NYIA GORE v. UNITED STATES
145 A.3d 540
| D.C. | 2016Background
- Police responded to a Motel 6 call: victim Ward reported Gore had refused to return his belongings and showed a text from Gore saying she had “trashed [his] shit.”
- Officers knocked; Gore opened her door and spoke from inside the room during a hallway “knock-and-talk.” She initially said she had trashed everything and that the items were in a dumpster.
- After a heated exchange, officers entered Gore’s room without consent, handcuffed her, and within seconds she admitted the items were in the bathtub and had been ripped up; officers recovered the damaged items from the bathroom and arrested her.
- Gore moved to suppress the in-room statements and the physical evidence as products of a warrantless, nonconsensual home entry and claimed Miranda error; the trial court denied suppression and convicted her after a bench trial.
- On appeal the court upheld sufficiency of the evidence and found pre-entry statements non-custodial (no Miranda required), but concluded the officers’ warrantless entry violated the Fourth Amendment and the inevitable-discovery justification failed.
Issues
| Issue | Gore’s Argument | Government’s Argument | Held |
|---|---|---|---|
| Warrantless entry/search of home | Entry/search violated Fourth Amendment; no consent or exigency; suppress in-room statements and recovered items | App. had admitted she trashed the property, providing probable cause to enter and arrest; evidence therefore admissible | Entering without a warrant and without exigent circumstances violated the Fourth Amendment; in-room statements and physical evidence must be suppressed |
| Inevitable discovery exception | Exclusion required because lawful discovery was not inevitable | Even if illegal entry, police would have inevitably found the evidence by obtaining a warrant after searching dumpsters | Government failed to show by preponderance that lawful discovery was inevitable; testimony that officers "could" have sought a warrant was insufficient |
| Miranda / custodial interrogation | Post-entry statements obtained without Miranda should be excluded as product of custodial interrogation | Pre-entry admissions were non-custodial; any post-entry Miranda error would be harmless because other evidence established guilt | Pre-entry doorway questioning was non-custodial (no Miranda required). Court did not need to resolve harmlessness for any post-entry Miranda error because Fourth Amendment exclusion of in-room evidence required reversal |
| Sufficiency of evidence for malicious destruction | Gore argued trial evidence unreliable | Government pointed to Ward’s testimony, Gore’s texts/statements, photographs | Conviction reversed on Fourth Amendment grounds but, on sufficiency alone, evidence (including admitted items) was sufficient to sustain conviction if properly admitted |
Key Cases Cited
- Payton v. New York, 445 U.S. 573 (warrantless nonconsensual entry into a home is per se unreasonable absent exigent circumstances)
- Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436 (custodial interrogation requires warnings)
- Nix v. Williams, 467 U.S. 431 (inevitable discovery doctrine: government must prove evidence would have been discovered lawfully)
- Kirk v. Louisiana, 536 U.S. 635 (fruits of a warrantless entry are suppressible despite probable cause)
- New York v. Harris, 495 U.S. 14 (warrantless entry suppresses statements and evidence obtained inside the home)