are as follows: On the afternoon of February 3, 2011, two officers of the Kansas City Police Department patrolling in a car observed a 2010 Ford Taurus with heavily tinted windows pass by. Because the [...]

©2012 Brian S. Batterton, Attorney, PATC Legal & Liability Risk Management Institute (www.llrmi.com) On July 17, 2012, the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals decided the United States v. Hill [i] which serves as an excellent review pertaining to the law regarding officers questioning drivers during traffic stops on matters unrelated to the reason for the stop.  The facts of Hill, taken directly from the case, are as follows: While driving on Route 74/76 toward Leland, North Carolina on March 17, 2009, Officer William Kozak of the Leland Police Department observed a green Chevrolet Tahoe repeatedly drift out of its lane. Pulling alongside the vehicle, [...]

©2012 Lou Reiter, Co-Director, PATC Legal & Liability Risk Management Institute (www.llrmi.com) ©2012 Steve Rothlein, PATC Legal & Liability Risk Management Institute (www.llrmi.com) Sexual misconduct, unfortunately, has become a more frequent allegation for many police agencies, large and small.  This article, however, deals with the officer or deputy who comes to work and his primary goal appears to be to have some form of sex.  I say “he” because most of the police sexual predators are males.  This article will also discuss some of the investigative steps you need to consider when you conduct investigations into all forms of sexual misconduct. How [...]

On September 11, 2012, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals decided Marquez v. City of Phoenix et al. [i], which serves as an excellent review regarding the law related to the constitutional requirements for a legal use of force. The facts of Marquez, taken directly from the case, are as follows: Early in the morning of July 28, 2007, Lydia Marquez was roused from her sleep by the sounds of "yelling . . . and cussing" coming from a spare bedroom in her Phoenix, Arizona, home. Inside were her son Ronald, her granddaughter Cynthia, and her great-granddaughter Destiny. A few days earlier, Cynthia [...]

©2012 Brian S. Batterton, Attorney, PATC Legal & Liability Risk Management Institute (www.llrmi.com) In 1976, the United States Supreme Court decided South Dakota v. Opperman [i] and held that police officers may conduct inventory searches of lawfully impounded vehicles for the purposes of (1) protecting the owners property, (2) protecting the police from claims of lost or stolen property and (3) protecting the police from dangerous objects, as long as the inventory is conducted pursuant to standardized police policy regarding circumstances and scope of such search.  The importance of having a standard police impound policy was illustrated in the Georgia Court of Appeals case [...]