State v. Huse

• Decision Date: 13 April 2016
• Docket Number: NO. PD–0433–14,PD–0433–14
• Citation: 491 S.W.3d 833
• Parties: The State of Texas v. Hayden Huse, Appellee
• Court: Texas Court of Criminal Appeals

491 S.W.3d 833

The State of Texas

v.Hayden Huse, Appellee

NO. PD–0433–14

Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas.

DELIVERED: April 13, 2016

Rehearing Denied June 15, 2016

Chuck Lanehart, Lubbock, for Appellee.

Jeffrey S. Ford, Asst. Criminal Dist. Atty., Lubbock, Lisa C. McMinn, State's Attorney, Austin, for the State.

OPINION

Yeary, J., delivered the opinion of the Court in which Keller, P.J. and Meyers, Keasler, Hervey, Alcala and Richardson, JJ., joined.

In this prosecution for the misdemeanor offense of driving while intoxicated, the State obtained evidence of Appellee's blood-alcohol concentration by issuing a grand jury subpoena for his hospital medical records. The trial court granted Appellee's motion to suppress on two grounds relevant to Appellee's current petition for discretionary review: 1) that obtaining Appellee's medical records without a warrant violated the Fourth Amendment, necessitating suppression under both the federal exclusionary rule and Article 38.23 of the Texas Code of Criminal Procedure ; and 2) that a misuse of the grand jury subpoena process caused the State's acquisition of Appellee's medical records to violate both state and federal law, also requiring suppression of the evidence under our state exclusionary rule, Article 38.23. U.S. Const. amend. IV ; Tex.Code Crim. Proc. art. 38.23. The State appealed. Tex.Code Crim. Proc. art. 44.01(a)(5).

In an unpublished opinion, the Seventh Court of Appeals reversed the trial court's order suppressing the evidence. State v. Huse, No. 07–12–00383–CR, 2014 WL 931265 (Tex.App.—Amarillo Mar. 6, 2014) (mem. op., not designated for publication). The court of appeals held that the trial court erred in that, respectively: 1) under this Court's opinion in State v. Hardy, 963 S.W.2d 516 (Tex.Crim.App.1997), Appellee lacked standing to raise a Fourth Amendment challenge to the State's acquisition of his medical records; and 2) the State did not acquire Appellee's medical records through an unlawful grand jury subpoena, so it was not necessary to suppress them under Article 38.23. Huse, 2014 WL 931265, at *4–6.

We granted Appellee's petition for discretionary review to address two issues. First, does the advent of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (“HIPAA”)¹ materially impact this Court's holding in Hardy with respect to Fourth Amendment standing to complain of the State's acquisition of specific medical records? And second, did the State acquire Appellee's medical records by way of a grand jury subpoena process that violated either HIPAA or state law, thus necessitating that they be suppressed under Article 38.23 ? We ultimately answer both questions “no.” Accordingly, we will affirm the judgment of the court of appeals.

I. BACKGROUND

The Facts

The facts of the case were largely stipulated to by the parties in the trial court and are not in serious dispute. They show the following time-line:

• On February 13, 2010, at approximately 2:00 o'clock in the morning, Appellee missed a curve and plowed his car into a cotton field.

• Lubbock County Deputy Sheriffs who responded to the scene detected the odor of alcohol on Appellee's breath. They transported him to the Covenant Medical Center in Lubbock.

• Appellee's blood was drawn for medical purposes at 4:50 a.m. Later analysis of his blood revealed a blood alcohol concentration of .219.

• Department of Public Safety Trooper Troy McKee met with Appellee at the hospital at approximately 5:15 a.m. He also noticed the odor of alcohol on Appellee's breath as well as other signs of alcohol ingestion. Appellee admitted to having had six or seven beers between 7:30 and 11:30 the previous evening. Appellee refused McKee's request for a specimen of breath or blood for blood alcohol analysis, and McKee did not attempt to compel one.

• On March 30, 2010, based on McKee's offense report, a Lubbock County Assistant District Attorney filed an application for a grand jury subpoena duces tecum to obtain Appellee's medical records for the February 13th incident. The subpoena issued by the District Clerk to Covenant Medical Center required an employee of the hospital to appear before the grand jury but stated that the hospital could comply by simply calling the District Attorney's office, presumably to arrange delivery of Appellee's medical records from that day to the Assistant District Attorney. No grand jury was actively investigating Appellee. Neither was any grand jury involved in the issuance of the subpoena, nor were the medical records required to be, nor ever actually were, returned to a grand jury.

