IN THE SUPREME COURT OF IOWA
No. 16–1720
Filed June 22, 2018
STATE OF IOWA,
Appellee,
vs.
TERRY LEE COFFMAN,
Appellant.
Appeal from the Iowa District Court for Story County, James B.
Malloy, Judge.
The defendant seeks further review of a court of appeals decision
affirming his conviction for operating while intoxicated, contending that
the district court erred in denying his motion to suppress. DECISION OF
COURT OF APPEALS AND JUDGMENT OF DISTRICT COURT
AFFIRMED.
Matthew T. Lindholm of Gourley, Rehkemper, & Lindholm, P.L.C.,
West Des Moines, for appellant.
Thomas J. Miller, Attorney General, Kevin Cmelik and Zachary
Miller, Assistant Attorneys General, Jessica Reynolds, County Attorney,
and Shean Fletchall, Assistant County Attorney, for appellee.
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MANSFIELD, Justice.
This case requires us to decide whether an officer was justified in
pulling behind a vehicle and activating his emergency lights when the
vehicle was stopped by the side of a highway after 1:00 a.m. with its brake
lights engaged. We conclude the officer’s actions were justified under the
“community caretaking function” exception to the warrant requirement of
the Fourth Amendment and article I, section 8 of the Iowa Constitution.
For this reason, we affirm the conviction for operating while intoxicated
that resulted from this roadside encounter.
I. Background Facts and Proceedings.
In the early hours of May 22, 2016, Story County Sheriff’s Deputy
Nicholas Hochberger was on assigned patrol in the southern part of the
county. When he was outside Slater at approximately 1:08 a.m., he
spotted a vehicle pulled over on the side of the highway with its brake
lights on. Deputy Hochberger turned on his flashing red and blue lights,
and he pulled to a stop behind the parked vehicle. Deputy Hochberger
later testified his objective in making this kind of stop is to “check on the
welfare of the occupants or see if they need any assistance, if they have
vehicle problems or medical problems, or if they’re just talking on their
phone.” Deputy Hochberger also explained why he activated his flashers:
First reason is it alerts traffic approaching any other
direction that I am stopped on the side of the roadway and
that there is potentially a hazard there; and number two is to
alert the driver or subjects of the vehicle that it’s just not a
stranger pulling up behind them. It is a law enforcement
officer stopping to check on them.
Deputy Hochberger did not run the vehicle’s license plate through
dispatch before exiting his vehicle. Instead, he immediately approached
the driver’s side window on foot to speak with the driver. While passing
the rear of the vehicle, the deputy noticed a registration violation because
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the license plate bracket covered the sticker and it was not possible to tell
whether the registration was current.
Upon reaching the driver’s window, Deputy Hochberger immediately
detected a strong odor of alcoholic beverage and noticed the driver’s red
and watery eyes. Deputy Hochberger’s initial questions were directed at
determining if there was an emergency or if the occupants needed
assistance. He asked, “Hi guys, everything okay tonight?”
When the driver, Terry Coffman, and his wife indicated that they
were okay, Deputy Hochberger then asked, “[W]hat’s going on?” Coffman
answered that his wife was having neck issues, so he had pulled over to
give her a back rub. At that point, Deputy Hochberger requested
Coffman’s license and registration and asked Coffman how much he had
had to drink that night. Coffman replied that he had consumed four beers,
the most recent a half hour before the stop.
Deputy Hochberger administered field sobriety tests, which Coffman
failed. Coffman was belligerent while performing the tests. After also
administering a preliminary breath test, the deputy determined that
Coffman was under the influence of alcohol and placed Coffman under
arrest. At the jail, implied consent was invoked, and Coffman refused to
submit to the chemical test.
On June 16, Coffman was charged by trial information in the Iowa
District Court for Story County with operating while intoxicated (OWI), first
offense, in violation of Iowa Code section 321J.2, a serious misdemeanor.
See Iowa Code § 321J.2(2)(a) (2016).
On August 25, Coffman filed a motion to suppress the evidence
obtained as a result of the stop of his vehicle. He alleged the stop violated
his rights under both the Fourth Amendment to the United States
Constitution and article I, section 8 of the Iowa Constitution. An
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evidentiary hearing on Coffman’s motion took place on September 9, and
the court issued a written ruling denying the motion on September 12.
Coffman filed a motion to reconsider, to reopen the record, and for
expanded findings and conclusions. This motion asked the court for the
first time “to distinguish the Fourth Amendment protections from those
under the Iowa Constitution.” In particular, Coffman asked the court
either to limit the community caretaking doctrine “to those cases where
emergency aid or assistance is needed or alternatively apply[] the
exclusionary rule to those cases where evidence of criminal activity is
gathered as a result of a community caretaking seizure.” The court issued
expanded findings and conclusions but confirmed its denial of the motion
to suppress.
In its order, the court noted,
A car parked on the shoulder of a highway at 1:00 a.m.
in a rural area in Iowa should raise a number of concerns.
There is a safety issue in having a vehicle parked within two
feet of the traveled portion of a highway, especially at 1:00
a.m., in an area that is not lighted. Second, the occupant(s)
of the vehicle might have car problems or medical issues that
they are experiencing. Most people would not simply pull over
to the side of the road in this type of setting at such an hour.
It would have been irresponsible for Deputy Hochberger to
simply drive by without checking on the vehicle.
Coffman waived his right to a jury trial and stipulated to a trial on
the minutes of testimony. On October 12, the court found Coffman guilty
of OWI, first offense, in violation of Iowa Code section 321J.2. The district
court sentenced Coffman to two days in jail and ordered him to pay a fine
and surcharges.
Coffman appealed, claiming that the stop of his vehicle and person
violated the Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution and article I,
section 8 of the Iowa Constitution. We transferred the case to the court of
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appeals, which affirmed Coffman’s conviction, concluding that the stop
demonstrated a “good-faith effort by a peace officer to assist the motorist
as a public servant rather than to launch a criminal investigation.”
We granted Coffman’s application for further review.
II. Standard of Review.
Coffman argues that the seizure violated his rights under both the
Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution and article I, section
8 of the Iowa Constitution. “When a defendant challenges a district court’s
denial of a motion to suppress based upon the deprivation of a state or
federal constitutional right, our standard of review is de novo.” State v.
Storm, 898 N.W.2d 140, 144 (Iowa 2017) (quoting State v. Brown, 890
N.W.2d 315, 321 (Iowa 2017)). We examine the whole record and “make
‘an independent evaluation of the totality of the circumstances.’ ” Id.
(quoting Brown, 890 N.W.2d at 321). “Each case must be evaluated in
light of its unique circumstances.” State v. Kurth, 813 N.W.2d 270, 272
(Iowa 2012) (quoting State v. Krogmann, 804 N.W.2d 518, 523 (Iowa 2011)).
III. Analysis.
Coffman claims that he was lawfully parked on the shoulder of the
highway and that Deputy Hochberger’s actions violated the Fourth
Amendment and article I, section 8. See U.S. Const. amend. IV (“The right
of the people to be secure in their persons . . . against unreasonable
seizures and searches, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue,
but on probable cause . . . .”); Iowa Const. art. I, § 8 (“The right of the
people to be secure in their persons . . . against unreasonable searches
and seizures, shall not be violated; and no warrant shall issue but upon
probable cause . . . .”). The State counters that the seizure of Coffman’s
vehicle was justified by the community caretaking exception to the warrant
requirement under both the Fourth Amendment and article I, section 8.
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A. The Community Caretaking Exception. The community
caretaking exception to the warrant requirement, recognized by the United
States Supreme Court in Cady v. Dombrowski, is “totally divorced from the
detection, investigation, or acquisition of evidence relating to the violation
of a criminal statute.” 413 U.S. 433, 441, 93 S. Ct. 2523, 2528 (1973).
This exception “involves the duty of police officers to help citizens an officer
reasonably believes may be in need of assistance.” State v. Tyler, 867
N.W.2d 136, 170 (Iowa 2015) (quoting State v. Kern, 831 N.W.2d 149, 172–
73 (Iowa 2013)). We have addressed this exception on a number of
occasions under both the United States and Iowa Constitutions. See, e.g.,
id. at 167, & n.15, 170–71 (Fourth Amendment); Kern, 831 N.W.2d at 172–
74 (article I, section 8); Kurth, 813 N.W.2d at 274–81 (Fourth Amendment);
State v. Wilkes, 756 N.W.2d 838, 842 (Iowa 2008) (Fourth Amendment);
State v. Tague, 676 N.W.2d 197, 204–06 (Iowa 2004) (article I, section 8);
State v. Crawford, 659 N.W.2d 537, 541–44 (Iowa 2003) (Fourth
Amendment); State v. Moore, 609 N.W.2d 502, 503–04 (Iowa 2000) (en
banc) (Fourth Amendment); State v. Carlson, 548 N.W.2d 138, 140–41,
143 (Iowa 1996) (Fourth Amendment and article I, section 8).
The community caretaking exception has three branches: “(1) the
emergency aid doctrine, (2) the automobile impoundment/inventory
doctrine, and (3) the ‘public servant’ exception.” Tyler, 867 N.W.2d at 170
(quoting Kurth, 813 N.W.2d at 274). The emergency-aid and public-
servant doctrines are closely related. See Kurth, 813 N.W.2d at 274
(quoting Crawford, 659 N.W.2d at 541).
Under the emergency aid doctrine, the officer has an
immediate, reasonable belief that a serious, dangerous event
is occurring. . . . [I]n contrast, the officer in a public servant
situation might or might not believe that there is a difficulty
requiring his general assistance. For example, an officer
assists a motorist with a flat tire under the public servant
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doctrine, but an officer providing first aid to a person slumped
over the steering wheel with a bleeding gash on his head acts
pursuant to the emergency aid doctrine.
Tyler, 867 N.W.2d at 170 (alterations in original) (quoting Crawford, 659
N.W.2d at 541–42). Other than that slight distinction, the two doctrines
are analytically similar. See id.; see also Kern, 831 N.W.2d at 173
(describing them as “very similar”).
We have said that application of the community caretaking
exception involves a three-step analysis:
(1) was there a seizure within the meaning of the Fourth
Amendment?; (2) if so, was the police conduct bona fide
community caretaker activity?; and (3) if so, did the public
need and interest outweigh the intrusion upon the privacy of
the citizen?
Crawford, 659 N.W.2d at 543; accord Tyler, 867 N.W.2d at 170; Kern, 831
N.W.2d at 173; Kurth, 813 N.W.2d at 277. We have cautioned that “[e]very
community caretaking case must be assessed according to its own unique
set of facts and circumstances.” Kurth, 813 N.W.2d at 277.
B. Community Caretaking Under the Fourth Amendment.
Coffman first challenges Deputy Hochberger’s stop under the Fourth
Amendment. We have not previously considered whether a law
enforcement officer is justified in parking behind and activating his
emergency lights to check on a motorist pulled over on the side of the
highway in the middle of the night. In Moore, we held that a park ranger
properly exercised a public-safety function when she stopped the
defendant’s vehicle to warn him that his speed posed a danger to park
campers, even though he was driving under the speed limit. 609 N.W.2d
at 503–04. In Kurth, we held that a police officer was not justified in
blocking in the defendant’s vehicle with his own where the defendant had
turned into a restaurant parking lot and parked that vehicle after
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apparently running over a road sign that had fallen into the street. See
813 N.W.2d at 278–81. That seizure occurred after the officer had already
ascertained that the damage to the vehicle was “not significant” and the
defendant “was in a position to address that damage.” Id. at 280.
Other state courts, however, have addressed situations close to the
present case. As we pointed out in Kurth, it is “not surprising” that much
of the relevant caselaw has arisen in state courts “in light of the fact that
community caretaking is generally the role of local police rather than
federal officers.” Id. at 273–74. The majority of other state courts have
sustained seizures similar to the one that occurred in the present case.
The Illinois Supreme Court upheld a stop under the community
caretaking doctrine in People v. McDonough, 940 N.E.2d 1100, 1110 (Ill.
2010). A trooper was on patrol at 7:30 p.m. when he noticed a car stopped
on the shoulder of a busy highway with the headlights off. Id. at 1103.
The trooper “decided to inquire whether the car’s occupants needed
assistance.” Id. The trooper turned on his overhead oscillating emergency
lights for safety purposes and pulled in behind the stopped vehicle. Id. at
1103–04. The trooper’s initial question upon approaching the vehicle was
whether everything was okay. Id. at 1104. The driver rolled down the
window further to answer, and the trooper smelled the odor of an alcoholic
beverage. Id. After failing field sobriety tests, the driver was arrested. Id.
