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MN: Arrest on an outstanding warrant was not sufficiently pretextual to violate Fourth Amendment

By John Wesley Hall, Jr.

Defendant’s arrest on an outstanding bench warrant for something else, for which there was probable cause, was not sufficiently pretextual to be a violation of the Fourth Amendment. State v. Jenkins, 2010 Minn. LEXIS 244 (May 20, 2010)*: With respect to Jenkins' claim that the police misused the bench warrant to arrest him for the two murders, we first note that there can be no question that an arrest pursuant to a valid warrant is supported by probable cause and is therefore reasonable. Jenkins has not identified, and we have not found, any case in which we have held otherwise. Nor are we aware of any case in which we have looked beyond the validity of the warrant and examined law enforcement's motive for executing the warrant, and we decline to do so in this case...continue to full post

Full post as published by Fourth Amendment on May 23, 2010 (boomark / email).