Lead Opinion
OPINION
delivered the opinion of the Court,
We granted this appeal to determine whether the warrantless blood draw violated the defendant’s right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures, guaranteed by the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution and article I, section 7 of the Tennessee Constitution, and, if so, whether the exclusionary rule applies and requires suppression of the evidence. We conclude that the warrant-less blood draw violated the defendant’s federal and state constitutional right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures. Nevertheless, we adopt the good-faith exception to the exclusionary rule articulated by the United States Supreme Court in Davis v. United States,
Sometime before 8:43 p.m. on the evening of October 29, 2011, a single-vehicle accident occurred in Knox County.
On April 17, 2012, about six months after the accident, the Knox County Grand Jury issued a presentment charging the defendant with two counts of vehicular homicide, Tenn. Code Ann. § 39-13-213 (2010), one count of vehicular assault, id. § 39-13-106 (2010), one count of reckless endangerment, id. § 39-13-103 (2010), and four counts of driving under the influence of an intoxicant, id. § 56-10-401 (Supp. 2011). The defendant thereafter filed a motion to suppress any evidence derived from the blood sample obtained from her without a warrant on the night of the accident. As relevant to this appeal, the defendant argued that she neither actually nor impliedly consented to the warrantless blood draw. In response, the State argued that the defendant had given actual verbal consent to the blood draw and had impliedly consented to the blood draw pursuant to statute, fee id § 55-10-406(a)(l), (f)(1), (f)(4) (Supp. 2011).
He spoke first with Mr. Page, who confirmed that he was a passenger and that the defendant was driving the vehicle. Deputy Strzelecki then located and spoke with the defendant. She was lying on a gurney in the emergency room, waiting to be transported to or from the x-ray department, “and she was alert аnd conscious and was talking to” him. Although they had only a “brief discussion because there was a lot of commotion with the ER, [the defendant] stated that she had been driving and that everybody in the car had been drinking.” Deputy Strzelecki also smelled alcohol during his interaction with the defendant, and he administered the horizontal gaze nystagmus (“HGN”) test.
In response to questioning by defense counsel, Deputy Strzelecki agreed that a medication known as Versed (also known as midazolam but hereinafter “Versed”), which the defendant had received before Deputy Strzelecki administered the HGN test, could have caused her to exhibit a positive effect on the HGN test.. Deputy Strzelecki testified, however, that a “normal dosage, [and] therapeutic level” of the medication “wouldn’t show a horizontal gaze nystagmus.” Deputy Strzelecki acknowledged that he was not aware the defendant- had received the medication when he administered the HGN test.
After the hearing on her first motion, but before the court ruled on her motion, the defendant filed an affidavit stating that she had no recollection of speaking with Deputy Strzelecki or consenting to the warrantless blood draw. She also filed copies of her medical records, including records from the paramedics who extricated her from the vehicle. These records indicated that the defendant was the driver of
LifeStar’s medical records, which the defendant also submitted, identified her as the driver of the vehicle and described her as hearing impaired and as having an altered mental state, possibly due to “intoxicants.” The defendant’s chief complaint was recorded as, “My wrist hurts and I am cold!” Her pupils were described as “equal[,] round[,] and reactive.” While en route to the hospital, she received intravenously,- at 9:28 p.m., ■ four milligrams of morphine for pain control, and at 9:29 p.m., two milligrams of Versed to calm her. At 9:35 p.m., LifeStar transferred the defendant’s care to UT Medical Center.
At 9:36 p.m., the trauma nurse at UT Mediсal Center recorded the defendant as “deaf [and] unable to hear verbal commands,” so commands were “written on paper [and] shown to” her. Because the defendant “became combative,” restraints were applied to her left wrist and to both her anides. At 9:45 p.m., the defendant was given two more milligrams of morphine, and at 9:47 p.m., and again at 9:50 p.m, she received two more milligrams of Versed, for a total of four milligrams. All medications were administered intravenously. Medical personnel noted that the defendant “became calm” and appeared to be sleeping after receiving these medications and described her as “resting comfortably” at 10:00 p.m. At 10:17 p.m., she received two more milligrams of Versed. By 10:25 p.m.,' UT Medical Center records indicate that she was takén tó x-ray, and the trauma nurse described the defendant as “more alert” and “moving all extremities.” At 10:30 p.m., the trauma nurse noted that “Lab” had come to the defendant’s “bedside for legal draw!”
After considering the proof offered at the suppression hearing and the affidavit and medical records the defendant submitted afterwards, the trial court, on May 14, 2013, denied the defendant’s motion to suppress, finding that the defendant had provided actual, verbal consent to the blood draw. The trial court accredited Deputy Strzelecki’s testimony that, when he observed the defendant lying on the gurney in the hospital emergency room, she appeared to.be alert ancl conscious, smelled of alcohol, told Deputy StrzelecM she had been drinking and driving, failed the HGN test, and, when asked if she would submit.to a.blood test, responded, “Dp whatever you have to do,” The trial court concluded that “[t]he circumstances surrounding this question and response indicate that it was a knowing and voluntary consent.” The trial court explained that “[t]he defendant continued to acquiesce in the act of taking two vials of her blood after the request,” and that there was “no indication” she “ever expressed any disagreement with the officer’s interpretation of the statement as consent to draw blood.” The trial court gave “little eviden-tiary value” to • the defendant’s affidavit because she “did not testify at the hearing where she would [hаve been] subject to cross-examination,” and the trial court ref
In .response to the trial court’s denial of her motion, the defendant filed a second motion to suppress on July 29, 2013, “due to additional medical evidence” and requested another hearing. At the August 30, 2013 hearing on this second motion to suppress, the parties apparently agreed to confirm, rather than repeat, all evidence presented at the April hearing. The State introduced without objection the defendant’s medical records from UT Medical Center, covering the period October 29, 2011, to November 5, 2011. Dr. John Robertson, Jr., a board-certified psychiatrist who had practiced in Knoxville since 1991, testified on the defendant’s behalf about her capacity “to have given voluntary, knowing, and intelligent consent to a blood draw.”
