State v. Bookman
| Decision Date | 24 August 2022 |
| Docket Number | A-32-21 |
| Parties | State of New Jersey, Plaintiff-Respondent, v. Steven L. Bookman, a/k/a Steven Bookman, Lamont Bookman, Shaw Forrest, Shawn Forrest, and Steven Sharp, Defendant-Appellant. |
| Court | New Jersey Supreme Court |
Argued April 25, 2022
On certification to the Superior Court, Appellate Division.
Jennifer A. Randolph, Designated Counsel, argued the cause for appellant (Joseph E. Krakora, Public Defender, attorney Jennifer A. Randolph and Michael J. Hampson, on the briefs).
Sarah D. Brigham, Deputy Attorney General, argued the cause for respondent (Matthew J. Platkin, Acting Attorney General attorney; Sarah D. Brigham, of counsel and on the briefs).
Alexander Shalom argued the cause for amicus curiae American Civil Liberties Union of New Jersey (American Civil Liberties Union of New Jersey Foundation, attorneys; Alexander Shalom and Jeanne LoCicero, on the brief).
Lee D. Vartan argued the cause for amicus curiae Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers of New Jersey (Chiesa Shahinian & Giantomasi, attorneys; Lee D. Vartan and Brittany A. Manna, on the brief).
In this appeal, this Court reviews the time, place, and manner in which the New Jersey State Police executed an arrest warrant, issued by the Deptford Township Municipal Court under the Automated Traffic System (ATS), for failure to appear in response to a motor vehicle violation. The Court also considers defendant Steven L. Bookman's argument that the Court should adopt a bright-line rule providing that an ATS warrant is not sufficient to justify the warrantless entry of a home under the hot pursuit doctrine.
Julian Bell was the subject of "a long-term investigation" for theft. On the evening of November 1, 2017, State Police received a tip that Bell was outside his residence engaged in an apparent drug transaction. The police did not have, or attempt to obtain, a warrant to detain Bell on the alleged narcotics transaction. The sole legal ground to arrest Bell was based upon an ATS warrant, issued by a municipal court on June 29, 2017, for failure to respond to a summons charging him with driving with a suspended driver's license. Eight officers deployed to the scene at around 1:00 a.m. on November 2. Bell and Bookman were standing outside when the officers arrived; they ran into a neighboring home with officers in pursuit. One officer found Bookman laying face down on the floor with his arms outstretched.
The officer who found Bookman testified that he frisked Bookman and asked whether he had any weapons; Bookman told the officer about a knife and gun in his pockets, which the officer retrieved. Bookman was found guilty of one weapon possession charge for the gun.
Bookman argued on appeal that the officers' entry into the residence was not justified by the hot pursuit exception to the warrant requirement. The appellate court noted the officers acted pursuant to a valid arrest warrant and were thus justified to pursue Bell into a private residence. The Appellate Division declined to distinguish between an arrest warrant issued by a judge for a criminal offense codified under Title 2C and an ATS warrant issued by a municipal court judge. The Court granted certification. 249 N.J. 91 (2021).
HELD: Under the totality of the circumstances reviewed here, the State Police detectives who entered the neighboring residence without a warrant did not have grounds to invoke the hot pursuit doctrine. The warrantless entry violated the Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution and Article I, Paragraph 7 of the New Jersey Constitution. Although the Court is disturbed by the manner of execution of this warrant, it declines to adopt a rigid, one-size-fits-all approach to the execution of all ATS arrest warrants.