• On March 31, 2010, the day after the subpoena duces tecum issued, Appellee was formally charged by information with the misdemeanor offense of driving while intoxicated.

• On April 15, 2010, Covenant Medical Center complied with the subpoena duces tecum, providing Appellee's medical records from February 13th to the District Attorney's office, along with a business record affidavit.

• On March 14, 2011, almost a year later, Appellee amended an earlier-filed motion to suppress to argue for the first time that his medical records should be suppressed as the product of a grand jury subpoena that violated both state law and HIPAA. No hearing was immediately conducted on Appellee's motion to suppress.

• On September 27, 2011, while Appellee's motion to suppress was still pending, the State moved to dismiss the information against Appellee, which was granted.

• On October 5, 2011, a new grand jury subpoena duces tecum issued, this time on the basis of an application that was actually signed by the foreman of the grand jury. But, as before, the subpoena issued by the District Clerk to Covenant Medical Center stated that the hospital could comply by simply contacting the District Attorney's office, to arrange delivery of Appellee's medical records to the Assistant District Attorney. It is unclear whether the medical records were ever actually returned to a grand jury. But no grand jury ever issued an indictment against Appellee.

• On October 6, 2011, the next day, Appellee was once again charged by information with driving while intoxicated on February 13, 2010. Appellee's pre-trial motions were carried over to the new information.

• On October 11, 2011, Covenant Medical Center complied with the second grand jury subpoena by supplying the same medical records directly to the Assistant District Attorney with a second business record affidavit.

• On January 25, 2012, the trial court conducted a hearing on Appellee's motion to suppress. As summarized by the court of appeals, “[i]n addition to testimony of Trooper McKee, the facts surrounding the subpoena process and the obtaining of the medical records were stipulated to between the State and Appellee, leaving only the issue of whether Appellee's medical records were illegally obtained and, therefore, excludable.” 2014 WL 931265, at *2.

• On August 6, 2012, the trial court granted Appellee's motion to suppress.

• On November 30, 2012, the trial court filed written findings of fact and conclusions of law in support of its grant of Appellee's motion to suppress.

The Trial Court's Findings and Conclusions

After setting out the above uncontested facts, the trial court prefaced its formal conclusions of law with a “discussion,” which included the following observations: “Because the State failed to establish that an actual grand jury investigation existed or that other legislative authority or a warrant authorized its actions, the State's use of the grand jury subpoena(s) appears to be an illegitimate exercise of authority. It is this court's opinion, that the use of a grand jury subpoenas [sic] for purposes wholly unrelated to actual grand jury investigations is inappropriate.” It is not altogether clear from these observations whether the trial court concluded that both the March 30th grand jury subpoena and the October 5th grand jury subpoena were unlawful, or just the March 30th grand jury subpoena. The trial court's formal conclusions of law do not entirely resolve this ambiguity. They read, almost in their entirety, as follows:

1) Defendant has standing to present his Motion to Suppress, including, but not limited to, challenging the process by which the State seized the medical records. This case is distinguishable from Hardy in at least two significant ways: first, Hardy was decided before HIPAA compliance was mandated; second, the subpoenas in this case seek any and all medical records and are not limited to merely blood tests.

2) HIPAA legislatively creates an expectation of privacy in medical information in the custody of a covered health care provider.

3) A general demand by the State for “any and all” medical records infringes upon protected privacy interests, even apart from HIPAA.

4) HIPAA provides means by which the State may lawfully obtain medical records.

5) The State obtained Mr. Huse's health information from a covered healthcare prov[id]er based upon a grand jury subpoena.

6) The 3/30/10 grand jury subpoena issued by the State was defective because it did not meet legislative requirements because no actual grand jury was involved with that subpoena. Therefore, the 3/30/10 subpoena was insufficient to satisfy HIPAA's grand jury subpoena exception.

7) The medical records obtained pursuant to the 3/30/10 subpoena were in violation of HIPAA.

8) The 10/05/11 grand jury subpoena does not cure the 3/30/10 subpoena's HIPAA violation.

9) The State failed to demonstrate any attenuation of the taint.

10) The State did not acquire the records via a warrant and no exception to the warrant requirement has been established.

11) Article 38.23 applies because the State did not comply with federal and/or state law when obtaining Huse's medical information.

12) This case presents no exigent circumstances. There is little danger that the evidence would be destroyed or that a delay in obtaining a search warrant would have jeopardized the investigation. Medical records, unlike alcohol in

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