Prior to testifying, Dr. Robertson reviewed the medical records relating to the defendant’s treatment after the accident. Dr. Robertson described the defendant’s injuries as severe, explaining that she had sustained a laceration to her forehead, a contusion to her right eye, dislocated fractures of her right arm, upper right leg tissue swelling, bruises, and other injuries. Dr. Robertson emphasized the defendant’s hearing impairment and pointed to the paramedic records indicating that her right pupil was “blown” and “non[-]reactive.” Dr. Robertson observed that the defendant had received morphine and Versed following the accident, and he described the properties of the latter medication, explaining that it produces a calming, disinhibiting effect, and causes a patient to become compliant and “gentle and quiet.” According to Dr. Robertson, Versed affects judgment and reasoning such that, “[Y]ou could ask [someone who received it] to do anything, and [that person] would do it.” He noted that the defendant became combative and received additional doses of these medications intravenously which, Dr.' Robertson opined, would have made their effect almost immediate and potent. He emphasized that by the time her blood was drawn around 10:30 p.m., the defendant had been given six milligrams of morphine and eight milligrams of Versed. Dr. Robertson testified that, given her injuries and the medications she received, the defendant would not have been capable of giving voluntary, knowing, and intelligent consent for the blood draw. He explained:
[F]irst you’ve got the head injury even before she has any medication, and then to the extent that she is no longer dazed and confused by such ... traumatic physical injuries and loss of consciousness related to the head injury[, and] [t]hen she’s got the psychological trauma of looking around and seeing people, bodies, dead and all the ambulance and the Life[ ]Star coming in picking her up. So you got all of this psychological trauma compounded on top of that, and then on the way, you’ve got these medications within minutes of getting—as soon as they can get an IV in, they’re giving her something, and so they get the IV in, they give her some medicine to calm her down, to control the pain, and then she hits the ER, and then she’s not calm enough. So—she’s combative, and so they’ve got to give her more medication*294 to calm her down, and each of these times they’re not giving it for the heck of it, but she’s getting—levels of agitation starting to go back up. The medicine’s not wearing off. It’s just that she requires quite a bit of medication here, and this is—this is enough to put someone down.
Oii cross-examination, Dr. Robertson acknowledged that his testimony was based on his general medical knowledge of the effects of the medications the defendant received, although he had “Googled” and looked up a few things on the Internet. He agreed that he had no way of knowing for sure how the medications had affected the defendant because he was not present to examine her on the evening of the accident. He also agreed that only the paramedics had recorded the defendant’s right pupil as blown, while LifeStar records, as well as those of the admitting physician and trauma nurse at UT Medical Center, described the defendant’s pupils as follows: (1) “Pupils equal, round and reactive to light”; (2) “The pupils are a size four, which are fairly small, and reactive bilaterally”; and (3) “Both eyes are reactive to light.” Dr. Robertson also agreed that, pri- or to her arrival at the hospital, the defendant had been described as “Alert,” and capable of reading lips, despite her hearing impairment. At counsel’s request, Dr. Robertson read into the record the following nursing assessment entered at 11:30 p.m. on October 29, 2011, about an hour after the blood draw.
Patient has a hearing aid, but refuses to put it in. Patient was cussing at the nursing staff. Administered morphine after orders were in. Will monitor. Patient arrived on—up on the floor with symptoms of intoxication. Patient screaming to get up and use the restroom and states she is in a lot of pain. Interpreter with patient, but patient answering all of ' my questions. Interpreter states that he was called in, but clearly doesn’t need..
Dr. Robertson nevertheless reiterated his opinion that the defendant lacked the capacity to give informed, intelligent; knowing, and voluntary consent to the blood draw as a result of the psychological and physical trauma she suffered in the accident and the “heavy doses” of medications she received before and after arriving at the hospital.
The State did' not offer rebuttal proof after Dr. Robertson testified, but the trial court sua sponte recalled Deputy Strze-lecki to the witness stand and asked him to describe in more detail the conversation in which the defendant admitted she was driving the vehicle and said that everyone in the vehicle was drinking. Deputy Strze-lecki responded, “She was on a gurney on her back in the ER. She was calm and alert, and when I approached her, I was standing over her. So she was on her back, and I was looking down.” When asked if he had known the defendant was hearing impaired, Deputy Strzelecki replied, “At that time I did not.” When asked whether the defendant was responding “verbally or in writing or what,” Deputy Strzelecki stated, “Verbally.” When asked, “Could you understand what she was saying?” Deputy Strzelecki answered, “Yes. And the conversation was very brief, and I could smell the alcohol on her, and at some point I asked if she would consent to a blood draw and ... [h]er response was, ‘Do what you have to do.’” When asked about the nature of their conversation before this exchange occurred, Deputy Strzelecki replied:
I don’t recall any other specific questions. It was a very brief conversation. I was trying to determine at that point who, in fact, was the driver. I was confident that was [the defendant], but there was also another surviving passenger in the car, and in that—all that chaos we*295 hadn’t determined 100 percent who was driving. So I had talked to the—to the passenger, and he had confirmed that she was the driver. She was still back in the ER, and she had acknowledged that she was driving. I don’t recall if she nodded or had said yes, but she had confirmed that she was driving, and at that-point I asked if she was willing to consent to a blood draw.