The Illinois court determined that the seizure was permissible under
the community caretaking exception to the warrant requirement of the
Fourth Amendment. Id. at 1109. In coming to this conclusion, the court
said,
[I]t was reasonable for [the trooper] to approach defendant’s
vehicle to offer any aid required under the circumstances. The
public has a substantial interest in ensuring that police offer
assistance to motorists who may be stranded on the side of a
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highway, especially after dark and in areas where assistance
may not be close at hand. In the proper performance of his or
her duties, a law enforcement officer has the right to make a
reasonable investigation of vehicles parked along roadways to
offer such assistance as might be needed and to inquire into
the physical condition of persons in vehicles. The occupant of
a parked vehicle may be intoxicated, suffering from sudden
illness, or may be only asleep. Under these circumstances, it
is within a responsible law enforcement officer’s authority to
determine whether assistance is needed.
Id. at 1109–10 (citation omitted).
In State v. Anderson, the Utah Supreme Court likewise held that the
seizure of a motorist who had stopped his vehicle on the side of the road
was justified by the community caretaking doctrine under the Fourth
Amendment. 362 P.3d 1232, 1234 (Utah 2015). Late one evening in
December, the defendant had pulled his car to the side of the road and
turned his hazards on. Id. “Because of the hazard lights, the cold weather,
and the late hour, the deputies decided to stop and check on the welfare
of any occupants of the vehicle.” Id. The deputies engaged their red and
blue flashing lights and pulled up behind the stopped vehicle. Id. After
they asked him whether he needed assistance, the deputies noticed that
he had bloodshot eyes. Id. They ultimately “obtained a warrant
authorizing them to arrest [the defendant], obtain blood or urine from him,
and search his vehicle,” within which they found marijuana. Id. at 1235.
The court concluded that the stop was minimally invasive into the
defendant’s rights and that “a reasonable officer would have cause to be
concerned about the welfare of a motorist in [the defendant’s] situation.”
Id. at 1239–40. The court further noted,
A motorist may have many motivations for pulling to the
side of a highway and engaging hazard lights, ranging from
the mundane to the life-threatening. The motorist could be
lost, disciplining rowdy children, sleeping, or answering a cell
phone call. But there is also a good chance that the motorist
has run out of gas, has mechanical problems, or, worse, is
experiencing a medical emergency. The fact that it is very cold
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and dark would exacerbate the duress of a motorist in need of
aid. Given the decent odds that a motorist in this situation
may need help, an officer would have reason to be concerned
and to at least stop to determine whether assistance is
needed.
Id. at 1240.
In Ullom v. Miller, the West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals
likewise found a seizure of a motorist was justified under the community
caretaking exception under both the Fourth Amendment and the West
Virginia Constitution. 705 S.E.2d 111, 123 (W. Va. 2010). The defendant
there had parked on the side of the road and turned on the parking lights.
Id. at 116. The vehicle’s hazard lights were not on, and the engine was not
running. Id. When the officer came across the vehicle at dusk during his
patrol, he had no other indication the driver needed assistance. Id. The
officer nevertheless “initiated a road safety check of the vehicle by stopping
his cruiser and approaching the vehicle.” Id. When he conversed with the
driver, he noted signs of intoxication. Id. Upon failing sobriety tests, the
driver was arrested for driving under the influence. Id.
The West Virginia court held that given the circumstances of the
case, “a reasonable and prudent officer in such a setting would have
reasonably suspected that an occupant of the vehicle was in need of
immediate help.” Id. at 123. Furthermore, the officer’s “initiating reasons
for his encounter with [the defendant] were, when viewed objectively, quite
clearly a reasonable, independent and substantial justification for any
intrusion he made into [the defendant’s] privacy.” Id.
In State v. Kramer, the Wisconsin Supreme Court also affirmed the
seizure of a motorist over federal and state constitutional objections.
759 N.W.2d 598, 601 (Wis. 2009). In that case, the defendant’s vehicle
was legally parked on the shoulder of a highway after the sun had set. Id.
The driver had turned the hazards on while he made a phone call. Id. A
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sheriff’s deputy spotted him, activated his cruiser’s emergency overhead
lights, and stopped behind the parked car. Id. The deputy’s reason for
stopping was “to check to see if there actually was a driver, [and to] offer
any assistance.” Id. (alteration in original). The deputy activated his own
emergency lights for “[s]afety considerations so other traffic could see
[him].” Id. (first alteration in original). Although he approached the vehicle
shining his flashlight and with his hand on his holstered gun—a practice
the deputy regularly followed “for safety considerations”—he asked the
driver if he could help with something and said he was “[j]ust making sure
[there were] no vehicle problems.” Id. at 601–02. During the interaction,
the deputy could tell that the driver was intoxicated, and the driver was
then arrested. Id. at 602.
The Wisconsin court held that the seizure was justified. Id. at 612.
It concluded the deputy had “an objectively reasonable basis for deciding
that a motorist may have been in need of assistance when he stopped
behind [the defendant’s] vehicle.” Id. at 610. The court also noted “that
the public has a substantial interest in ensuring that police assist
motorists who may be stranded on the side of a highway, especially after
dark and outside of an urban area when help is not close at hand.” Id. at
611.
In State v. Lovegren, the Montana Supreme Court similarly upheld
a seizure of a motorist based on the community caretaking doctrine. 51
P.3d 471, 476 (Mont. 2002). There, an officer noticed a vehicle parked on
the side of the highway at 3:05 a.m. Id. at 471–72. Upon approaching the
vehicle, the officer found the defendant asleep in the driver’s seat and
knocked on the window. Id. at 472. When the defendant did not wake up,
the officer opened the door. Id. The defendant suddenly awoke and
blurted, “I was drinking.” Id. The officer spotted other signs of
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intoxication, and after the defendant failed the field sobriety tests, he was
charged with driving under the influence. Id.
Overruling both federal and state constitutional objections, the
Montana court found the officer had acted properly because the officer had
“objective, specific and articulable facts suggesting that [the defendant]
might be in need of assistance.” Id. at 476. According to the court,
While [the defendant] might simply have been asleep, he might
just as likely have been ill and unconscious and in need of
help. Under these circumstances, Officer Hofer had the right
to check on [the defendant’s] welfare and to open the door of
[the defendant’s] vehicle when [the defendant] failed to
respond to a knock on the window of his vehicle. As the State
points out, it would have been a dereliction of Officer Hofer’s
duties if, after knocking on the window and obtaining no
response, Officer Hofer walked away and continued on his
patrol.
Id.
The Tennessee Supreme Court confronted a similar situation in
State v. McCormick and found the seizure was justified by the community
caretaking doctrine under the United States and Tennessee Constitutions.
494 S.W.3d 673, 689 (Tenn. 2016). At 2:45 a.m., a law enforcement officer
pulled behind a vehicle that was sitting in the entrance to a shopping
center parking lot. Id. at 676. The shopping center was closed, and the
back left wheel and rear portion of the vehicle were “partially in the
roadway.” Id. The officer parked behind the vehicle and turned on his
blue lights for safety reasons. Id. He proceeded “to do a welfare check on
the subject in the vehicle.” Id. The driver was slumped over the steering
wheel, the engine was running, and the headlights were on. Id. When the
officer was unable to awaken the driver by tapping on the window, he
opened the car door. Id. The officer immediately detected signs that the
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driver had been drinking. Id. The driver failed field sobriety tests and was
arrested for driving under the influence. Id. at 676–77.
The Tennessee court determined that the officer’s conduct fell within
the community caretaking exception. Id. at 688–89. The court explained,
Given the time, 2:45 a.m., location, and limited accessibility
and availability of assistance from sources other than the
officer, the risk of danger had the officer provided no
assistance was substantial. Indeed, Sgt. Trivette would have
been “derelict in his duty as a police officer” had he failed to
take steps to determine the defendant’s welfare. Again, the
defendant was slumped over the steering wheel, either asleep
or unconscious, with his vehicle protruding partially onto the
public roadway, placing him at risk of injury or death from a
rear end collision. Having carefully considered the relevant
facts, we conclude that Sgt. Trivette’s actions were well within
the community caretaking exception.
Id. at 688–89 (quoting Commonwealth v. Fisher, 13 N.E.3d 629, 633 (Mass.
App. Ct. 2014)).
In State v. Kleven, the South Dakota Supreme Court likewise found
that an officer properly exercised his community caretaker function, and
therefore concluded the officer’s seizure of a motorist was permissible
under the Fourth Amendment. 887 N.W.2d 740, 743–44 (S.D. 2016). The
officer saw a vehicle parked on the side of the street in the early hours of
the morning in a downtown area. Id. at 741. He requested a license plate
check. Id. After waiting some twenty minutes, he decided to park his
patrol car directly behind the defendant’s vehicle and arranged for another
patrol car to park directly in front. Id. The officer believed the driver was
passed out or asleep. Id. The officer then knocked on the car window; the
defendant stirred but did not acknowledge the officer. Id. The officer
opened the door and detected the odor of an alcoholic beverage. Id. The
driver was arrested and charged with driving under the influence. Id. The
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court determined that, given the circumstances, the officer had sufficient
reason to conduct a health and safety check. Id. at 743.
The North Dakota Supreme Court upheld the seizure of a motorist
in Borowicz v. North Dakota Department of Transportation after an officer
noticed a vehicle parked on a service road with its headlights on but the
motor off. 529 N.W.2d 186, 187 (N.D. 1995). When the officer saw
someone slumped in the driver’s seat, he pulled behind the vehicle and
activated his overhead lights. Id. at 187–88. He approached the driver’s
side, knocked on the window, and observed that the driver appeared to be
asleep. Id. He knocked harder with his flashlight, awakening the driver,
who then opened the door to the pickup. Id. In the subsequent
interaction, the officer noticed signs of intoxication, and the defendant was
eventually arrested. Id. at 187. The court concluded the officer’s conduct
was reasonable under the circumstances. Id. at 188–89.
In People v. Laake, the Illinois Appellate Court upheld a vehicle
seizure under the community caretaking doctrine of the Fourth
Amendment. 809 N.E.2d 769, 772–73 (Ill. App. Ct. 2004). 1 There, the
officer received a report at approximately 3:00 a.m. from police dispatch
about a possible intoxicated driver in his area of patrol. Id. at 770–71.
While searching for that car, he happened upon a vehicle stopped on the
shoulder with its brake lights on. Id. at 771. He pulled behind the vehicle
and activated his overhead emergency lights. Id. His purpose was “to
check on the welfare of [the] driver.” Id. Additionally, “[t]he area was
isolated and not well lighted.” Id. During the officer’s initial encounter
with the driver, he noticed telltale signs of intoxication and that the driver
1We distinguished the Laake decision in Kurth. See Kurth, 813 N.W.2d at 280–
81.
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had a flat tire. Id. The driver was ultimately convicted of driving under
the influence. Id.
The appellate court concluded that there was “nothing wrong” with
the officer’s “check[ing] on the welfare of [the car’s] driver.” Id. at 773.
“Police officers routinely provide roadside assistance in addition to
conducting criminal investigation. Such assistance is designed to ensure
public safety, and we do not believe that any concomitant technical
detention is unreasonable.” Id.
In Marsh v. State, an Alaska appellate court found that a seizure was
permitted under the community caretaking exception to the Fourth
Amendment warrant requirement. 838 P.2d 819, 820 (Alaska Ct. App.
1992). During the early evening hours, a state trooper noticed a vehicle
that appeared to be stalled on the side of a highway. Id. The trooper
activated his overhead lights and pulled behind the car; activation of the
lights was “standard police procedure so that traffic on the highway could
see [the trooper] parked along the road in the dark.” Id. At this point, the
driver started the engine of his vehicle. Id. Nonetheless, the officer
proceeded to speak to the driver and thus learned his license had been
revoked. Id. Assuming for purposes of appeal that there had been a
seizure, the appellate court determined that the trooper acted properly
pursuant to his community caretaking function in finding out whether the
driver needed assistance. Id.
In Kozak v. Commissioner of Public Safety, a Minnesota appellate
court decided that a deputy’s conduct was justified under the community
caretaking exception. 359 N.W.2d 625, 628 (Minn. Ct. App. 1984). The
defendant had parked on the side of the road and fallen asleep. Id. at 627.
A deputy stopped to investigate and knocked on the window to awaken the
driver. Id. The driver opened the door, and the deputy noted signs of
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intoxication. Id. The driver failed the field sobriety tests and was arrested.
Id. The court noted,
In the proper performance of his duties, an officer has
not only the right but a duty to make a reasonable
investigation of vehicles parked along roadways to offer such
assistance as might be needed and to inquire into the physical
condition of persons in vehicles.
