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ACQUISITION OF CELL PHONE LOCATION DATA, PLACING DEFENDANT NEAR THE MURDER SCENE, DID NOT REQUIRE A WARRANT SUPPORTED BY PROBABLE CAUSE (FOURTH DEPT).

The Fourth Department, in a full-fledged opinion by Justice Whalen, determined the acquisition of data indicating the location of defendant’s cell phone close in time to the murder did not require a warrant supported by probable cause. The court also found that the reason for the prosecutor’s elimination of a juror, offered in response to defendant’s Batson challenge, was not pretextual. With respect to the cell phone location data, the court wrote:

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… [W]e conclude that the acquisition of the cell site location information was not a search under the Fourth Amendment to the federal constitution because defendant’s use of the phone constituted a voluntary disclosure of his general location to his service provider, and a person does not have a reasonable expectation of privacy in information voluntarily disclosed to third parties … . In contending otherwise, defendant relies on United States v Jones (565 US 400 [2012]) — particularly Justice Sotomayor’s concurring opinion in that case (565 US at 413-418) — and Riley v California (___ US ___, 134 S Ct 2473 [2014]). In our view, that reliance is misplaced. Jones is distinguishable because it involved direct surveillance of the defendant by the police using a GPS device as opposed to information that the defendant had voluntarily disclosed to a third party …  Notwithstanding Justice Sotomayor’s suggestion that “it may be necessary to reconsider the premise that an individual has no reasonable expectation of privacy in information voluntarily disclosed to third parties” … , we remain bound by the third-party doctrine when interpreting the Fourth Amendment “[u]ntil a majority of justices on the [Supreme] Court instructs us otherwise” … . Riley, in turn, is distinguishable because it involved an inspection of the contents of the defendant’s phone, rather than mere location information … . People v Jiles, 2017 NY Slip Op 08944, Fourth Dept 12-22-17

 

CRIMINAL LAW (ACQUISITION OF CELL PHONE LOCATION DATA, PLACING DEFENDANT NEAR THE MURDER SCENE, DID NOT REQUIRE A WARRANT SUPPORTED BY PROBABLE CAUSE (FOURTH DEPT))/EVIDENCE (CRIMINAL LAW, (ACQUISITION OF CELL PHONE LOCATION DATA, PLACING DEFENDANT NEAR THE MURDER SCENE, DID NOT REQUIRE A WARRANT SUPPORTED BY PROBABLE CAUSE (FOURTH DEPT))/CELL PHONE LOCATION DATA (CRIMINAL LAW, ACQUISITION OF CELL PHONE LOCATION DATA, PLACING DEFENDANT NEAR THE MURDER SCENE, DID NOT REQUIRE A WARRANT SUPPORTED BY PROBABLE CAUSE (FOURTH DEPT))/SEARCH AND SEIZURE (CELL PHONE LOCATION DATA, (ACQUISITION OF CELL PHONE LOCATION DATA, PLACING DEFENDANT NEAR THE MURDER SCENE, DID NOT REQUIRE A WARRANT SUPPORTED BY PROBABLE CAUSE (FOURTH DEPT))/SUPPRESSION (CELL PHONE LOCATION DATA, (ACQUISITION OF CELL PHONE LOCATION DATA, PLACING DEFENDANT NEAR THE MURDER SCENE, DID NOT REQUIRE A WARRANT SUPPORTED BY PROBABLE CAUSE (FOURTH DEPT))

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