1. The Court discusses the process by and offenses for which ATS warrants can be issued. Arrest warrants for Title 39 violations require a finding of probable cause by a judicial officer as defined in Rule 7:2-1(d)(1). (pp. 12-13)
2. Law enforcement officers have a duty to enforce validly issued arrest warrants without distinction, whether they were issued for minor or serious offenses. New Jersey follows the United States Supreme Court's precedent that an arrest warrant implicitly carries with it the limited authority to enter a dwelling where the suspect lives when there is reason to believe the suspect is inside. However, to search for the subject of an arrest warrant in the home of a third party, the police must also obtain a search warrant absent exigent circumstances or consent. In light of state and federal constitutional guarantees of the right to privacy, warrantless entries into the home are presumptively invalid unless the State can show that one of the exceptions to the warrant requirement applies. Evidence found pursuant to a warrantless search not justified by an exception to the warrant requirement is subject to suppression. (pp. 13-15)
3. One exception to the warrant requirement is the presence of exigent circumstances, including the "hot pursuit" doctrine under which a warrantless entry may be justified to prevent the possible destruction of evidence and the threat of violence by the suspect. Whether there are sufficient exigent circumstances to justify a warrantless entry into a third party's home is a fact-sensitive inquiry. Specifically, courts must consider whether, under the totality of the circumstances, the entry was objectively justified. (pp. 15-16)
4. To determine whether the totality of the circumstances in this case justified the officers' hot pursuit into a third-party residence to execute an ATS warrant to arrest Bell, the Court considers guidance from case law as to factors particularly relevant to such a totality-of-the-circumstances inquiry. In Welsh v. Wisconsin, the United States Supreme Court explained that, "[b]efore agents of the government may invade the sanctity of the home, the burden is on the government to demonstrate exigent circumstances that overcome the presumption of unreasonableness that attaches to all warrantless home entries." 466 U.S. 740, 750 (1984). The Court stated that, "[w]hen the government's interest is only to arrest for a minor offense, that presumption of unreasonableness is difficult to rebut." Ibid. In Lange v. California, the Supreme Court noted that, even when suspect flees, "[w]hen the nature of the crime, the nature of the flight, and surrounding facts present no . . . exigency, officers . . . must get a warrant." 141 S.Ct. 2011, 2021-22 (2021). The New Jersey Supreme Court reached a similar conclusion in State v. Bolte, 115 N.J. 579, 581(1989), and recently relied upon the principles endorsed in Bolte in finding that warrantless entry upon spotting a stolen phone case through the window of a residence was not justified under either hot pursuit or any other exigent circumstances because the police had no "basis to believe that defendant would injure anyone inside the house or the officers themselves, [such] that waiting to obtain a warrant would have been unreasonable." State in Int. of J.A., 233 N.J. 432, 451 (2018). (pp. 16-23)
5. Here, the State Police officers were not entitled to enter the neighboring residence under the hot pursuit doctrine. The ATS warrant only authorized Bell's arrest and the entry of his home, if necessary; it did not authorize officers to pursue Bookman into the neighboring home, and Bookman's decision to run from the scene did not constitute grounds to invoke the hot pursuit doctrine. In this case, the officers knew that the ATS warrant was for a minor traffic offense and had no reason to suspect there was any risk of danger or destruction of evidence relevant to that warrant that may have justified a hot pursuit. Unlike in State v. Jones, 143 N.J. 4 (1995), the State Police here encountered Bell and Bookman based on a planned execution of the ATS warrant, and any exigency was a direct result of the officers' decision to unreasonably execute the ATS warrant. The Court notes that the leader of the police team (1) selected an unreasonable time of the day to execute the warrant (1:00 a.m. in a residential neighborhood); (2) deployed an unreasonable number of officers -- eight -- to execute the traffic warrant arrest; (3) unreasonably pursued Bookman, a man who was neither named on the ATS warrant nor suspected of being involved in any criminal activity; and (4) unreasonably entered the home of a third party without a warrant. Law enforcement officers cannot create the exigencies they later use to undermine the sanctity of one's home. The State failed to meet its burden to prove that the officers' actions were objectively reasonable under the hot pursuit doctrine. The Court rejects the State's invocation of "high crime area" as a relevant factor in this case. The State did not present competent evidence illustrating that the relevant area was in fact within a "high crime area." (pp. 23-28)
REVERSED. Defendant's conviction is VACATED.
FUENTES JUDGE (TEMPORARILY ASSIGNED).
In this appeal, this Court reviews the time, place, and manner in which the New Jersey State Police executed an arrest warrant, issued by the Deptford Township Municipal Court under the Automated Traffic System (ATS), for failure to appear in response to a Title 39 violation.
Sometime after 1:00 a.m. on November 2, 2017, State Police officers were deployed to arrest Julian Bell on a four-month-old failure to appear warrant. When the officers arrived at Bell's home, he was standing outside with defendant Steven Bookman. Bell and Bookman fled into a row house next door to Bell's residence, and officers pursued Bookman to a second-floor bedroom. After an officer informed Bookman he did not have legal grounds to detain him, Bookman voluntarily told the officer he had...
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