Id. at 628. The court added,
The occupant of an already parked car may be
intoxicated, he may be suffering from sudden illness or heart
attack, or may be just asleep. Surely, it is within a responsible
peace officer’s duty as it relates to the public to determine
whether his assistance is needed.
Id.
Coffman directs us to Commonwealth v. Livingstone, a recent case
where the Pennsylvania Supreme Court found a Fourth Amendment
violation. 174 A.3d 609, 638 (Pa. 2017). In Livingstone, a trooper saw a
vehicle pulled over onto the right shoulder of a divided highway with the
engine running but the hazard lights not activated. Id. at 614. The trooper
“activated his emergency lights and, with his passenger window down,
pulled alongside the stopped vehicle.” Id. After motioning to the driver to
roll down the window, he asked her if she was okay. Id. The driver
appeared to be staring at him with “glossy eyes” but answered
affirmatively. Id. Nevertheless, the trooper pulled his cruiser in front of
the stopped vehicle, exited his vehicle, and approached the driver on foot.
Id. When the trooper reached the vehicle, he asked to see the motorist’s
driver’s license and asked whether she had been drinking. Id. The
motorist denied drinking but made a number of confused statements. Id.
Based on these statements and the appearance of the motorist’s eyes, a
preliminary breath test was administered, and ultimately the motorist was
convicted of driving under the influence. Id. at 614–15.
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The Pennsylvania court found that a seizure had occurred as soon
as the trooper pulled alongside the stopped vehicle with his flashers on.
Id. at 621–25. Turning to the question whether the community caretaking
exception applied, the court held that “the officer must point to specific,
objective, and articulable facts which would reasonably suggest to an
experienced officer that assistance was needed.” Id. at 637 (emphasis
added). Notwithstanding an extensive review of cases like Ullom, Kramer,
Lovegren, McCormick, McDonough, and Kleven where similar seizures had
been upheld, the court overturned the motorist’s conviction. Id. at 629–
33, 638. In its view, the trooper was not able to “articulate any specific
and objective facts that would reasonably suggest that Appellant needed
assistance.” Id. at 638 (plurality opinion).
Federal courts have also weighed in on this subject. See, e.g., United
States v. Barry, 394 F.3d 1070, 1075 (8th Cir. 2005) (holding that it was
not a seizure when the officer approached the parked vehicle and knocked
on the window). For instance, in Winters v. Adams, the United States
Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit found that a seizure of a driver in
a parked vehicle was justified by the community caretaking doctrine. 254
F.3d 758, 764 (8th Cir. 2001). 2 There, the officers were responding to a
complaint regarding an unknown, intoxicated individual. Id. at 760, 761.
The first officer to arrive came upon a person seated behind the wheel of a
car in the suspected area. Id. The officers approached to ask him about
his circumstances, and he responded that he was “waiting for a push to
start his car.” Id. When the officer asked for identification, the driver
rolled up the window, locked the door, and said he wanted to be left alone.
Id. Neither officer suspected criminal activity, but the driver began acting
2We also distinguished Winters in our Kurth decision. See 813 N.W.2d at 275–76.
18
strangely and moving about wildly in his car. Id. at 760–61. The officers
“were initially concerned with determining [the driver’s] physical condition
in order to ensure that ‘he would not be able to drive and hurt someone.’ ”
Id. at 761. Another officer testified that “he felt that he had a responsibility
to protect [the driver] and ‘the public at large to make sure this person
can’t hurt anyone else.’ ” Id. The officers thus broke into the car and
forcibly removed the driver, whose ultimate diagnosis was
“methamphetamine intoxication.” Id. at 761–62.
In determining that the stop was justified, the court found that the
officers “ ‘would have been derelict in their duties’ had they not detained”
the driver. Id. at 764. (quoting United States v. Rideau, 949 F.2d 718, 720
(5th Cir. 1991), rev’d on other grounds on reh’g, 969 F.2d 1572, 1573 (5th
Cir. 1992) (en banc)). To find otherwise would have required the officers
“simply to walk away from [the] vehicle, thus perhaps permitting a possibly
intoxicated individual to drive the vehicle, potentially harming himself and
other citizens.” Id. (footnote omitted).
In United States v. Ingram, the United States Court of Appeals for
the Ninth Circuit determined that the seizure of the defendant’s parked
vehicle was not justified by the community caretaking doctrine. 151
F. App’x 597, 599 (9th Cir. 2005). A U.S. Park Police Officer noticed a
vehicle parked at an “awkward angle” and decided to investigate along with
another officer. Id. at 598. The court rejected the government’s
community caretaking argument because
[o]nce the officers were able to observe that the passengers
were in no distress of any kind, no “reasonable grounds
[existed] to believe that there [was] an emergency at hand and
an immediate need for their assistance for the protection of
life or property.”
19
Id. at 599 (second and third alterations in original) (quoting United States
v. Cervantes, 219 F.3d 882, 888 (9th Cir. 2000), overruled on other grounds
by Brigham City v. Stuart, 547 U.S. 398, 404, 126 S. Ct. 1943, 1948
(2006)).
As previously noted, we examine every community caretaking case
before us according to its own set of unique circumstances. Kurth, 813
N.W.2d at 277. We must decide “whether the facts available to the officer
at the time of the stop would lead a reasonable person to believe that the
action taken by the officer was appropriate.” Tague, 676 N.W.2d at 204.
To demonstrate reasonableness, the State must show “specific and
articulable facts that indicate [the officer’s] actions were proper.” Kurth,
813 N.W.2d at 277 (quoting Crawford, 659 N.W.2d at 542).
The present case is unlike our Kurth case or the Ninth Circuit’s
Ingram case, where objective facts available to the officers indicated that
the community caretaking need had dissipated by the time the seizures
occurred. See Ingram, 151 F. App’x at 599; Kurth, 813 N.W.2d at 280–81.
In Kurth, a motorist appeared to have run over a sign that had fallen into
the roadway. 813 N.W.2d at 271. By itself, this could have justified an
officer’s community caretaking intervention. Id. at 278. However, the
motorist thereafter promptly and lawfully pulled into the parking lot of an
open restaurant and parked his vehicle. Id. at 271–72. The officer saw
that there was no difficulty with the drivability of the vehicle and the
damage to the vehicle was insignificant. Id. at 272, 278. Nevertheless, at
that point the officer activated his emergency lights and blocked in the
vehicle. Id. at 278. In short, in Kurth, the putative community caretaking
seizure occurred only after the need for such a seizure had ended. Id. The
motorist was parked in a parking lot of an open restaurant and appeared
to be in a position to address any minor vehicle damages. Id.
20
Other cases cited by Coffman are distinguishable for the same
reasons. See State v. Graham, 175 P.3d 885, 891 (Mont. 2007) (finding
under federal and state constitutional principles that the seizure of a
parked vehicle on a dirt pullout was not reasonable where the officer had
seen the truck driving shortly before the stop and thus knew that it was
operable); State v. Button, 86 A.3d 1001, 1005 (Vt. 2013) (holding that the
stop was not justified under the Fourth Amendment or state constitution
in part because “[t]he trooper saw that all of the various lights on
defendant’s car were operating properly, and that defendant’s car was
running fine”).
This case also can be distinguished from cases cited by Coffman
where the vehicle was parked well off the road, and therefore, the officer
could have safely stopped and sought to speak with the driver without
activating his flashers. See State v. Schmidt, 47 P.3d 1271, 1272, 1274
(Idaho Ct. App. 2002) (finding that the seizure of the vehicle by activating
the overhead lights and blocking it in was not justified under the Fourth
Amendment where the vehicle was “parked twenty to thirty feet off on the
right side of the road in an unimproved pullout”); State v. Boutin, 13 A.3d
334, 337–38 (N.H. 2010) (finding under the state constitution that the
trooper’s actions were unreasonable when the vehicle was parked in a
“pull-off area” and the trooper could have pulled alongside the driver to do
a welfare check without performing a seizure by activating his flashers).
The present case is also unlike our own State v. Coleman, where
after the vehicle had been seized, objective facts became available to the
officer demonstrating the problem that was the basis for the stop had been
resolved. See 890 N.W.2d 284, 285, 301 (Iowa 2017) (holding that after
stopping a motorist on suspicion of driving while suspended, but then
determining that the driver was not the motorist in question, the officer
21
had to let the motorist go immediately without asking for license,
registration, and proof of insurance). This case is actually the reverse of a
Coleman situation. After making the initial stop, Deputy Hochberger
determined that there was a violation with respect to vehicle registration,
thus providing further justification for the stop.
Lastly, Livingstone, the Pennsylvania case on which Coffman relies,
is factually and legally distinguishable. In Livingstone, the trooper came
upon the motorist at 9:30 p.m. and acknowledged that when he pulls
alongside a vehicle, “[n]ine out of ten times usually they’re on their cell
phone.” 174 A.3d at 638. In the present case, though, Deputy Hochberger
came upon a vehicle pulled just off a rural road after 1:00 a.m. The odds
that a law enforcement officer was just interrupting a routine cell phone
call diminish, undoubtedly, as the hour gets later.
Furthermore, Livingstone’s invariable requirement that the officer
have “specific, objective, and articulable facts which would reasonably
suggest to an experienced officer that assistance was needed,” id. at 637
(emphasis added), is inconsistent with the more flexible standard in our
caselaw—i.e., “whether the facts available to the officer at the time of the
stop would lead a reasonable person to believe that the action taken by
the officer was appropriate,” Tague, 676 N.W.2d at 204; see Kurth, 813
N.W.2d at 277 (requiring the state to show “specific and articulable facts
that indicate [the officer’s] actions were proper” (quoting Crawford, 659
N.W.2d at 542)). Under our precedent, the officer does not need specific
facts indicating that assistance is needed, only that it may be needed. See
Kern, 831 N.W.2d at 172; see also Tyler, 867 N.W.2d at 170; cf.
Livingstone, 174 A.3d at 617 (noting the Pennsylvania Superior Court,
which was reversed in the opinion, upheld the trooper’s actions because
22
“the circumstances were sufficient to suggest . . . that assistance might be
needed”).
When we apply our three-part inquiry as set forth above, we believe
the stop in this case complied with the Fourth Amendment. Under the
first part of the test, the State concedes there was a seizure. Next, we
consider whether Deputy Hochberger’s conduct amounted to bona fide
community caretaking activity.
At the suppression hearing, Deputy Hochberger testified that he
regularly stops behind vehicles stopped alongside the roadway in order to
“check on the welfare of the occupants or see if they need any assistance.”
In this case, it was the middle of the night, Deputy Hochberger was
traveling along a highway slightly outside of town, the vehicle was pulled
over just two feet off from the roadway itself, and the vehicle’s brake lights
were activated. We conclude this was bona fide community caretaking
activity.
Lastly, we balance the public need and interest against the intrusion
on privacy. We believe the public interest in having officers check on the
welfare of a motorist pulled over at the side of a highway in the middle of
the night is significant. There could be many reasons why the motorist
needs help. The motorist could be lost, there could be trouble with the
vehicle, or the motorist could be in some kind of medical difficulty.
Coffman was parked on the side of the highway at 1:00 a.m. without his
hazard lights on. This created a potentially dangerous situation for himself
and for other drivers who may not have seen him. The remote location
and the late hour may have made it difficult for him to obtain help if he
had needed it.
At the same time, the privacy intrusion was not great. A seizure
occurred only because Deputy Hochberger activated his emergency
23
flashers. Deputy Hochberger did this for everyone’s benefit, so the pulled-
over vehicles would be visible and so the motorist—Coffman—would know
it wasn’t just a stranger approaching from behind. Cf. Kurth, 813 N.W.2d
at 281 (noting that the officer activated his emergency flashers even
though the defendant had parked in the lot of an open restaurant and the
officer “could not and did not argue that he activated his emergency lights
for his own protection”). The vehicle was already at rest when Deputy
Hochberger activated the flashers, and the setting was by the side of a
highway. See id. at 280–81. After performing this balancing, we conclude
the public interest here outweighed the intrusion on privacy. We find the
decisions discussed above from appellate courts in Utah, West Virginia,
Wisconsin, Montana, Illinois, Tennessee, South Dakota, North Dakota,
Alaska, and Minnesota to be persuasive.
Furthermore, the deputy’s actions here were tailored to providing
assistance only to the extent it may have been needed. See id. at 278
(“[T]he officer may not do more than is reasonably necessary to determine
whether a person is in need of assistance, and to provide that assistance.”
(quoting Crawford, 659 N.W.2d at 542–43)). Deputy Hochberger’s
conduct, which included activating his emergency lights, parking behind
the parked car, and approaching the vehicle on foot to check on its
occupants, was reasonable given the objective of safely determining
whether the motorist needed help. See, e.g., Anderson, 362 P.3d at 1240.