In response to additional questions, Deputy Strzelecki stated that he had told the defendant who he was when he first approached her, “[a]nd pretty much just was visually connecting eye contact between us, and the only actual sentence was the, ‘Do whatever you have to' do.’” Deputy Strzelecki stated that the defendant’s eyes were open and her pupils equal and that her eyes were “tracking normally” when he administered the HGN test as he spoke with her. He reiterated that she had exhibited the six clues of intoxication on- that test.
On September 3, 2013, the State submitted an audiorecording of a telephone conversation between the defendant and her father, which had been made when the defendant called her father from the jail on a regular phone, rather than a phone for the hearing impaired. The State submitted the recording to illustrate that the defendant’s hearing impairment would not have impeded her • ability to understand Deputy Strzelecki’s request for her to consent to the blood draw.
One day later, September 4, 2013, the trial court entered an order granting the defendant’s motion to suppress. The trial court found that the defendant had not actually.consented to the blood draw and that Deputy Strzleeki lacked “reasonable grounds” to believe the defendant was driving while intoxicated, which was required under the implied consent statute to justify the warrantless blood draw.
the interaction between [Deputy] Strze-lecki and the defendant paint[ed] a different picture than the one initially presented to the court at the first hearing. The court previously believed that the defendant had a verbal interchange with the officer where she verbally answered*296 multiple questions. The added responses from the defendant concerning the consumption of alcohol and who was driving gave the phrase, “Do whatever you have to do” more credence as an intelligent and knowing response to the request for a blood test. When asked about what was specifically said by the defendant, the [deputy] acknowledged that the defendant only spoke one sentence during the entire brief conversation. The mere fact that the defendant non-verbally acknowledged that she was the driver gives the court much less confidence that she understood what was being asked of her when a blood sample was requested.
The officer did not explain to the defendant that she could refuse to consent to the blood draw. Nor did he advise her that refusal to submit could result in a suspension of her driver’s license. Although not required by the law in order for the consent to be valid, such advice would have gone a long way in ensuring that the consent was given from a free mind and rational intellect in this case. When she responded, “Do whatever you have to do,” the officer did not provide further clarification as to what he wanted to do or why. To be clear, the court does not find that [Deputy] Strezelecki has been deceptive in any way in his testimony. The court finds this officer to be quite credible. However, the more specific questions аsked by the court during the second hearing, along with the additional proof from Dr. Robertson, present a more complete understanding of his interaction with the defendant and her ability to comprehend this interaction.
Here, we have a defendant in a hospital after a severe car accident. She has been given multiple doses of medications designed to calm her down and make her more compliant with demands and requests. She has some degree of hearing impairment that interferes with her ability to communicate. She has a brief interaction with a police officer who asks her to follow his pen with her eyes during the HGN test. He then asks her if she was the driver. She gives a nonverbal cue indicating in the affirmative. The officer asks her for a sample of her blood to which she responds, “Do whatever you have to do.” Taking all of these factors into account the court now finds that the State has failed to prove by [a] preponderance of the evidence that this statement was a specific and intelligently given consent to have law enforcement take a sample of her blood for testing to determine possible impairment. It is just as likely that the defendant was complying with any request made of her due to the medication. Her one sentence response of acquiescence is insufficient to prove she was specifically consenting to a search of her blood.
(Citations omitted.)
With respect to its conclusion that Deputy Strzelecki lacked probable cause to believe the defendant was driving under the influence, the trial court pointed out that field sobriety tests were not administered and no testimony was offered to indicate the defendant’s eyes were bloodshot or her speech slurred. The trial court also pointed to Deputy Strzelecki’s testimony that the blood draw “would have been mandatory,” because of the confirmed fatalities.
The State sought and obtained permission from the trial court and the Court of Criminal Appeals for an interlocutory appeal pursuant to Tennessee Rule of Appellate Procedure 9. In the intermеdiate appellate court, the State argued that “(1) exigent circumstances supported the blood draw; (2) [the] [defendant gave actual consent to the blood draw; and (3) the blood draw was authorized under the implied consent statute.” State v. Reynolds, No. E2013-02309-CCA-R9-CD,
[The defendant] acquiesced to the terms of the implied consent law, specifically under subsection (f)(1), by obtaining a driver’s license and driving on the streets and highways of Tennessee. At no time after the accident did she withdraw her consent or refuse to submit to the subsequent blood draw. We emphasize that the application of the Tennessee implied consent statute has not been held to be invalid or unconstitutional in this context—where an individual suspected of DUI, based upon probable cause, did not refuse to submit to a chemical test. Therefore, because we determine the officer had probable cause '“to believe that [the defendant,] the driver of a motor vehicle involved in an accident resulting in the injury or death of another ... committed [DUI]” and because [the defendant] never refused to submit to the blood draw, the results of the blood test are admissible. T[enn].*298 C[ode] A[nn]. § 66-10-406(0(1) (Supp, 2011).
Id. at *15 (footnote omitted).
Alternatively, the intermediate appellate court opined that, were the implied consent law held unconstitutional, the good-faith exception to the exclusionary rule should be adopted and applied to prevent suppression of the evidence in this case. Id. at *16. The Court of Criminal Appeals recognized that Tennessee has not formally adopted the 'good-faith exception. Id. Nevertheless, the intermediate appellate court opined that the facts of this case would fit squarely within the good-faith exceptions articulated in Davis v. United States,
We granted the defendant’s application for permission to appeal and, in the order doing so, stated our particular interest in briefing and argument on the following issues:
1. Whether the Court should adopt the good-faith exception to the exclusionary rule, see United States v. Leon,468 U.S. 897 [104 S.Ct. 3405 ,82 L.Ed.2d 677 ] (1984); and
2. [I]f so, whether the good-faith exception would preclude application of the exclusionary rule-in this case.
