State v. Wright

On a cold night in January 2020, Defendant Eric Wright was stopped by three police officers who wanted to search his backpack without a warrant. Mr. Wright, a Black and unhoused man, refused consent five times and admitted to being scared of the police. The police kept on insisting he open his bag and called Mr. Wright “deceptive.” Finally, Mr. Wright acquiesced to a search of his backpack. The police found a firearm and immediately arrested Mr. Wright.

Warrantless searches violate the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution unless the government can prove that an exception to the warrant requirement applies. One such exception is consent to search—when the defendant voluntarily agrees to let the police search their person, home, or belongings. But the facial appearance of consent does not automatically make a warrantless search lawful. The government must prove that the consent was voluntary and not the result of police coercion. In other words, if Mr. Wright felt as if he had no choice but to consent, or that the officers would not take no for an answer, then his consent was involuntary and the search thus unconstitutional.
The trial court held that the search complied with the Fourth Amendment and Mr. Wright consented to having his backpack searched. However, the North Carolina Court of Appeals reversed this decision, ruling that Mr. Wright’s consent was the result of coercion.

In a Supreme Court appeal, the ACLU, alongside the ACLU of North Carolina, filed an amicus brief arguing that the Court of Appeals decision should be affirmed given that the State failed to prove that Mr. Wright voluntarily consented to a search of his bag. We argue that courts must consider the totality of circumstances when determining whether consent was voluntary, including characteristics of the defendant that may them more susceptible to coercion. Critical to this analysis is an understanding that, in interacting with the police, certain people may have reason to be more fearful. An unhoused Black man, like Mr. Wright for example, may be less likely to feel he has any choice but to consent, given the over-criminalization of Black and unhoused communities. Fear of police brutality and violence—disproportionately aimed at Black men—also likely affects a defendant’s perception of police encounters. Our brief argues that, when considering the totality of the circumstances, the realities of relations between police and vulnerable communities to which a particular defendant belongs must be taken into account when asking whether a reasonable person, in the defendant’s shoes, would feel free to leave or refuse consent.