The deputy’s decision to address this roadside situation was not
unreasonable, and arguably it would have been “a dereliction of duty” to
ignore it. See Lovegren, 51 P.3d at 476. Many motorists would appreciate
and expect officers to engage in this kind of community caretaking activity.
Coffman suggests the deputy should not have stopped behind his
vehicle and could have accomplished his community caretaking purpose
24
by pulling alongside it instead. This would have been impractical. See
Kramer, 759 N.W.2d at 611 (“Kramer suggests that Wagner could simply
have pulled up along side of his vehicle, rolled down the window and asked
if Kramer needed assistance. We conclude that doing so would have
required Wagner to stop in the middle of one lane of a two-lane highway.
Doing so would have added to the dangerousness of the stop for both
Wagner and Kramer, if an inattentive motorist had come to the crest of the
hill without appreciating that the officer’s vehicle was blocking one lane of
traffic.”). The best way for Deputy Hochberger to determine whether the
Coffmans needed help was to talk to them.
Providing help to motorists is an important function performed by
law enforcement officers. In 2016 alone, Iowa state troopers assisted more
than 11,462 motorists in need. Iowa Dep’t Pub. Safety, FY2016 Annual
Report 22 (2016), www.dps.state.ia.us/commis/pib/Annual_
Report/2016/FY2016AnnualReport.pdf [https://perma.cc/J7E4-
BRMT]. The year before, the Story County Sheriff’s Office reported
assisting 957 motorists. Story Cty. Sheriff’s Office, 2015 Annual Report,
Story County, Iowa 11 (2015), http://www.storycountyiowa.gov
/index.aspx?NID=963 [https://perma.cc/H6QW-XZ3U]. By way of
comparison, this is only slightly less than the number of speeding tickets
the office issued. Id.
We hold that this particular encounter fell within the community
caretaking exception to the Fourth Amendment’s warrant requirement, as
we have interpreted that exception in prior cases and as most other
jurisdictions have interpreted it.
C. Community Caretaking Exception Under Article I, Section 8.
Coffman also argues that even if the stop complied with the Fourth
Amendment, we should interpret the community caretaking doctrine
25
differently under the Iowa Constitution. The State counters that error has
not been preserved on this point because the defendant did not assert this
position until he filed a motion for reconsideration of the denial of his
motion to suppress. The district court, however, did not indicate that it
was declining to consider Coffman’s arguments for reconsideration as
untimely but instead reached their merits. Accordingly, we conclude error
was preserved. See State v. Bowers, 661 N.W.2d 536, 540 (Iowa 2003)
(electing to review an untimely motion to suppress on the merits where the
district court reached the merits).
“What is required under the Iowa Constitution, in each and every
case that comes before us, is . . . exercise of our best, independent
judgment of the proper parameters of state constitutional commands.”
State v. Short, 851 N.W.2d 474, 490 (Iowa 2014).
In his appellate briefing, Coffman appears to merge the two distinct
Iowa constitutional arguments he made below. That is, under article I,
section 8, he asks us to do away with the public servant component of the
community caretaking exception for evidentiary purposes only. Evidence
could be used if it was obtained when an officer had “an immediate
reasonable belief that a serious, dangerous event [was] occurring”—i.e.,
“that emergency aid is required.” Meanwhile, police would still be free to
respond to other community caretaking situations without violating the
Iowa Constitution, but evidence from those situations could not be used.
In short, Coffman would have us establish two tiers of community
caretaking interventions. Both would be lawful and constitutional, but
only “emergency” interventions could provide source material for
subsequent criminal prosecutions.
In support of this argument, Coffman cites Commonwealth v.
Canavan, a decision of the Massachusetts Appeals Court. 667 N.E.2d 264
26
(Mass. App. Ct. 1996). Canavan is actually a Fourth Amendment decision,
not a state constitutional case. Id. at 268 n.8. There, the appellate court
found an officer was not justified in pulling over a moving vehicle that he
suspected to be lost. Id. at 265, 268. The officer had no other basis for
believing the driver needed assistance. Id. at 265. The court noted that
the interest in aiding the motorist “may ‘be as well served by having the
police officer make his presence known and leaving to the motorist the
decision as to whether to stop and seek directions.’ ” Id. at 266 (quoting
United States v. Dunbar, 470 F. Supp. 704, 707 (D. Conn. 1979), aff’d, 610
F.2d 807 (2d Cir. 1979)). The decision itself, however, does not limit
community caretaking to emergency situations. Instead, it draws a
distinction between a lost motorist and one who may potentially be at risk
to himself or others:
Dunbar does not inhibit the police from making intrusions
amounting to seizures when the governmental interest
predominates—thus seizure even of lost motorists is justified
when safety hazards are actually entailed and lights and
sirens are needed to arouse the attention of the drivers and
avoid mishap.
Id. at 267.
Furthermore, the Massachusetts court cited with approval
Commonwealth v. Leonard, 663 N.E.2d 828 (Mass. 1996), a Massachusetts
Supreme Judicial Court decision in which the court upheld a police action
taken based upon the potential illness of the driver. Canavan, 667 N.E.2d
at 268. In Leonard, a state trooper was determined to be justified in
pulling over a driver pursuant to the community caretaking doctrine
because, according to the Canavan court, “the police action as a whole,
the opening of the door included, might be seen as part of the interaction
of citizen with police for the well being of the person and so raising no
constitutional issue.” Id. (citing Leonard, 663 N.E.2d at 508–09). Leonard
27
is closer to the present case than Canavan. Neither decision supports
Coffman’s proposed interpretation of article I, section 8.
Notably, in another case with even more factual similarity to ours,
the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court upheld the stop under the
community caretaking exception. See Commonwealth v. Evans, 764
N.E.2d 841, 844 (Mass. 2002). In Evans, a state trooper saw a car pulled
over on the side of a highway with its right blinker flashing at 11:30 p.m.
Id. at 843. The trooper pulled behind the parked vehicle and activated his
cruiser’s lights, then approached the driver on foot to see if he needed
assistance. Id. The court held this conduct “falls squarely under the
trooper’s community caretaking function.” Id. at 844.
Coffman’s opening brief also cited Provo City v. Warden, 844 P.2d
360 (Utah Ct. App. 1992). There, the Utah Court of Appeals—again
applying the Fourth Amendment rather than a state constitutional
provision—did “adopt . . . the imminent danger to life or limb” standard
proposed by Coffman. See id. at 364–65. Warden also said that “stops
which are legitimate exercises of police community caretaker
responsibilities, but which are not ‘reasonable’ under the Fourth
Amendment, may result in application of the exclusionary rule, while still
achieving the objectives of community caretaking.” Id. at 365. However,
Warden is not good law, even in Utah. The State pointed out in its
answering brief that Warden was expressly overruled by the Utah Supreme
Court in Anderson, 362 P.3d at 1237, 1239. Accordingly, Coffman
dropped any reference to Warden in his application for further review to
this court.
As noted, Coffman maintains we should apply the exclusionary rule
to any nonemergency acts of community caretaking, even if the acts were
otherwise proper. However, the exclusionary rule exists in Iowa as a
28
“remedy for the constitutional violation” and to “protect[] the integrity of
the courts.” State v. Cline, 617 N.W.2d 277, 289 (Iowa 2000) (en banc),
overruled on other grounds by State v. Turner, 630 N.W.2d 601, 606 n.2
(Iowa 2001). It “places the parties in the positions they would have been
in had the unconstitutional search not occurred.” Id. If law enforcement
has acted in a way that is not unconstitutional or illegal but is in fact
socially desirable, our article I, section 8 precedent does not provide a
basis for suppressing the results of that conduct.
Law professor Michael R. Dimino Sr. elaborated on this point in the
context of community caretaking searches, stating,
Searches are either reasonable or unreasonable. Generally
speaking, reasonable searches are constitutional and give rise
to no issue of remedy. Unreasonable searches are
unconstitutional and usually result in exclusion of evidence
found during the unreasonable search. The targeted
exclusionary rule, however, either requires exclusion when
the police were acting reasonably in fulfilling community-
caretaking function, or calls the community-caretaking
search unreasonable and excludes evidence—all the while
winking and nodding to police departments to encourage them
to act in the very manner the court holds to be
unconstitutional.
Michael R. Dimino Sr., Police Paternalism: Community Caretaking,
Assistance Searches, and Fourth Amendment Reasonableness, 66 Wash. &
Lee L. Rev. 1485, 1558 (2009) [hereafter Dimino] (footnotes omitted). We
agree with Professor Dimino’s basic line drawing: police conduct is either
legal or illegal, and if it is legal, its fruits should not be suppressed under
the Iowa Constitution. 3
3Professor Dimino finds that a total of ten states do not recognize community
caretaking searches as a valid warrant exception in nonemergency situations. See
Dimino, 66 Wash. & Lee L. Rev. at 1503–04. The lead case is People v. Mitchell, 347
N.E.2d 607, 609 (N.Y. 1976), abrogated by Stuart, 547 U.S. at 404–05, 126 S. Ct. at 1948.
The present case, however, involves a vehicle seizure, not a search. See John W.
Sturgis VII, Note, Help! I Need Somebody (or Do I?): A Discussion of Community Caretaking
and “Assistance Seizures” Under Iowa Law, 99 Iowa L. Rev. 1841, 1863 (2014) (noting
29
Recently, in State v. Ramirez, this court confronted the question
whether the results of a federal search that complied with the federal law
on anticipatory warrants should be excluded from a state prosecution
because Iowa law does not authorize anticipatory warrants. 895 N.W.2d
884, 886 (Iowa 2017). We concluded,
When a bona fide federal investigation leads to a valid federal
search, but the evidence is later turned over to state
authorities for a state prosecution, we do not believe
deterrence or judicial integrity necessarily require a
reexamination of the search under standards that
hypothetically would have prevailed if the search had been
performed by state authorities.
Id. at 898. A dissent disagreed and would apply the exclusionary rule to
any search within Iowa that would have violated the Iowa Constitution or
Iowa statutes if conducted by Iowa officials. See id. at 899 (Wiggins, J.,
dissenting). However, Coffman wants to go a step further than the Ramirez
dissent and suppress the results of a stop even if it violated neither the
Iowa Constitution nor Iowa law. We are not persuaded this is appropriate.
During his oral argument before our court, Coffman changed course
somewhat from his appellate briefing. First, Coffman posited that “the
public servant doctrine should not allow officers to seize individuals.” This
of course would extinguish the doctrine altogether. Our discussion
heretofore explains why we do not find this jurisprudential approach
persuasive.
that all ten of these jurisdictions use the Mitchell test exclusively on searches). Coffman
cites no case other than the overruled Warden decision that has limited community
caretaking seizures of vehicles to emergency situations. It does appear that Nevada, a
jurisdiction not included in Professor Dimino’s list of ten, will uphold a community
caretaking stop of a vehicle “only where there are clear indicia of an emergency.” State v.
Rincon, 147 P.3d 233, 237 (Nev. 2006).
We emphasize that today’s decision applies only to vehicle seizures and should
not be extended to searches.
30
Second, Coffman urged us to restrict the public servant doctrine to
circumstances where the officer has a firm basis for concluding that the
motorist actually needed assistance. As his counsel elaborated, he would
“requir[e] the state to show specific, objective facts as to why a need
existed.”
Clearly, a community caretaking seizure of a motorist must be
supported by objective grounds to believe the motorist or a third party
affected by the motorist may need assistance. Still, we would not set the
required threshold of proof as high as Coffman would. Coffman’s
threshold would deter officers from stepping into a situation, like the one
in this case, where the motorist may need help but the officer cannot tell.
Helping a citizen and investigating a citizen for commission of a crime are
two different things. An officer lacking a warrant should have somewhat
more latitude to do the former than to do the latter.
Thus, we believe the basic three-part test we have applied to
community caretaking seizures of motorists under the Fourth Amendment
also provides an appropriate standard under article I, section 8. See Kurth,
813 N.W.2d at 277; Crawford, 659 N.W.2d at 543. The requirements
embedded in that test—that the community caretaking be “bona fide” and
that “the public need and interest outweigh the intrusion upon the privacy
of the citizen”—will protect against abuse of this warrant exception.
Crawford, 659 N.W.2d at 543.
We do note, however, one qualification. In applying the Fourth
Amendment, we have said that “the relevant test for determining whether
the community caretaking exception applies is an objective one based on
the information available at the time of the stop and does not depend upon
the subjective motivations of the individual officers involved.” Kurth, 813
N.W.2d at 279 n.3. Under article I, section 8, though, we believe it is
31
incumbent on the state to prove both that the objective facts satisfy the
standards for community caretaking and that the officer subjectively
intended to engage in community caretaking. As we implied in Kurth, the
term “bona fide” generally has both an objective and a subjective
component. See id. One law professor has advocated requiring proof of
“a good-faith community-caretaking motivation” in the search context.