State v. Reynolds, No. E2013-02309-SC-R11-CD (Tenn. Mar. 16, 2015) (order granting the application and specifying particular issues of interest to the Court for briefing and argument).
II.Standard of Review
The standards governing an appellate court’s review of a trial court’s decision on a motion to suppress are well established. We uphold the trial court’s findings of fact unless the evidence preponderates against them. State v. Bell,
III.Analysis
A. Probable Cause
1. Arguments on Appeal
Both the trial court and the Court of Criminal Appeals concluded that the record does not support a finding that the defendant actually consented to the blood draw. The State has not challenged that conclusion on appeal, so we will not address that issue. Instead, the State argues that the implied consent law, specifically Tennessee Code Annotated sections 55-
& History of Implied, Consent Laws
“The problem of drunk driving arose almost as soon as motor vehicles came into use.” Birchfield v. North Dakota, — U.S.-,
3. Tennessee’s Implied Consent Laios
Tennessee first adopted an implied consent law -in 1969. See Act qf May 9, 1969, ch. 292, §§ 2, 3, 5, 1969 Tenn. Pub. Acts 832, 833-35. At the time of the defendant’s accident in October 2011, Tennessee’s implied consent law provided in relevant part as follows:
(a)(1) .Any person who drives a motor vehicle in this [Sítate is deemed to have given consent to a test or tests for the puipose of determining the alcoholic content of that person’s blood, a test or tests for the purpose of determining the drug content of the person’s*300 blood, or both tests. However, no such test or tests may be administered pursuant to this section, unless conducted at the direction of a law enforcement officer having [probable cause] to believe the person was driving while under the influence of alcohol, a drug, any other intoxicante,] or any combination of alcohol, drugs, or other intoxicants as prohibited by [section] 55-10-401, or was violating the provisions of [section] 39-13-106, [section] 39-13-213(a)(2)[,] or [section] 39-13-218.
(f)(1) If a law enforcement officer has probable cause to believe that the driver of a motor vehicle involved in an accident resulting in the injury or death of another has committed a violation of [section] 55-10-401 [(driving under the influence of an intoxicant) ], [section] 39-13-213(a)(2) [(vehicular homicide),] or [section] 39-13-218 [ (aggravated vehicular homicide) ], the officer shall cause the driver to be tested for the purpose of determining the alcohol or drug content of the driver’s blood. The test shall be performed in accordance with the procedure set forth in this section and shall be performed regardless of whether the driver does or does not consent to the test.
(4) The results of a test performed in accordance with subdivision (f)(1) may be offered as evidence by either the [5]tate or the driver of the vehicle in any court or administrative hearing relating to the accident or offense subject to the Tennessee Rules of Evidence.
Tenn. Code Ann. § 55-10-406(a)(l), (f)(1), (f)(4) (Supp. 2011). The defendant is correct that, if Deputy Strzelecki lacked probable cause to believe she was driving under the influence, the implied consent statute does not provide authority for the blood draw. To resolve the first issue in this appeal, we therefore focus on probable cause.
A Legal Standards for Determining Probable Cause
Probable cause has often been the topic of discussion in judicial decisions throughout this country. Bell,
“[T]he probable[-]cause standard is ... practical, nontechnical,” State v. Jacumin,
The proсess [for assessing probable cause] does not deal with hard certainties, but with probabilities. Long before the law of probabilities was articulated as such, practical people formulated certain common-sense conclusions about human behavior; jurors as factfinders are permitted to do the same—and so are law enforcement officers. Finally, the evidence thus collected must be seen and weighed not in terms of library analysis by scholars, but as understood by those versed in the field of law enforcement.
Texas v. Brown,
As a result, “[d]eterminations of probable cause are extremely fact-dependent.” Bell,
“It must always be remembered that probable cause’ is evaluated ‘from the perspective of a reasonable officer on the scene, rather than with the 20/20 vision of hindsight.’” Frazier v. Williams,
5. Application of Probable Cause Legal Standards
Applying these legal standards, we conclude that, at the time Deputy Strzelecki directed medical staff to obtain a sample of the defendant’s blood, probable cause existed to believe that the defendant was driving under the influence of an intoxicant at the time of the accident. Deputy-Strze-lecki was initially dispatched to UT Medi
Deputy Strzelecki’s testimony was corroborated by notations of medical professionals in the LifeStar and UT Medical Center records that were introduced as evidence in the suppression hearings. Deputy Strzelecki, who was well-versed in the field of law enforcement and particularly DUI enforcement administered the HGN test and concluded that the defendant exhibited all six clues of intoxication. Additionally, during the hearing on the defendant’s first motion to suppress, Deputy Strzelecki testified that the defendant admitted she had been drinking and driving. At the hearing on the second motion, Deputy Strzelecki again testified that the defendant admitted she was driving the vehicle, but he-neither repeated nor retracted his earlier testimony that she had also admitted to drinking.
Rather, in response to specific questions from the trial court, Deputy Strzelecki acknowledged that his conversation with the defendant had been very brief and that the defendant had spoken only one complete, sentence, consisting of “Do whatever you have to do,” when he broached the subject of obtaining a blood sample. Deputy Strze-lecki’s testimony that the defendant spoke only one complete sentence during their conversation does not conflict with the testimony he gave at the first hearing regarding the defendant admitting to drinking and driving. As the trial court recognized, the defendant may have used nonverbal responses, or she, may have used incomplete sentences or single-word answers to communicate with Deputy Strzelecki.
Thus, while Deputy Strzelecki’s testimony at the- second hearing differed from his testimony at the first hearing, his testimony at the two hearings was not inconsistent. At both suppression hearings Deputy. Strzelecki testified that he smelled an odor of alcohol on and about the defendant when he spoke with her at the hospital. The trial court, which observed him testify, specifically found Deputy Strezelecki “to be quite credible” and not “deceptive in any way in his testimony.”
