State v. Jones
2017 S.D. LEXIS 115, 903 N.W.2d 101, 2017 SD 59 (2017)
Premium Feature
Subscribe to Lexplug to listen to the Case Podcast.
Rule of Law:
The continuous, warrantless use of a pole camera for long-term surveillance of a person's residence constitutes a search under the Fourth Amendment because it violates a reasonable expectation of privacy in the aggregate of one's activities.
Facts:
- On January 23, 2015, Detective Dana Rogers received a tip from a DCI agent that Brady Schutt, a known drug dealer, was traveling to Joseph Jones's residence in Brookings to acquire large quantities of marijuana.
- The same day, without a warrant, Detective Rogers arranged for a city employee to install a pole camera on a public street light across from Jones's trailer home.
- From January 23 to March 19, 2015, the camera continuously recorded the street and the exterior of Jones's residence and front yard, twenty-four hours a day.
- The camera transmitted a live feed that Detective Rogers could view on his mobile phone or review as recorded footage, allowing him to fast-forward through periods of inactivity.
- Through the surveillance, Detective Rogers monitored all of Jones's movements to and from the home, as well as the arrival and departure of all visitors and their vehicles.
- On March 6, 2015, Detective Rogers observed Jones on the camera placing a trash bag in his vehicle. Rogers subsequently retrieved the bag from a community dumpster and found items indicating marijuana use.
- On March 11, 2015, after again observing Jones take out the trash via the camera, Detective Rogers retrieved more trash bags containing marijuana stems and partial blunts.
Procedural Posture:
- The State of South Dakota charged Joseph Jones with multiple drug-related offenses in the South Dakota circuit court, which is the trial court of general jurisdiction.
- Jones filed a motion to suppress the evidence obtained from his home, arguing the preceding warrantless pole camera surveillance violated the Fourth Amendment.
- The circuit court judge stated orally that without the pole camera evidence, the subsequent search warrants for GPS trackers and the home would have lacked probable cause.
- The circuit court denied Jones's motion to suppress, concluding that no Fourth Amendment violation occurred and that, in the alternative, the good-faith exception to the exclusionary rule would apply.
- Jones, as the appellant, appealed the denial of his suppression motion to the Supreme Court of South Dakota.
Premium Content
Subscribe to Lexplug to view the complete brief
You're viewing a preview with Rule of Law, Facts, and Procedural Posture
Issue:
Does the continuous, warrantless use of a pole camera for two months to surveil the exterior of a person's residence from a public vantage point constitute an unreasonable search in violation of the Fourth Amendment?
Opinions:
Majority - Wilbur, Retired Justice
Yes, the warrantless, two-month pole camera surveillance of Jones's home was an unreasonable search. While there was no physical trespass, the government's action violated Jones's reasonable expectation of privacy under the Katz test. Although individual movements outside the home are exposed to the public, the aggregation of this information over a long period through 24/7 electronic surveillance creates a mosaic of intimate details about a person’s life, associations, and patterns. This expectation of privacy in the whole of one's movements is one society is prepared to recognize as reasonable, especially given technological advancements that make such surveillance cheap and easy. Unlike a human officer, a camera does not tire, blink, or get distracted, fundamentally altering the relationship between citizen and state. However, the evidence is not suppressed because of the good-faith exception to the exclusionary rule, as Detective Rogers acted reasonably in what was an unsettled area of law.
Concurrence - Gilbertson, Chief Justice
No, the surveillance was not a search, though I concur in the result to affirm the denial of suppression. The United States Supreme Court has consistently held that mere visual observation from a public vantage point is not a search. The pole camera only captured what was knowingly exposed to the public and observable by any passerby. The duration of surveillance is irrelevant; the Fourth Amendment analysis depends on the method of surveillance, not the quantity of information obtained. The majority wrongly adopts the reasoning from a non-binding concurrence in United States v. Jones and ignores controlling precedent from Kyllo v. United States, which holds a search occurs only when police use sense-enhancing technology not in general public use to obtain information from inside the home. Policy concerns about an 'Orwellian' society are best addressed by the legislature, not by judicially expanding the Fourth Amendment.
Analysis:
This decision establishes a significant, privacy-protective precedent in South Dakota by holding that long-term, technologically-aided surveillance of a home can constitute a Fourth Amendment search, even without a physical trespass. It adopts the 'mosaic theory' of privacy, where the aggregation of publicly observable data over time intrudes upon a reasonable expectation of privacy. This ruling creates a notable split with several federal circuit courts that have upheld similar warrantless pole camera surveillance, positioning South Dakota's judiciary as a stronger guardian of privacy against emerging surveillance technologies.