See Dimino, 66 Wash. & Lee L. Rev. at 1534. Closer to home, a law student
note has specifically recommended that there should be a “subjective good
faith requirement” for community caretaking seizures under article I,
section 8. See John W. Sturgis VII, Note, Help! I Need Somebody (Or Do
I?): A Discussion of Community Caretaking and “Assistance Seizures” Under
Iowa Law, 99 Iowa L. Rev 1841, 1873 (2014); see also Mary Elisabeth
Naumann, The Community Caretaker Doctrine: Yet Another Fourth
Amendment Exception, 26 Am. J. Crim. L. 325, 359 (1999) (“The concern
over the use of the doctrine as a pretext for criminal investigations tends
to be the most common objection to both the use and extension of the
community caretaker doctrine.”). 4
We find these authors’ arguments persuasive. Investigatory seizures
of motorists and community caretaking seizures of motorists should
remain analytically separate. Otherwise, the latter could become simply a
4Several other state courts, applying the Fourth Amendment, have held that
community caretaking stops of vehicles must be for community caretaking purposes or
at least must take the officer’s motive into account. See State v. Marx, 215 P.3d 601, 606
(Kan. 2009) (“The State failed to carry its burden of justifying the initial detention of the
Marxes’ motor home as a public safety stop for community caretaking purposes.”); State
v. Rinehart, 617 N.W.2d 842, 844 (S.D. 2000) (affirming denial of a motion to suppress a
community caretaking traffic stop because the officer testified “his whole intention in
stopping Rinehart was to see if he was all right” and “the trial court did not find fault with
[the officer’s] motives and was able to judge the officer’s credibility as he testified”);
Kramer, 759 N.W.2d at 607 (“[W]hen a search or seizure is not supported by probable
cause or reasonable suspicion and it is contended that the reasonableness of police
conduct stands on other footing, an officer’s subjective motivation is a factor that may
warrant consideration.”).
32
way to perform an investigation without meeting the reasonable suspicion
or probable cause standard. To insure this separation, therefore, we hold
that under the Iowa Constitution, a community caretaking seizure of a
vehicle must be undertaken for genuine community caretaking purposes.
In a sense, this restores the community caretaking exception to its roots,
where it was “totally divorced” from criminal investigation. See Cady, 413
U.S. at 441, 93 S. Ct. at 2528.
Here, based on our de novo review of the record while giving
deference to the district court’s findings, we conclude that Deputy
Hochberger’s motivation was to assist Coffman. Like the district court, we
note that Deputy Hochberger did not run the vehicle’s plates through
dispatch but instead immediately went up to the driver’s side of the vehicle
and asked if everything was okay. Therefore, the seizure in this case met
the additional requirement we have just recognized under article I, section
8.
In sum, we do not believe the conduct of the deputy in this case was
unconstitutional or even deserving of criticism. Iowans expect law
enforcement on patrol to offer a helping hand in situations like this where
a motorist is pulled over on a public highway at night and may be in
difficulty. As noted above, Iowa state troopers assisted over 10,000
motorists in need in a single year, and the sheriff’s office of this county
assisted nearly 1000 motorists in that time span. Applying the same
three-part test we have used under the Fourth Amendment, but modifying
it to impose a further requirement that the officer acted out of a genuine
community caretaking motivation, we find that the stop here did not
violate article I, section 8.
33
IV. Conclusion.
For the reasons stated, we affirm the judgment of the district court
and the decision of the court of appeals.
DECISION OF COURT OF APPEALS AND JUDGMENT OF
DISTRICT COURT AFFIRMED.
Cady, C.J., and Waterman and Zager, JJ., join this opinion. Appel,
J., files a dissenting opinion in which Wiggins, J., joins. Hecht, J., takes
no part.
34
#16–1720, State v. Coffman
APPEL, Justice (dissenting).
I respectfully dissent. For the reasons expressed below, I would hold
that the search and seizure was unlawful under article I, section 8 of the
Iowa Constitution. In order to fully understand the context of today’s
decision, it is necessary to review the purposes of constitutional provisions
related to search and seizure, development of the “community caretaking”
exception in the United States Supreme Court, the state and federal
caselaw attempting to apply it, and the implications the doctrine may have
on search and seizure law generally.
I. Purpose of Constitutional Provisions Related to Search and
Seizure.
It is important at the outset to understand the purposes of Search
and Seizure Clauses in the State and Federal Constitutions. The central
purpose of the Fourth Amendment and article I, section 8 of the Iowa
Constitution “is to safeguard the privacy and security of individuals
against arbitrary invasions by government officials.” South Dakota v.
Opperman, 428 U.S. 364, 377, 96 S. Ct. 3092, 3101 (1976) (Powell, J.,
concurring). The search and seizure provisions are not enabling acts
designed to justify ever-expanding kinds of police intrusion but are
designed to limit authorities to proper bounds. The search and seizure
provisions of both the Federal and Iowa Constitutions show a distrust of
police power and standardless discretion. See Tracey Maclin, The Central
Meaning of the Fourth Amendment, 35 Wm. & Mary L. Rev. 197, 201 (1993).
The United States Supreme Court, of course, has recognized
exceptions to the warrant requirement, and so have we. Yet, as noted in
Terry v. Ohio, the exceptions must be “confined in scope” and “strictly
circumscribed.” 392 U.S. 1, 25–26, 29, 88 S. Ct. 1868, 1882, 1884 (1968).
35
We too have emphasized that exceptions to the warrant requirement, such
as the search-incident-to-arrest doctrine, must be “narrowly construed
and limited to accommodating only those interests it was created to serve.”
State v. Gaskins, 866 N.W.2d 1, 8 (Iowa 2015) (quoting State v. McGrane,
733 N.W.2d 671, 677 (Iowa 2007)).
Justice Jackson famously declared decades ago that the warrant
requirement was imposed to ensure that a neutral and detached
magistrate made the judgment calls necessary to protect privacy and
liberty interests and not an officer “engaged in the often competitive
enterprise of ferreting out crime.” Johnson v. United States, 333 U.S. 10,
13–14, 68 S. Ct. 367, 369 (1948). Yet, the liberty and privacy interests are
not less important when the government purpose is beneficial. As noted
by Justice Brandeis, “Experience should teach us to be most on our guard
to protect liberty when the government’s purposes are beneficent.”
Olmstead v. United States, 277 U.S. 438, 479, 48 S. Ct. 564, 572 (1928)
(Brandeis, J., dissenting).
Further, no encroachments on liberty are minor. As noted more
than a century ago by Justice Bradley, illegitimate practices gain their
footing when accepted in their “mildest and least repulsive form.” Boyd v.
United States, 116 U.S. 616, 635, 6 S. Ct. 524, 535 (1886), overruled in
part on other grounds by Warden v. Hayden, 387 U.S. 294, 302, 306–07,
87 S. Ct. 1642, 1647–48, 1649–50 (1967). And, decisions bending search
and seizure restrictions tend to creep—yesterday’s close case becomes
tomorrow’s norm. See State v. Pinkard, 785 N.W.2d 592, 609 (Wis. 2010)
(Bradley, J., dissenting).
36
II. United States Supreme Court Cases Regarding the
Community Caretaking Exception to the Warrant Requirement.
In 1973, a divided United States Supreme Court decided Cady v.
Dombrowski, 413 U.S. 433, 93 S. Ct. 2523 (1973), a case often identified
as embracing a community caretaking exception to the warrant
requirement of the Fourth Amendment. In Cady, a police officer, after
consuming alcohol, drove his car into a guardrail and crashed into a bridge
abutment. Id. at 435–36, 93 S. Ct. at 2525. At the scene, authorities
briefly searched his vehicle for his service revolver, but the weapon was
not found. Id. at 436, 93 S. Ct. at 2525. The officer was taken to a local
police station and charged with drunken driving. Id. His automobile was
towed to a private garage where it was left unguarded outside the premises.
Id.
Law enforcement more thoroughly searched the police officer’s
seized automobile at the private garage in an effort to find the service
revolver, which according to testimony at the hearing on the motion to
suppress, was “standard procedure in [the police] department.” Id. at 437,
93 S. Ct. at 2526. During the more exhaustive search, police uncovered
incriminating evidence including a flashlight with spots of blood from
between the two front seats of the vehicle, a bloody car mat, and bloody
clothing in the trunk of the vehicle. Id. The question before the Cady
Court was whether the warrantless search of the automobile passed
constitutional muster under the Fourth Amendment. Id. at 442, 93 S. Ct.
at 2528–29.
The Cady majority concluded that it did. Id. at 448, 93 S. Ct. at
2531. The majority emphasized a number of features of the case in
arriving at its conclusion. First, the Court emphasized that a line of cases
already established an exemption from the warrant requirement for
37
automobiles. Id. at 439–40, 93 S. Ct. at 2527. Second, the majority noted
that state officials, in light of their local regulatory functions, have much
more contact with vehicles than do most federal law enforcement officers.
Id. at 441, 93 S. Ct. at 2528. Third, the Court noted that the police already
had exercised a form of custody and control over the vehicle by towing it
from the scene to a private garage. Id. at 442–43, 93 S. Ct. at 2529.
Fourth, the majority noted that the search of the trunk of the vehicle was
pursuant to a “standard procedure” in the local police department. Id. at
443, 93 S. Ct. at 2529.
Under the circumstances, the Cady majority concluded that
the type of caretaking “search” conducted here of a vehicle
that was neither in the custody nor on the premises of its
owner, and that had been placed where it was by virtue of
lawful police action, was not unreasonable solely because a
warrant had not been obtained.
Id. at 447–48, 93 S. Ct. at 2531. Further, the Court observed that the
trunk of the automobile “was vulnerable to intrusion by vandals” and was
“reasonably believed to contain a gun.” Id. at 448, 93 S. Ct. at 2531.
Despite the narrow language, the Supreme Court also used the term
“community caretaking,” a potentially protean phrase, to describe police
activities not associated with the detection and investigation of crime. Id.
at 441, 93 S. Ct. at 2528. Specifically, the Cady majority observed,
Local police officers, unlike federal officers, frequently
investigate vehicle accidents in which there is no claim of
criminal liability and engage in what, for want of a better term,
may be described as community caretaking functions, totally
divorced from the detection, investigation, or acquisition of
evidence relating to the violation of a criminal statute.
Id.
The above sentence from the Cady majority is, of course, completely
true. The interpretive question, however, as will be seen below, is whether
38
this language was intended to provide a springboard for a stand-alone
community caretaking exception to the warrant requirement that extends
far beyond the limitations expressly emphasized in the majority opinion of
Cady.
Justice Brennan, joined by Justices Douglas, Stewart, and
Marshall, dissented. Id. at 450, 93 S. Ct. at 2532 (Brennan, J.,
dissenting). Justice Brennan noted that none of the established
exceptions to the warrant requirement applied under the facts of the case.
Id. at 451–53, 93 S. Ct. at 2533–34. According to Justice Brennan, the
search was not pursuant to the automobile exception because the vehicle
was in the custody of the police, was not a search incident to arrest or a
seizure of evidence in plain view, was not a search pursuant to a forfeiture
proceeding, and did not arise from exigent circumstances. Id. at 451–54,
93 S. Ct. at 2533–34. Justice Brennan thus found the majority had
engaged in a serious departure from established Fourth Amendment
principles. Id. at 454, 93 S. Ct. at 2534.
The Cady decision itself is an inventory search case and directly led
to further inventory search cases in the United States Supreme Court. See
Colorado v. Bertine, 479 U.S. 367, 371–72, 107 S. Ct. 738, 741 (1987);
Opperman, 428 U.S. at 374–76, 96 S. Ct. at 3099–3100 (majority opinion).
These cases make no mention of a broad, stand-alone community
caretaking exception to the warrant requirement. Since Opperman and
Bertine, the Supreme Court has not provided further guidance on the issue
of the community caretaking exception to the warrant requirement of the
Fourth Amendment.
A fighting issue in the lower courts has been the extent to which the
community caretaking exception in Cady is limited by the case’s facts. Is
the exception limited to searches of impounded automobiles such as those
39
involved in Cady, Opperman, and Bertine? Does it extend to other kinds
of searches involving automobiles that do not involve impoundment or
inventory searches? Does it extend into searches of residences?