Moreover, any adverse affect the medications had on the defendant’s performance on the HGN test is not relevant to the probable cause assessment because Deputy Strzelecki was unaware the defendant had received those medications when he administered, the test. As already noted, when determining whether probable cause exists, courts only consider “the facts and circumstances within the knowledge of the officers, and of which they had reasonably trustworthy information” at the time the challenged search or seizure occurred and do not apply 20/20 hindsight when gauging the existence of probable cause. Echols,
B. Statutory Implied Consent and the Consent Exception to the Warrant Requirement
We next consider the State’s argument that the implied consent law satisfies the consent exception to the warrant requirement and justifies the warrantless blood draw. The defendant asserts that it does not and argues that the practice of obtaining blood samples without a warrant was not based on the implied consent law but upon the widely held erroneous belief that the natural dissipation of alcohol in the bloodstream qualified as an exigency, sufficient to justify a warrantless blood draw pursuant to the exigent circumstances. exception in every drunk driving case. See Schmerber v. California,
The Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution guarantees “[t]he right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures,” and provides that “no [w]arrants shall issue, but upon probable cause.” U.S. Const. Amend. IV.
Although the text of the Fourth Amendment and article 1, section 7 does not specify when a warrant must be obtained, the general rule is that a warrant ordinarily should be obtained because warrants are the safeguard against unreasonable searches. Kentucky v. King,
Exigent circumstances is one such exception. Mincey v. Arizona,
In Schmerber,
The officer in [Schmerber] ... might reasonably have believed that he was confronted with an emergency, in which the delay necessary to obtain a warrant, under the circumstances, threatened the destruction of evidence[.] We are told that the percentage of alcohol in the blood begins to diminish shortly after drinking stops, as the body functions to eliminate it from the system. Particularly in a case such as this, where time had to be taken to bring the accused to a hospital and to investigate the scene of the accident, there was no time to seek out a magistrate and secure a warrant. Given these special facts, we conclude that the attempt to secure evidence of blood-alcohol content in this case was an appropriate incident to petitioner’s arrest.
Id. at 770-71,
Courts applying Schmerber disagreed about its meaning. Some courts interpreted it as simply adopting the totality of the circumstances test for purposes of determining whether the exigent circumstances exception was satisfied. See, e.g., State v. Johnson,
The disagreement about the scope of Schmerber as it related to the exigent
The majority decision in McNeely dealt only with the exigent circumstances exception. Id. at 1568; Birchfield,
In this appeal, the State has argued that the McNeely plurality’s discussion indicates that a warrantless blood draw pursuant to the implied consent law “withstands Fourth Amendment scrutiny, at least where there has been no withdrawal or revocation of consent.” As additional support for its position, the State has relied on Court of Criminal Appeals decisions, decided both before and after McNeely, holding that statutory implied consent qualifies as consent for purposes of the separate consent exception to the state and federal constitutional warrant requirements. See, e.g., Humphreys,
The consent exception to the warrant requirement applies when a person voluntarily consents to a search. Schneckloth v. Bustamonte,
After this appeal was briefed and argued, the United States Supreme Court rendered a decision in which implied consent laws were discussed, see Birchfield,
It is well established that a search is reasonable when the subject consents, and that sometimes consent to a search need, not be express but may be fairly inferred from context. Our prior opinions have referred approvingly to the general concept of implied-consent laws that impose civil penalties and eviden-tiary consequences on. motorists who refuse to comply. Petitioners do not question the constitutionality of those laws, and nothing we say here should be read to cast doubt on them.
It is another matter, however, for a State not only to insist upon an intrusive blood test, but also to impose criminal penalties on the refusal to submit to such a test. There must be a limit to the consequences to which motorists may be deemed to have consented by virtue of a decision to drive on public roads.
Respondents and their amici all but concede this point. North Dakota emphasizes that its law makes refusab a misdemeanor and suggests that laws punishing refusal more severely would present a different issue. Borrowing from our Fifth Amendment jurisprudence, the United States suggests that motorists could be deemed to have consented to only those conditions that are “reasonable” in that they have a “nexus” to the privilege of driving and entail penalties that are proportional to severity of the violation. But in the Fourth Amendment setting, this standard does*308 not differ in substance from the one that we apply, since reasonableness is always the touchstone of Fourth Amendment analysis. And applying this standard, we conclude that motorists cannot be deemed to have consented to submit to a blood test on pain of committing a criminal offense.
Id. at 2185-86 (internal citations omitted) (emphases added). In applying its holdings to one of the three consolidated cases before it, the Supreme Court stated:
Unlike the other petitioners, [Steve Michael] Beylund was not prosecuted for refusing a test. He submitted to a blood test after police told him that the law required his submission, and his license was then suspended and he was fined in an administrative proceeding. The North Dakota Supreme Court held that Beylund’s consent was voluntary on the erroneous assumption that the State could permissibly compel both blood and breath tests. Because voluntariness of consent to a search must be determined from the totality of all the circumstances, we leave it to the state court on remand to reevaluate Beylund’s consent given the partial inaccuracy of the officer’s advisory.
Id. at 2186 (emphases added) (citations and quotation marks omitted).
Birchfield arguably can be read to support the State’s argument because it appears to suggest that statutory implied consent may in some circumstances satisfy the consent exception to the warrant requirement because a motorist’s act of driving on state roads is deemed consent. However, the manner in which the Birch-field Court applied its holding to Mr. Bey-lund’s case can also be read as supporting the defendant’s argument that the adequacy of consent for purposes of an exception to the constitutional warrant requirement must be determined based on the totality of the facts and circumstances of each particular case, rather than implying consent from a motorist’s action in driving on state roads. Because Mr. Beylund consented only after receiving erroneous information about his ability to refuse consent and the consequences of doing so, the Supreme Court in Birchfield declined to rely on implied consent alone and remanded for a determination of whether his consent was voluntary, given the totality of the circumstances.
