Washington v. Mayfield

by
In 2015, Derek Salte came home to find an unfamiliar truck parked in his driveway, with a man, Petitioner John Mayfield, asleep in the driver's seat. After being asked to leave, the truck would not move. Mayfield got out through the passenger side, ran away, leaving the door open with the engine and windshield wipers still running. Salte called police; a responding officer turned off the truck's engine, placed the keys on the driver's seat, and closed the passenger door. The officer did not search for or observe anything in the passenger compartment. The officer spotted Mayfield walking on the other side of the street; Salte identified him as the person who was in the truck. The officer believed Mayfield was trying to walk past them without making contact, which seemed odd given the truck was Mayfield's (and not stolen). Mayfield was eventually asked about recent drug use, consented to a pat-down search, and consented to a search of the truck. Police discovered methamphetamine in the truck and arrested Mayfield. Mayfield was charged with one count of possession of a controlled substance with intent to deliver. He moved to suppress the drugs found in the truck, arguing he was unlawfully seized. The issue this case presented for the Washington Supreme Court's review centered on the attenuation doctrine: where evidence obtained in violation of the Fourth Amendment is not subjection to exclusion if the connection between the constitutional police conduct and the evidence is remote or was interrupted by some intervening circumstance. The Supreme Court determined the Washington exclusionary rule was not categorically incompatible with the attenuation doctrine, but attenuation had to be narrow and apply only where intervening circumstances have genuinely severed the causal connection between the misconduct and the discovery of evidence. The Court found no intervening circumstances to satisfy the attenuation doctrine in this case as a matter of law. Therefore, Mayfield's motion to suppress should have been granted, and reversed the appeals court's holding otherwise. View "Washington v. Mayfield" on Justia Law