A second fighting issue is the standard to be employed in
determining whether a warrantless community caretaking search is
lawful. While the Cady majority refers to “reasonableness” as a test of
evaluating the lawfulness of law enforcement actions, what exactly does
that mean? 413 U.S. at 439, 93 S. Ct. at 2527 (majority opinion). Finally,
the Cady majority emphasizes that the search was “totally divorced” from
criminal investigation or prosecution. Id. at 441, 93 S. Ct. at 2528. How
does a court enforce the totally divorced requirement?
In the more than forty years since Cady, the United States Supreme
Court has not addressed these issues, and as a result, the development of
the community caretaking doctrine has been left to the lower courts. The
only authoritative declaration from the Supreme Court has been the Cady
decision, which permitted a warrantless search for community caretaking
purposes under the limited circumstances described in that case.
In considering the scope and standards under the community
caretaking exception, it is important not to conflate community caretaking
with other recognized exceptions to the warrant requirement. For
example, warrantless searches have been permitted when there are exigent
circumstances or to render emergency aid. See Mincey v. Arizona, 437
U.S. 385, 392, 98 S. Ct. 2408, 2413 (1978); Michigan v. Tyler, 436 U.S.
499, 509, 98 S. Ct. 1942, 1949–50 (1978). Many community caretaking
searches fall within these well-established exceptions and do not require
a stand-alone community caretaking doctrine. Further, many community
caretaking activities of law enforcement arise from consensual encounters
that do not implicate constitutional search and seizure protections. A
40
court’s refusal to adopt an expansive, stand-alone community caretaking
doctrine does not mean that police are prohibited from engaging in
community caretaking, but only that if evidence is discovered without a
warrant through community caretaking activities, it will be suppressed
unless it is admissible under another recognized search and seizure
concept.
III. Development of Community Caretaking in Lower Federal
Courts.
In light of the limited guidance from the Cady majority and the
vigorous nature of the dissent, it is hardly surprising that the lower federal
courts have been divided with respect to the application of the community
caretaking exception to the warrant requirement outside the context of a
Cady search of an impounded automobile. For the most part, however,
the federal cases do not involve searches of automobiles, which ordinarily
arise in state court proceedings. Yet, the federal cases illustrate some of
the fundamental issues involved in considering the scope and standards
that inhere in warrantless searches pursuant to a community caretaking
function.
For example, several circuits have refused to extend the community
caretaking exception. These cases rely on the limiting language in Cady
and the availability of other well-recognized exceptions to the warrant
requirement. See, e.g., United States v. Bute, 43 F.3d 531, 535 (10th Cir.
1994) (rejecting community caretaking outside of automobile searches);
United States v. Erickson, 991 F.2d 529, 533 (9th Cir. 1993) (holding
exigent-circumstances exception adequately accommodates need for
warrantless home entry); United States v. Pichany, 687 F.2d 204, 208–09
(7th Cir. 1982) (per curiam) (“[T]he Supreme Court did not intend to create
a broad exception to the . . . warrant requirement to apply whenever the
41
police are acting in an ‘investigative,’ rather than a ‘criminal’ function.”).
On the other hand, the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth
Circuit has broken free from the limiting language and factual scenario in
Cady and found that the community caretaking doctrine applies to
searches of homes. See United States v. Quezada, 448 F.3d 1005, 1007
(8th Cir. 2006); cf. Ray v. Twp. of Warren, 626 F.3d 170, 177 (3d Cir. 2010)
(holding, in the context of qualified immunity, that searching the home
under community caretaking did not violate clearly established law);
Phillips v. Peddle, 7 F. App’x 175, 179–80 (4th Cir. 2001) (same). The Sixth
Circuit swings from seemingly endorsing the extension to homes to
seemingly limiting the doctrine to automobiles. Compare United States v.
Williams, 354 F.3d 497, 508 (6th Cir. 2003) (“[W]e doubt that community
caretaking will generally justify warrantless entries into private homes.”),
with United States v. Rohrig, 98 F.3d 1506, 1521–22 (6th Cir. 1996)
(allowing entry into a home in the middle of the night to turn down loud
music disturbing neighbors).
Another question percolating through the federal courts is whether
the community caretaking exception extends beyond emergency situations
and inventory searches to a third amorphous category of police officers
acting as public servants. Arguably, everything an officer does pursuant
to his or her lawful duties is acting as a public servant. As a result, a case
can be made that the public-servant exception to the warrant requirement
would swallow up constitutional restrictions on warrantless searches all
together. Some federal courts have seemingly limited the scope of the
community caretaking doctrine by adopting the relatively stringent
standards generally applicable to a warrantless search based on
emergency aid. See United States v. Stafford, 416 F.3d 1068, 1073–75 (9th
Cir. 2005); Martin v. City of Oceanside, 360 F.3d 1078, 1081–83 (9th Cir.
42
2004); see also Michael R. Dimino Sr., Police Paternalism: Community
Caretaking, Assistance Searches, and Fourth Amendment Reasonableness,
66 Wash. & Lee L. Rev. 1485, 1503–04, 1504 n.90 (2009) [hereinafter
Dimino].
Once the scope of permissible community caretaking has been
established, the next question is what standards the court should apply
in determining the validity of the warrantless search. One federal court
has, like Cady itself, simply declared that the ultimate inquiry is whether
the officer acted “within the realm of reason.” Lockhart-Bembery v. Sauro,
498 F.3d 69, 75 (lst Cir. 2007) (quoting United States v. Rodriguez-Morales,
929 F.2d 780, 786 (1st Cir. 1991)); see Cady, 413 U.S. at 439, 935 S. Ct.
at 2527. To simply declare that the search must be “reasonable” is to have
no standard at all that judges can consistently and uniformly apply. See
Dimino, 66 Wash. & Lee L. Rev. at 1499.
A more structured approach to reasonableness in the context of
community caretaking is found in United States v. Garner, 416 F.3d 1208
(10th Cir. 2005). In Garner, the Tenth Circuit fashioned a three-part test
for community caretaking, namely, whether “(1) there are specific and
articulable facts reasonably warranting the action; (2) the government’s
interest outweighs the individual’s interest in being free of the seizure; and
(3) the scope of the detention is no more severe than necessary for its
purpose.” Dimino, 66 Wash. & Lee L. Rev. at 1501; see Garner, 416 F.3d
at 1213. The second step of the Garner formulation is not without its
problems, however, because if the government’s purpose in executing the
search is to assist the individual, there is no government interest to be
balanced under step two: the only interest involved is, in fact, the interest
of the individual being searched. See Dimino, 66 Wash. & Lee L. Rev. at
1502.
43
IV. Development of Community Caretaking in State Courts.
Like the federal courts, the state courts are divided on the scope and
standards of the community caretaking exception. As in federal court, the
struggle over the scope of the community caretaking doctrine has surfaced
on the question of whether it extends to home searches.
For example, in State v. Vargas, the New Jersey Supreme Court
considered whether evidence obtained pursuant to a warrantless welfare
check was admissible. 63 A.3d 175, 177 (N.J. 2013). The Vargas court
noted that although Cady was sometimes cited as a source of a stand-
alone community caretaking exception to the warrant requirement, “[a]
careful reading of Cady . . . raises the question of whether the United
States Supreme Court intended to create a new stand-alone warrant
exception.” Id. at 182. In order to understand whether the development
of the community caretaking doctrine “has become untethered from its
initial moorings,” the court examined the language in Cady. Id. at 182–
83. The Vargas court noted that while “the Supreme Court in Cady
recognized law enforcement’s ‘community caretaking functions,’ it never
suggested that community-caretaking responsibilities constituted a wholly
new exception to the warrant requirement that would justify the
warrantless search of a home.” Id. at 183. The Vargas court noted that
Cady, as well as Opperman and Bertine, never intended “community
caretaking as an exception to the warrant requirement” and that “[a]ll
three cases involved permissible inventory searches.” Id. at 184.
In the end, the Vargas court concluded that a broad community
caretaking doctrine could not support a warrantless search of a home. Id.
at 187. The court emphasized the limited scope of Cady and the
availability of other exceptions to the warrant requirement, including the
emergency-aid and exigent-circumstances exceptions. Id. at 188–89; see
44
also State v. Wilson, 350 P.3d 800, 804–05 (Ariz. 2015) (rejecting
community caretaking in homes, emphasizing Cady was limited to
automobiles); Vargas, 63 A.3d at 187 (holding community caretaking
doctrine does not permit warrantless entry or search of home absent
exigent circumstances); State v. Ryon, 108 P.3d 1032, 1043 (N.M. 2005)
(declining to apply community caretaking to a home search, noting that
such a search must meet the requirements of the emergency-aid
exception).
Other state courts, however, have expanded the scope of community
caretaking beyond Cady to apply it to searches of homes as well, at least
under some circumstances. See People v. Ray, 981 P.2d 928, 934 (Cal.
1999) (articulating a broad community caretaking exception); State v.
Alexander, 721 A.2d 275, 284–85 (Md. Ct. Spec. App. 1998) (finding home
search permitted under community caretaking exception); see also
Commonwealth v. Waters, 456 S.E.2d 527, 529–30 (Va. Ct. App. 1995)
(holding community caretaking could apply to seizure of individual). These
cases tend to emphasize the broad nature of community caretaking
responsibilities of law enforcement rather than the limiting language in
Cady.
The Oregon Supreme Court, on the other hand, does not recognize
the community caretaking exception under the Oregon Constitution. State
v. Bridewell, 759 P.2d 1054, 1059 (Or. 1988) (en banc). Whenever a police
officer is engaged in community caretaking functions, the officer must still
comply with constitutional standards, including that any search and
seizure must be reasonable. Id. The Court of Appeals of Oregon explained
that while the community caretaking exception is not recognized under
Oregon law, an “analogous” exception exists, namely, the emergency-aid
doctrine. State v. Christenson, 45 P.3d 511, 514 (Or. Ct. App. 2002). Yet,
45
under this exception the police officer must have an objectively reasonable
belief that a true emergency exists, which is a demanding standard. Id.
Oregon courts also recognize an exigent-circumstances exception. State
v. Snow, 94 P.3d 872, 874 (Or. 2004) (en banc). Clearly, Oregon courts
feel that police officers are able to adequately assist the citizens of their
state with only the emergency-aid and exigent-circumstances exceptions.
V. Development of Community Caretaking in Iowa Supreme
Court Precedents.
We have considered community caretaking in a number of cases.
Like many other courts, however, our handling of this search and seizure
doctrine has not always been precise.
For example, in State v. Kersh, we considered the admissibility of
evidence—namely a pistol—obtained pursuant to a search of an
automobile and driver after police received a report that the vehicle had
been driven up onto the lawn, the driver was slumped over the wheel when
police arrived, and the driver did not respond to police knocks on the
window. 313 N.W.2d 566, 567 (Iowa 1981), overruled in part on other
grounds by State v. Lake, 476 N.W.2d 55, 56–57 (Iowa 1991). Police
investigated but did not seize the vehicle. Id. at 568.
In Kersh, we noted that the warrantless search would be unlawful
“unless it fell within one of the carefully prescribed exceptions.” Id. We
stated that the search fell within two exceptions to the warrant
requirement, which we did not label. Id. We cited Mincey, however, and
other cases involving the emergency-aid exception. Id. We also later
suggested that there was reason to believe that the driver was intoxicated.
Id. We did not, however, expressly discuss the community caretaking
doctrine. Although police in Kersh may have been engaged in community
caretaking, the case itself does not involve application of a stand-alone
46
community caretaking exception to the warrant requirement but instead
provides a conventional application of well-established exceptions to the
warrant requirement. The Kersh case does not expressly state whether
the challenge was brought under the Fourth Amendment, article I, section
8 of the Iowa Constitution, or both.
A decade later, we decided State v. Mitchell, 498 N.W.2d 691 (Iowa
1993). In Mitchell, the defendant brought a Fourth Amendment challenge
to a vehicle search. Id. at 693. In this case, unlike in Kersh, police stopped
the vehicle. Id. at 692. The police made the stop because one of the rear
taillights was out. Id. Although the applicable criminal statute required
only that the vehicle be equipped with “a lighted rear lamp,” the driver was
subject to a “fix-it memorandum” under rules adopted by the Iowa
Department of Public Safety. Id. at 693. The stop in this case was thus a
result of an ongoing rule violation. Id. at 693–94. Generally citing Cady,
we stated that the duties of officers extend beyond crime detection and
include public-safety functions. Id. Yet, the fact that officers’ duties are
broad does not mean that a stand-alone community caretaking exception
to the warrant requirement exists that provides for warrantless searches
beyond situations involving exigent circumstances, emergency aid, or
consensual encounters. No Iowa constitutional issue was raised in
Mitchell.