Thus, although Birchfield shed some light, it failed to answer definitively the question of whether implied consent satisfies the consent exception to the warrant requirement. Based on the limited guidance Birchfield provided, the unusual facts of this case, and our ability to resolve this appeal on another ground, we decline to determine in this appeal whether the implied consent statute satisfies the consent exception to the warrant requirement or whether the implied consent statute violates the federal or state constitution by authorizing warrantless blood draws.
Here, Deputy Strzelecki did not rely primarily on the implied consent law in obtaining the defendant’s blood. Rather, he erroneously believed that the defendant had actually consented to the blood draw, and he viewed the blood draw as mandatory, regardless of the defendant’s consent, because the accident involved fatalities. As a result, he did not advise the defendant of her ability to decline consent to the blood draw or of the consequences of doing so. The State has not challenged the lower courts’ conclusion that-the defendant did not voluntarily consent to the blood draw and has argued only that the implied consent law satisfies the consent exception in situations, such as this one, where the defendant did not revoke or withdraw her
C. Good-faith Exception to the Exclusionary Rule
The United States Supreme Court created the exclusionary rule as a remedy for Fourth Amendment violations in Weeks v. United States,
Eight years after Weeks, this Court considered whether evidence discovered in a warrantless search of the defendant’s vehicle in violation of article I, section 7 was unlawfully admitted at the defendant’s trial. Hughes v. State,
The state, having through its executive representatives produced the evidence of a violation of the law by one of its citizens by means prohibited by the Constitution, cannot be permitted through its judicial tribunal to utilize the wrong thus committed against the citizen to punish the citizen for his wrong; for it was only by violating his constitutionally protected rights that his wrong has been discovered.
Id.; see also Hampton v. State,
Although Mapp declared that “all evidence obtained by searches and seizures in violation of the Constitution is ... inadmissible in a state court,” id. at 655,
To ensure that the exclusionary rule serves this single purpose, the Supreme Court has adopted good-faith exceptions to the exclusionary rule, beginning with United States v. Leon,
In subsequent decisions, the Supreme Court has applied the rationale of Leon to recognize additional good-faith exceptions in different factual and legal scenarios, where applying the exclusionary rule would not result in appreciable deterrence. See, e.g., Davis,
In Davis, the most recent Supreme Court decision discussing the good-faith exception, the police arrested Davis in April 2007, handcuffed him, and placed him in a squad car.
The State correctly notes that this Court has not previously decided whether to adopt a good-faith exception to the exclusionary rule that applies to violations of article I, section 7 of the Tennessee Constitution. See State v. Carter,
Having the issue now “squarely presented,” we adopt as an exception to the state exclusionary rule the good-faith exception described in Davis. As already noted, this Court has long recognized that article I, section 7 is identical in intent and purpose to the Fourth Amendment. McCormick,
Like the Minnesota Supreme Court, however, we wish to “note the narrowness of our holding.” State v. Lindquist,
Finally, having adopted the Davis good-faith exception, we agree with the State that it applies here. Prior to McNeely, no warrant was required for a blood draw in drunk driving cases because Tennessee courts had interpreted Schmerber as establishing a broad categorical rule that the natural dissipation of alcohol within the bloodstream presents an exigent circumstance, justifying a warrantless blood draw in every drunk driving case. See, e.g., Humphreys,
In so holding, we reject the defendant’s final argument that Tennessee Rule of Criminal Procedure 41(g) provides her greater protection because it requires suppression of evidence derived from “[a] search or seizure [that] was made illegally without a - search warrant ... оr in any other way in violation of the constitutional protection against unreasonable searches and seizures.” Tenn: R. Crim. P. 41(g)(1). As already explained, the exclusionary rule is a judicially crafted remedy for- constitutional violations. As a result, this Court has both the authority and the responsibility to decide whether the Davis good-faith exception, or any other exception, should be adopted. Hodge v. Craig,
IV. Conclusion
Accordingly, for the reasons explained herein, we conclude that Deputy Strzeleeki had probable cause to believe that the defendant was driving while intoxicated at the time of the accident; thus the implied consent statute was triggered. We decline to decide in this appeal whether statutory implied consent satisfies the consent exception to the warrant requirement, because even assuming the warrantless blood draw violated the Fourth Amendment and article I, section 7, the exclusionary rule does not apply. Rather, we adopt the good-faith exception to the exclusionary rule as articulated in Davis and hold that this exception applies here. Accordingly, we affirm the judgment of the Court of Criminal Appeals on the separate grounds stated and remand this matter to the trial court for further proceedings consistent with this decision. Costs of this appeal are taxed to the State of Tennessee.
SHARON G. LEE, J., filed a dissenting opinion.
. Facts in this opinion have been gleaned from the record of this interlocutory appeal and from the trial court’s orders on the defendant’s motions to suppress. The defendant has not been tried, and factual statements in this opinion are not binding on remand and do not relieve the State of its obligation to prove the charged criminal offenses beyond a reasonable doubt at any future trial.
. At the time of the defendant’s warrantless blood draw, these statutes provided as follows:
(a)(1) Any person who drives a motor vehicle in this [S]tate is deemed to have given consent to a test or tests for the purpose of determining the alcoholic content of that person’s blood, a test or tests for the purpose of determining the drug content of the person’s blood, or both tests. However, no such test or tests may be administered pursuant to this section, unless conducted at the direction of a law enforcement officer having reasonable grounds to believe the person was driving while under the influence of alcohol, a drug, any other intoxicant[,] or any combination of alcohol, drugs, or other intoxicants as prohibited by [section] 55-10-401, or was violating the provisions of [section] 39-13.-106, [section] 39-13-213(a)(2)[,] or [section] 39-13-218.
