State v. Blythe, 462 P.3d 1177

Early morning traffic stop for speeding/failure to stop; Gabriel Parent was driver and Nicholas Blythe was passenger.
Deputy Boardman observed a rolled-up dollar bill on Blythe and tin foil on the car floor—items officers associated with drug use; Blythe was ordered out, patted down, and stood by the patrol car.
Parent admitted to having marijuana in the car; deputies searched the vehicle and found burned tin foil and what they believed to be a usable amount of heroin under the passenger seat.
After discovering the vehicle evidence but before formally arresting Blythe, Deputy Boardman told Blythe to ‘‘kick your shoes off’’; officers then found baggies of heroin inside a shoe, handcuffed Blythe, and read Miranda rights.
Blythe moved to suppress the heroin, arguing the shoe search violated the Fourth Amendment; the district court rejected consent and upheld the search as incident to arrest.
Blythe entered a conditional guilty plea preserving the suppression issue; the Idaho Supreme Court vacated the conviction, reversed denial of suppression, and remanded, holding the search was not justified under the search-incident-to-arrest doctrine.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Whether the warrantless search of Blythe’s shoes was lawful under the search-incident-to-arrest exception to the Fourth Amendment	State: Deputies had probable cause to arrest Blythe (possession, paraphernalia, frequenting) so the search was lawful as incident to arrest (also asserted consent)	Blythe: Search preceded any custodial arrest and neither Chimel rationales (officer safety or evidence preservation) justified the intrusion	Court: Reversed—probable cause alone insufficient when search precedes arrest; no imminent custodial arrest and neither officer-safety nor evidence-preservation rationales supported the shoe search; suppression required

Chimel v. California, 395 U.S. 752 (search-incident-to-arrest limited to arrestee and area within immediate control for officer safety and evidence preservation)
Knowles v. Iowa, 525 U.S. 113 (search incident to citation unjustified where neither Chimel rationale present)
State v. Lee, 162 Idaho 642, 402 P.3d 1095 (Idaho: search-incident-to-arrest unreasonable when totality shows arrest was not going to occur)
Rawlings v. Kentucky, 448 U.S. 98 (search need not precisely follow arrest if contemporaneous and not used to establish probable cause)
State v. Newsom, 132 Idaho 698, 979 P.2d 100 (arrest of one occupant does not justify search of another’s person)