The next case is State v. Carlson, 548 N.W.2d 138 (Iowa 1996). The
Carlson case involved a warrantless, nighttime raid of a residence. Id. at
139. As in Kersh, we found in Carlson that police were acting lawfully
under the exigent-circumstances and emergency-aid exceptions to the
warrant requirement. Id. at 143. Blended into the discussion is dicta
about the community caretaking function, but the thrust of the case is
that the warrantless search was lawful under traditional exceptions to the
47
warrant requirement. Id. at 141 & n.3. Carlson is thus a case where the
court “declare[s] that the community caretaker exception applies, but then
use[s] law applicable to one of the other exceptions, such as the emergency
doctrine.” See State v. Deneui, 775 N.W.2d 221, 232 (S.D. 2009). The
challenge in Carlson was brought under both the Fourth Amendment and
article I, section 8, but no effort was made to distinguish Iowa
constitutional law from prevailing federal precedent. 548 N.W.2d at 140.
After Carlson, we decided State v. Moore, 609 N.W.2d 502 (Iowa
2000) (en banc). In Moore, a park ranger stopped a vehicle to warn the
driver that his speed posed a danger to campers parked in the area. Id. at
503. When the vehicle was stopped, the park ranger smelled alcohol and
notified the Iowa state patrol, leading to the driver’s arrest for operating a
vehicle while intoxicated. Id. The driver sought to suppress evidence
arising from the stop. Id. The district court denied the motion to suppress.
Id.
On appeal, we affirmed the district court. Id. We noted specifically
the circumstances in the park where there was a full campground with
numerous families, individuals, and no sidewalks. Id. at 503–04. Further,
the evidence showed that parked vehicles along the campsites obstructed
the view of campers entering the roadway and obstructed the view that
motorists would have of campers who might step out onto the road. Id. at
503. Under the peculiar facts and circumstances, we held that the stop
was a valid public-safety function. Id. at 504. Moore solely involved a
challenge under the Fourth Amendment. See id. Additionally, it is a third-
party assistance case, where the police intervention with respect to the
vehicle driver was designed to protect others and not the driver. See id. at
503–04.
48
In 2003, we decided State v. Crawford, a Fourth Amendment case.
659 N.W.2d 537, 539 (Iowa 2003). In Crawford, a call was received by a
police dispatcher in the early morning hours that a person in the caller’s
apartment “had taken some pills” and was “physically aggressive towards
[her] and was yelling and shouting.” Id. at 539–40 (alteration in original).
A second call revealed that the individual had left the apartment in a
flatbed truck. Id. at 540. Police encountered the truck on the way to the
apartment and activated their overhead lights, and the truck pulled over
to the side of the road. Id. Crawford, the driver of the truck, disobeyed
the command to remain in the vehicle and ultimately went to the patrol
car. Id. At the patrol car, the police detected an odor of alcohol, obtained
admissions from Crawford, and administered a preliminary breath test,
the results of which showed intoxication above the legal limit. Id.
For the first time, we canvassed the community caretaking doctrine
in some detail. Id. at 541–43. We noted that warrantless searches are per
se unreasonable, “[s]ubject to a few carefully drawn exceptions.” Id. at
541. In discussing community caretaking, we cited a commentary that
noted “the community caretaking exception encompasses three separate
doctrines: (1) the emergency aid doctrine, (2) the automobile
impoundment/inventory doctrine, and (3) the ‘public servant’ exception
noted in Cady.” Id.; see Mary Elisabeth Naumann, Note, The Community
Caretaker Doctrine: Yet Another Fourth Amendment Exception, 26 Am. J.
Crim. L. 325, 330–41 (1999). Aside from the commentary, we cited no
caselaw for the proposition that community caretaking involves an
amorphous public-servant prong. See Crawford, 659 N.W.2d at 541. We
then broadly stated, somewhat inaccurately, that we had applied the
community caretaking doctrine in Moore, Carlson, Mitchell, and Kersh. Id.
49
at 542. Moore, Carlson, and Kersh involved emergency or exigent
circumstances, while Mitchell involved an ongoing infraction of the law.
In Crawford, we stated that in community caretaking cases, the
reasonableness of the warrantless search is based on the facts and
circumstances of the case, that reasonableness is determined by balancing
the public need against the nature of the intrusion on the privacy of the
individual, and that pursuant to the balancing requirement, “the state has
the burden of ‘showing specific and articulable facts that indicate their
actions were proper.’ ” Id. at 542 (quoting Carlson, 548 N.W.2d at 142).
We then proceeded to embrace a three-pronged test for community
caretaking as articulated by a Wisconsin appellate court in State v.
Anderson. Id. at 543 (citing State v. Anderson, 417 N.W.2d 411, 414 (Wis.
Ct. App. 1987)). Under the three-pronged Anderson test, a court
considering the validity of a warrantless search under the community
caretaking exception asks
(1) was there a seizure within the meaning of the Fourth
Amendment?; (2) if so, was the police conduct bona fide
community caretaker activity?; and (3) if so, did the public
need and interest outweigh the intrusion upon the privacy of
the citizen?
Id.
In applying the Anderson test, the Crawford court found that there
was a seizure. Id. The Crawford court then stated that the second step of
the analysis rested on “whether the facts available to the officer at the
moment of the seizure would have warranted a reasonable person to
believe an emergency existed.” Id. (emphasis added). As to this step, we
noted that police had received a report of a male subject taking some pills,
being physically aggressive, being confused and not knowing where he
was, and leaving in a flatbed truck. Id. We concluded that this was
50
sufficient for the officer to take the action he did “in the interest of public
safety and emergency aid.” Id. (emphasis added). We then briefly turned
to the balancing test and stated that the need and interest in determining
the condition of a person taking pills and acting oddly was sufficient to
outweigh the minimal intrusion of the defendant driver’s rights. Id.
Although the case nominally involved community caretaking, the language
of Crawford emphasizes the emergency-aid doctrine as providing the
exception to the warrant requirement.
We came to a different conclusion in a challenge to a warrantless
search under article I, section 8 of the Iowa Constitution in State v. Tague,
676 N.W.2d 197, 206 (Iowa 2004). In Tague, an officer followed a vehicle
for about a mile at about 2:00 a.m. and observed the vehicle cross over the
left edge of the roadway. Id. at 200. At this point, the officer activated his
emergency lights and pulled the vehicle over. Id. Once pulled over, the
officer approached the vehicle, detected the odor of alcohol, and observed
the driver’s bloodshot eyes and a slight slur to his speech. Id. After
conducting a field sobriety test, the driver was arrested for operating under
the influence. Id.
In Tague, the state defended the stop on the ground there was
reason to believe that the driver was either intoxicated or fatigued. Id. at
204. After canvassing the record for particular and articulable facts to
support the stop, we concluded that an isolated incident of briefly crossing
the edge line does not give rise to suspicion of either intoxication or fatigue.
Id. at 205–06. We noted,
Drivers talking on their cell phone, looking at a map, adjusting
the radio, adjusting the heater, defroster or air conditioner, or
checking on a child restrained in the back seat can lead a
driver to momentarily cross an edge line, without giving rise
to a reasonable suspicion of intoxication or fatigue.
51
Id. at 205.
Our most recent community caretaking case is State v. Kurth, where
the defendant challenged a warrantless search of his automobile under
the Fourth Amendment. 813 N.W.2d 270, 271 (Iowa 2012). In Kurth, an
officer activated his emergency lights and blocked in a driver in a parking
lot based on the officer’s belief that the vehicle had struck an object in the
roadway and suffered minor damage not affecting the drivability of the car.
Id. at 271–72. We outlined the Cady opinion, citing a commentator who
noted that the case provided “little doctrinal guidance from the Supreme
Court other than the vague command of reasonableness.” Id. at 273
(quoting Dimino, 66 Wash. & Lee L. Rev. at 1490).
In sum, our cases have been inconsistent. In Kurth, Carlson, and
Crawford, the searches involved community caretaking but were analyzed
under the emergency-aid or exigent-circumstance exceptions to the
warrant requirement. In Moore, although the officer was engaged in
community caretaking, traditional emergency-aid or exigent-
circumstances doctrines could have supported the officer’s actions.
Finally, in Tague and Kurth, we refused to apply a broad, stand-alone
community caretaking doctrine under the facts and circumstances of the
case. In no case have we affirmatively stated that the community-
caretaking doctrine, whatever it includes, is broad enough to cover
situations where law enforcement is providing assistance to the driver of a
vehicle—first-party assistance—nor have we considered the requirements
that the state must show for a warrantless first-party assistance search to
meet constitutional standards.
52
VI. Survey of State and Federal Cases Involving First-Party
Assistance Searches and Seizures of Stopped Vehicles and Motorists
Under the Community Caretaking Exception.
We now turn to cases involving warrantless first-party assistance
searches and seizures of vehicles on the side of the road. Given the
doctrinal uncertainty surrounding community caretaking, it comes as no
surprise that the caselaw related to warrantless searches and seizures of
such vehicles is scattered. It is no doubt true that the results in the cases
turn on the totality of the facts and circumstances, and as a result, the
precedents may not provide a basis for rigid reliance. Yet, a survey of the
cases can help inform our analysis of the present controversy.
A substantial number of cases involving first-party assistance
seizures of stopped vehicles have required specific, articulable facts
demonstrating a reasonable belief that the driver or passengers were in
need of assistance. These cases often emphasize that when there are only
generalized concerns, law enforcement may utilize less intrusive means to
determine whether there is a need of assistance but may not engage in
warrantless seizures.
An illustrative case is Commonwealth v. Livingstone, 174 A.3d 609
(Pa. 2017). In Livingstone, police encountered a vehicle parked on the side
of the road at 9:30 p.m. Id. at 614. The hazard lights of the vehicle,
however, were not activated. Id. The Livingstone court determined that if
there was a public-servant prong to community caretaking, there must be
a means that “will cabin reliance on the exception and enable courts to
properly assess its employment.” Id. at 635. The court determined that
in order to apply the public-servant prong of community caretaking to a
parked vehicle, the officer “must be able to point to specific, objective, and
articulable facts that would reasonably suggest to an experienced officer
that a citizen is in need of assistance.” Id. at 634. As in Tague, the
53
Livingstone court noted that there are many possibilities that could cause
a vehicle to be on the side of the road, namely, to look at a map, make
telephone calls, send text messages, or pick something up off the floor. Id.
at 634–35. The court held the seizure invalid and suppressed resulting
evidence obtained from it. Id. at 638.
State v. Boutin is a similar case. 13 A.3d 334 (N.H. 2010). Here, a
vehicle was on the “pull off” of a road at 8:35 p.m. on a dark, cold night
with snow on the ground. Id. at 335. A police officer seized the vehicle in
order to make sure everyone was “okay.” Id. at 337. According to the
Boutin court, however, there were no specific and articulable facts to justify
the intrusion. Id. The court observed that the vehicle was parked legally
and there were no “signs of an accident, that the car was disabled, or that
the passengers were in any type of distress.” Id. The court stated that the
officer had “generalized concerns” but the officer “did not describe any
specific and articulable facts that justified the intrusion.” Id. The officer’s
actions, according to the court, amounted to nothing more than a hunch.
Id. The court further noted that a seizure of the vehicle and its occupants
was not necessary as the officer could have activated his rear-facing lights
and could have used a spotlight to illuminate the parked vehicle if
necessary. Id. at 338; see also State v. Schmidt, 47 P.3d 1271, 1274 (Idaho
Ct. App. 2002) (holding detention of vehicle pulled off the road not
reasonable under community caretaking).
A third case of interest is Ozhuwan v. State, 786 P.2d 918 (Alaska
Ct. App. 1990). Here, an officer encountered two cars parked at night in
an area near a boat launch in a campground, a place where teenagers were
known to congregate to drink. Id. at 920. The officer activated his
emergency lights, thereby seizing the vehicles and their occupants. Id. at
921. The Ozhuwan court concluded that a general awareness that the
54
campground was used at night as a place for minors to drink was
insufficient to support the search and seizure. Id. at 921–22. The court
emphasized that there was no actual indication of any problem and that
no request for assistance had been received. Id. at 922. While the court
noted that generalized concerns for safety could certainly have justified a
contact in a nonintrusive manner, the generalized concerns did not
support a seizure. Id.
A fourth case illustrating the limits of community caretaking in a
first-party assistance case is State v. Button, 86 A.3d 1001 (Vt. 2013).
Here, shortly before midnight, the defendant pulled to the side of the road
and stopped with his engine running and lights on. Id. at 1002. According
to the Button court, the vehicle did not pose a traffic hazard. Id. at 1005.