(f)(1) If a law enforcement officer has probable cause to believe that the driver of a motor vehicle involved in an accident resulting in the injury or death of another has committed a violation of [section] 55-10-401, [section] 39-13-213(a)(2)[,] or [section] 39-13-218, the officer shall cause the driver to be tested for the purpose of determining the alcohol or drug content of the driver's blood. The test shall be performed in accordance with the procedure set forth in this section and shall be performed regardless*290 of whether .the driver does or does not consent to the test[J
[ (01(4) The results of a test performed in1 accordance with subdivision (f)(1), (f)(2)[,] and (f)(3) may be offered as evidence by either the [S]tate or the driver of the vehicle in any court or administrative hearing relating to the accident or offense subject to the Tennessee Rules of Evidence.
Tenn. Code Ann. § 55-10-406(a)(l), (f)(1), (f)(4) (Supp. 2011).
. The State attached copies of dispatch records indicating the time Officer Strzelecki received the page to a. pleading it filed.
. The horizontal gaze nystagmus test “tracks the [horizontal] movements of the eyes in order to gauge whether an individual might be under the influence of an intoxicant.” State v. Bell,
.Deputy Strzelecki had received basic training on administering the HGN.test in 2002, had completed a twenty-four hour course at the Governor’s Highway Safety Office on standard field sobriety testing and alternate tests, including the HGN test, and had completed a thirty-two hour course on driving under the influence ("DUI”), which tested his proficiency on standard field sobriety tests, as well as the HGN test. Deputy Strzelecki had also watched videos by an expert on the HGN test, which included instruction about its scientific basis, Deputy Strzelecki had also served as a DUI instructor for the Knox County Sheriff’s Office Training Academy and DUI task force member. He had made more than 350 DUI arrests and had "[a]ssist[ed] officers in better understanding the legal environment for DUI enforcement so they will become more skillful in DUI detection deterrence.” The defendant objected to Deputy Strzelecki testifying as an expert regarding her performance on the HGN test, but the trial court overruled the defense objection, and this issue is not before us in this appeal.
. Deputy Strzelecki described the six clues as follows: “I take their vision out as far as they can see and hold it there for a minimum of four seconds, and you’ll continue to see the eye twitch, and that’s maximum deviation. The other test is—that's .one clue for each eye. The other test is lack of smooth pursuit, and I’m taking about a two-second pass in front of each eye, watching for that lack of smoothness where the eye is jerking back and forth. And then the last part of the test is onset of nystagmus prior.to [forty-five] degrees. So I go from [twelve] inches out, and I go up to about a [forty-five] degree angle and observe the person's eyes and watch for that onset to begin before I get to that [forty-five] degree point, and [the defendant] exhibited all six clues.”
. Miranda v. Arizona,
. Deputy Strzelecki was not "100 percent sure” of the driver’s identity, so he also obtained a blood sample from Mr. Page. This appeal relates only to the blood sample obtained without a warrant from the defendant.
. LifeStar represents UT Medical Center and provides critical care treatment and aero medical transport via a fleet of helicopters.
. Tennessee Code Annotated section 55-10-406(a)(1) (Supp. 2011) provides that no test for determining the alcoholic or drug content of a person's blood "may be administered pursuant to this section, unless conducted at. the direction of a law enforcement officer having reasonable grounds to believe the person was driving while under the influence-of alcohol, a drug, any other intoxicant, or any combination of alcohol, drugs, or other intoxicants as prohibited by [section] 55-10-401, or was violating the provisions of [section] 39-13-106, [section] 39-13-213(a)(2)[,] or [section] 39-13-218." (Emphasis added), The term "reasonable grounds" is not statutorily defined, but Tennessee courts have equated it with "probable cause” and have used the terms interchangeably. See, e.g., State v. Bowery,
. As additional support for its conclusion that probablе cause was lacking, the trial court referred to the defendant as not being arrested "until April of 2012, a year and half" after the accident occurred. This reference is inaccurate. The accident occurred in October 2011, about six months before the defendant’s arrest. Additionally, the date of the defendant's arrest has no bearing on whether, on the night of the accident, Deputy Strzelecki
. After stating that this issue had not been raised in the trial court and could be deemed waived, the Court of Criminal Appeals nevertheless decided to address “this ... question of law that seems to be.unsettled.” Reynolds,
. This provision is now codified at Tennessee Code Annotated section 55-10-406(d)(5)(A) (Supp. 2015).
. The Fourth Amendment applies to the States through the Fourteenth Amendment. Mapp v. Ohio,
. This Court remains "free to interpret the provisions of [the Tennessee] constitution to afford greater protection than the federal constitution.” State v. Cox,
. The warrant requirement serves the "essential purpose” of assuring citizens "that such intrusions are not the random or arbitrary acts of government agents[,]. ... that the intrusion is authorized by law, and that it is narrowly limited in its objectives and scope.” Skinner,
. The State also has not appealed from the Court of Criminal Appeals’ conclusion that waiver forecloses its argument that the war-rantless blood draw was justified by the exigent circumstances exception. Reynolds,
. Courts in the following jurisdictions have refused to hold that statutory implied consent satisfies the consent exception to the warrant requirement. Flonnory v. State,
. We note that the General Assembly enacted a statute in 2011 entitled "Exclusionary Rule Reform Act.” Tenn. Code Ann. § 40-6-108 (2012). This statute applies to "any evidence that is seized as a result of executing a search warrant.” H. § 40-6-108(a). Thus, the statute is not implicated in this appeal involving only a warrantless search.