The court held the seizure unlawful. Id. at 1006. The court noted that
had the “defendant indicated that he needed help, or parked in a
precarious location,” the result might be different. Id. Yet, under the
circumstances, the court reasoned that the officer could have slowly driven
by the defendant’s car while looking through the window to determine
whether the driver needed help. Id.
Two cases out of Montana show the privacy interests that people
have in their automobiles when parked at night. In State v. Hoover and
State v. Graham, adults engaging in consensual intimacy in their parked
cars were seized by law enforcement officers. Hoover, 402 P.3d 1224,
1227–28 (Mont. 2017); Graham, 175 P.3d 885, 887 (Mont. 2007). In both
cases, the locations of the parked vehicles were somewhat unusual.
Hoover, 402 P.3d at 1227 (involving a vehicle parked in between two
storage units at automobile dealership lot); Graham, 175 P.3d at 887
(stating police officer observed vehicle “parked on a dirt pullout within
plain sight of the road”). There were no specific and articulable facts,
55
however, that suggested the persons in the vehicles were in need of
assistance. Hoover, 402 P.3d at 1235; Graham, 175 P.3d at 891. Any
undeveloped, generalized suspicions were insufficient to support the
seizures and subsequent searches. Hoover, 402 P.3d at 1235; Graham,
175 P.3d at 891.
There is one federal case dealing with the seizure of a parked vehicle.
In United States v. Gross, a police officer noticed a person slumped down
in the front passenger seat of a lawfully parked vehicle. 662 F.3d 393, 396
(6th Cir. 2011). The officer parked his car directly behind the vehicle,
blocking it in, and turned on his vehicle spotlight. Id. at 396. The officer
then approached the passenger side door and asked the passenger for
identification. Id. at 397. The officer ran a warrant check, discovered an
outstanding warrant, and arrested the passenger. Id.
The Sixth Circuit rejected the claim that the seizure was permissible
under the community caretaking doctrine. Id. at 400. The Gross court
emphasized that there was no indication that community caretaking was
needed. Id. at 400–01. Further, the Gross court emphasized any
legitimate caretaking “could have been accomplished through a
consensual encounter rather than” by blocking in the vehicle and
investigating the occupant. Id. at 401.
There are, however, first-party assistance cases involving parked
vehicles where seizures under the public-servant prong of community
caretaking have been upheld. These cases, however, often emphasize
specific and particular facts related to the need for first-party assistance to
support the seizure.
For example, there are a number of first-party assistance cases
involving parked vehicles sustaining community caretaking seizures in
what might be called slumped-driver cases. See, e.g., In re Suspension of
56
Driver’s License of Clayton, 748 P.2d 401, 402–03 (Idaho 1998); Kozak v.
Comm’r of Pub. Safety, 359 N.W.2d 625, 627, 628 (Minn. Ct. App. 1984);
State v. Lovegren, 51 P.3d 471, 472, 474, 476 (Mont. 2002). In these cases,
an officer observes a driver slumped over the wheel of a parked car before
a seizure is made. Knowledge of the presence of a slumped driver provides
sufficient particularized concern to justify a seizure of the vehicle and
subsequent search.
A second category of first-party assistance cases involving parked
vehicles are cases where assistance is impliedly invited. See, e.g., People
v. McDonough, 940 N.E.2d 1100, 1103, 1110 (Ill. 2010); State v. Anderson,
362 P.3d 1232, 1234, 1240 (Utah 2015); State v. Kramer, 759 N.W.2d 598,
601, 610 (Wis. 2009). For instance, in cases where the parked vehicle has
flashing emergency or hazard lights, seizures have been found lawful and
the evidence arising from them has not been suppressed.
A third category of first-party assistance cases involving parked
vehicles arises where odd circumstances surround the parked vehicle. For
instance, in State v. McCormick, the defendant’s vehicle was parked
kittywampus across the entryway of a closed grocery store, with seventy-
five percent of the entryway blocked, and a left wheel protruding onto the
public roadway at around 2:45 a.m. 494 S.W.3d 673, 676 (Tenn. 2016).
The officer activated his rear lights and found the driver slumped over the
wheel. Id. The McCormick court found sufficient particularized facts to
support the actions of law enforcement. Id. at 688–89.
In general, though the results in the first-party assistance cases
involving stopped vehicles are somewhat mixed, the caselaw embraces a
concern that the public-servant prong of community caretaking must be
carefully cabined through a particularized showing that the driver or
occupants are likely to desire or consent to assistance by law enforcement.
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See, e.g., Boutin, 13 A.3d at 336 (stressing warrantless seizures must fall
“within the narrow confines of a judicially crafted exception”); State v.
Diloreto, 850 A.2d 1226, 1237 (N.J. 2004) (“The community caretaker
doctrine remains a narrow exception to the warrant requirement.”);
Livingstone, 174 A.3d at 635 (requiring officer to articulate specific and
objective facts to “cabin reliance on the exception and enable courts to
properly asses its employment”); McCormick, 494 S.W.2d at 688 (“[C]ourts
must meticulously consider the facts and carefully apply the exception in
a manner that mitigates the risk of abuse.”).
VII. Analysis.
I begin by considering the lesser claim advanced by Coffman,
namely, that even assuming the validity of a public-servant prong of
community caretaking, the seizure in this case was unlawful. In
considering the validity of a warrantless search and seizure, the burden of
rebutting a presumption of unlawfulness rests with the government. State
v. Horton, 625 N.W.2d 362, 368 (Iowa 2001) (en banc) (Snell, J.,
dissenting); State v. Moriarty, 566 N.W.2d 866, 868 (Iowa 1997).
The first question under Crawford is whether there was a seizure.
659 N.W.2d at 543. The State does not contest that a seizure occurred
when the officer in this case activated his overhead emergency lights.
There is ample authority for the proposition that a seizure occurs when a
police officer activates emergency lights and pulls behind a parked vehicle.
See, e.g., Livingstone, 174 A.3d at 621–25; Anderson, 362 P.3d at 1237.
But see Kramer, 759 N.W.2d at 606 (assuming without deciding that driver
was seized).
The second question is whether the police officer was engaging in a
bona fide community caretaking activity. Crawford, 659 N.W.2d at 543.
In order to support the seizure in this case as a bona fide community
58
caretaking activity, under the better-reasoned cases, there must be
specific, peculiar, and articulable facts to support the notion that the
occupants of the vehicle consented to receiving assistance. See Schmidt,
47 P.3d at 1274; McDonough, 940 N.E.2d at 1109. We said as much in
Crawford, where we stated that “specific and articulable facts” were
required to support the warrantless seizure. 659 N.W.2d at 542–43.
The requirement of specific, peculiar, and articulable facts is critical
to any community caretaking analysis. Even the cases that embrace the
public-servant prong of community caretaking emphasize the need for
providing effective limits to prevent abuse. See Livingstone, 174 A.2d at
637; McCormick, 494 S.W.2d at 688. Without clear controls, the public-
servant prong could swallow search and seizure protections. Ray, 981
P.2d at 941 (Mosk, J., dissenting). If there is to be a public-servant aspect
of the community caretaking exception, it must be carefully controlled.
Here, the State did not meet its burden of showing specific,
particularized reasons for the seizure. At best, the police officer may have
had a generalized concern about the situation of the occupants in the
vehicle. In Tague, we emphasized that there are many reasons why a
person might swerve once over the line on the left side of the road. 676
N.W.2d at 205. Similarly, the caselaw demonstrates that there are all
kinds of reasons why a person might pull off the road. See Livingstone,
174 A.3d at 634–35 (listing reasons).
It is also important to note what was absent here. There was no
slumped driver, no activation of hazard lights, no objective indices of a
request for help, no oddball parking, and no safety hazard. As the above
discussion indicates, many of the cases supporting seizures of parked
vehicles rely upon these types of particularized facts. See, e.g., Clayton,
748 P.2d at 402 (involving a slumped driver); McCormick, 494 S.W.3d at
59
688 (involving vehicle parked kittywampus blocking entrance to grocery
store late at night and driver slumped over); Kramer, 759 N.W.2d at 610
(holding search constitutional when driver’s hazard lights were activated).
And, there was no reason why a consensual encounter, rather than
a seizure, would not have been sufficient to satisfy any community
caretaking interest. “[T]he multitudinous everyday contacts between
police officers and individuals do not approach any need for forcible
intrusions on privacy.” Commonwealth v. Canavan, 667 N.E.2d 264, 267
(Mass. App. Ct. 1996). A number of parked-vehicle cases persuasively
stand for the proposition that interventions less than seizures are
adequate to vindicate any community caretaking function. Gross, 662
F.3d at 401; Ozhuwan, 786 P.2d at 922; Boutin, 13 A.3d at 337–38; Button,
86 A.2d at 1002.
It is true, of course, that the incident occurred at night. This is, at
best, a double-edged sword. As police found in Hoover, 402 P.3d at 1227,
and Graham, 175 P.3d at 887, night time parked vehicles may be used for
consensual intimate encounters. To paraphrase the New Hampshire
Supreme Court, if we were to accept this argument, we would be rendering
the constitutional protection dependent on the time of day. Cf. Boutin, 13
A.3d at 337 (rejecting role of seasons in validating search).
Further, this case involves a seizure designed to benefit the party
seized, or a first-party assistance seizure. When a first-party assistance
seizure is involved, there is no government interest beyond that of assisting
the individual. See State v. Kinzy, 5 P.3d 668, 681 (Wash. 2000) (en banc)
(“Rendering aid or assistance through a health or safety check is a
hallmark community caretaking of the function exception.”); cf. Kramer,
759 N.W.2d at 611 (stressing the public interest involved is assisting
motorists). Such seizures can be justified, not by balancing the interests
60
of the government against the individual, but only on a theory of implied
consent that focuses solely on the individual. When the government acts
to protect a person, “the only relevant perspective is that of the individual
citizen.” Ronald J. Bacigal, Choosing Perspectives in Criminal Procedure, 6
Wm. & Mary Bill Rts. J. 677, 728–29 (1998). In this case, there was no
reason based on the facts known to the police officer to believe that the
occupants of the vehicle desired police assistance.
And, under Iowa law the privacy interest of a party in an automobile
is substantial. In State v. Vance, we cited a body of academic writing that
seeks to increase privacy protections with respect to automobiles
compared to recent United States Supreme Court precedent. 790 N.W.2d
775, 787 (Iowa 2010); see Carol A. Chase, Cars, Cops, and Crooks: A
Reexamination of Belton and Carroll with an Eye Toward Restoring Fourth
Amendment Privacy Protection to Automobiles, 85 Or. L. Rev. 913, 940–41
(2006). In his concurring opinion in State v. Storm, Chief Justice Cady
concluded that under the facts presented, a warrantless search of an
automobile could be sustained on an exigent-circumstances theory but
only because the defendant failed to show that technology made the
acquisition of a warrant practical under the circumstances of the case.
898 N.W.2d 140, 157 (Iowa 2017) (Cady, C.J., concurring specially).
Notably, the concurring opinion did not emphasize the lessened
expectation of privacy in an automobile but only its mobility. See id.
Automobiles are used by Iowans for many purposes, which may include
taking a snooze, rubbing the neck of a spouse, as here, or other intimate
acts.
In light of the above discussion, it is not necessary to address the
larger argument that we should decline to adopt a community caretaking
exception that includes the public-servant prong. There are, of course,
61
some important reasons supporting such a view. As has been pointed out
above, nothing in Cady itself specifically embraces a broadly framed,
stand-alone community caretaking exception. Further, rejection of a
broadly framed community caretaking exception would have limited
impact on law enforcement as many community caretaking encounters are
either consensual or supported by the emergency-aid or exigent-
circumstances exceptions. In addition, as demonstrated by the review of
caselaw, the public-servant prong tends to be highly fact specific, which
could lead to lack of clarity in the law and the slicing and dicing of fact
patterns with no principled rule of decision. See, e.g., Graham, 175 P.3d
at 891 (characterizing case as a close call); State v. Cryan, 727 A.2d 93, 95
(N.J. Super. Ct. App. Div. 1999) (same); Pinkard, 785 N.W.2d at 603
(majority opinion) (same). For those who favor bright-line rules for
adjudication and who advocate certainty and predictability in the law, the
elimination of the potentially sprawling public-servant prong might be in
order. Yet, by tightly cabining the public-servant prong in first-party
assistance cases with a requirement of specific and particularized facts
related to the question of whether the occupants of the parked vehicle are
manifesting any desire for assistance, the potential abuse is at least
limited if not eliminated. In any case, it is not necessary for us to address
the larger question today.
VIII. Conclusion.
In my view, for the above reasons, the seizure here was invalid under
article I, section 8 of the Iowa Constitution. As a result, I respectfully
dissent.
Wiggins, J., joins this dissent.