. The State also advocated for adoption of the good-faith exception recognized in Krull, but we need not address this good-faith exception because we have not here found it necessary to determine the constitutionality of the implied consent statute. The Court of Criminal Appeals urged us to adopt the Krull exception if the implied consent law were held unconstitutional because it authorized or mandated warrantless blood draws. As already noted, however, another Panel of the Court of Criminal Appeals has held that the implied consent law does not authorize or mandate warrantless blood draws and upheld the statute's constitutionality. Wells,
.See Hinkle v. State,
. For, this reason, the dissent's assertion that our adoption of the Davis good-faith exception allows "a police officer to violate a citizen's constitutional rights with no consequences” is simply incorrect The Davis good-faith exception applies only if the police action is consistent with governing law that is only subsequently overruled or modified.
. The dissent suggests that applying the Davis good-faith exception here is not proper because the United States Supreme Court did not apply it to the defendant in McNeely and because a Texas court refused to apply it. See Aviles v. State,
Dissenting Opinion
dissenting.
I agree with the Court’s conclusion that the warrantless blood draw violated Ms. Reynolds’ right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures, -as guaranteed by the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution and article I, section 7 of the Tennessee Constitution. I dissent from the Court’s decision to excuse these constitutional violations by adopting a good-faith exception to the exclusionary rule. The adoption of this exception for a constitutional violation erodes our citizens’ rights to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures as guaranteed by the United States and Tennessee Constitutions. Therefore, I would hold that the test results of Ms. Reynolds’ warrantless blood draw must be suppressed. Moreover, given the unusual facts of this case, the adoption of a good-faith exception for a constitutional violation based on an officer’s good-faith reliance on binding judicial precedent, as set forth in Davis v. United States,
First, as the Court discusses, courts adopting a good-faith exception have concluded that the primary interest served by the exclusionary rule is deterring police misconduct. See United States v. Leon,
Second, by its decision, the Court is sanctioning the officer’s invasive act of taking a sample of Ms. Reynolds’ blood without a warrant and in violation of her constitutional rights. In doing so, the Court has created a category of cases in which police officers may violate constitutional rights with no consequences. Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, in her dissent in Illinois v. Krull,
Third, the Court’s decision treats Ms. Reynolds differently than the defendants in McNeely and Aviles v. State,
Similarly, in Aviles,
Like the drivers in McNeely and Aviles, Ms. Reynolds was subjected to a warrant-less blood draw. After being seriously injured in a traffic accident, Ms. Reynolds was taken by air ambulance to the hospital. One other person was injured, and two people died in the accident. The officer neither witnessed the accident nor saw Ms. Reynolds driving the vehicle. He was dispatched to the hospital to obtain a blood sample from Ms. Reynolds and another person injured in the accident. According to the officer, the blood draw was mandatory. Tennessee Code Annotated section 55—10—406(f)(1) provides that, when an officer has probable cause to believe the driver of. a vehicle involved in an accident resulting in the injury or death of another has committed a violation of the driving under the influence statute, then the officer “shall cause the driver to be tested for the purpose of determining the alcohol or drug content of the driver’s blood.” Ms. Reynolds did not consent to the test and could not withdraw her implied consent. There was no proof of any exigent circumstances, and the officer did not obtain a warrant. The trial court granted Ms. Reynolds’ motion to suppress, and the Court of Criminal Appeals reversed. While recognizing that the warrantless blood draw violated Ms. Reynolds’ right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures, as guaranteed by the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution and article I, section 7 of the Tennessee Constitution, the Court’s ruling today allows for the admission of the blood test results under a good-faith exception that was not applied by the courts in McNeely or Aviles.
Fourth,- assuming I concurred in the adoption of a good-faith exception for a constitutional violation based on good-faith reliance on. binding judicial precedent, I would not apply it here. The Supreme Court in McNeely did not overrule its previous decision in Schmerber v. California,
In addition to' this uncertainty, this Court never interpreted Schmerber as establishing a per se rule that the dissipation' of alcohol always results in the finding of exigent circumstances. Although cases decided' by the Court of Criminal Appeals cited language from Schmerber that the percentage of alcohol in the blood begins to diminish shortly after drinking stops, these cases do not rise to the level of “binding judicial precedent.” In State v. Humphreys,
Finally, I am not alone in my concerns regarding the adoption of a good-faith exception for violations of Fourth Amendment protections. Some state courts have declined to adopt the Leon good-faith exception because it erodes the constitutional rights of its citizens or otherwise conflicts with state statutory or constitutional law.
Drunk driving is a serious problem and threatens the lives of innocent -people. However, to ensure the protection guaranteed to our citizens by article I, section 7 of the Tennessee Constitution, to maintain a remedy for violations of those protections, and to promote judicial integrity and fairness, this Court should decline to adopt the Davis good-faith exception to the exclusionary rule. Although the United States Supreme Court has adopted a good-faith exception, we have the authority to provide the citizens of our state with greater protections, and I submit we should do so in this case. As Chief Justice John Marshall so, eloquently stated in Marbury v. Madison,
For these reasons, I respectfully dissent.
. The opinion cited State v. Janosky, M1999-02574-CCA-R3-CD,
. The Court notes that “[t]he State urges us to adopt the good-faith exception articulated in Davis and points out, correctly, that courts in several other jurisdictions have adopted [the Davis] good-faith exception and it has been applied to prevent thе exclusion of evidence obtained from warrantless blood draws conducted prior to McNéely." (Footnotes omitted). Only five of the thirteen cases cited in footnote 22 actually involved warrantless blood draws. Moreover, in those cases, the courts emphasized that the binding judicial precedent in those jurisdictions clearly permitted warrantless blood draws under the exigent circumstances exception. Thus, these cases are distinguishable.
.See Marsala,
