NJ: Officer sticking foot in door was Fourth Amendment entry

Blocking the door so defendant could not close it and terminate his conversation with the police involved the “threshold” and thus was an entry into the house without exigent circumstances. Terry does not permit entry into homes on reasonable suspicion. However, the officer could arrest defendant for hurting the officer, and the search incident of his person was valid. The search of his house was not. State v. Jefferson, 413 N.J. Super. 344, 994 A.2d 1067 (2010):

The trial court said, “the police were facing a potentially armed suspect who had not unequivocally indicated that he did not wish to speak to them.” But defendant’s possible willingness to speak to the police from inside his house did not translate into permission for them to enter. Defendant gave no indication that he had invited the police into the hallway, or into any part of his home. We reject the State’s argument that Sergeant Smith could reasonably believe that she was permitted to “move to the threshold to view [defendant’s] entire body and ascertain that defendant was not armed.” In fact, she inserted herself into the doorway while defendant was peering from behind it, thus expressing his choice to exclude the police from his home.

The State has not cited any case recognizing an exception from the warrant requirement when the police wish to enter a home to effect a Terry-type investigative detention of a suspect. The State’s argument that the police have such authority is inconsistent with the constitutional requirement that police have a warrant, or establish an exception to the warrant requirement, when they enter a home to make a formal arrest.

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In this case, the police had no warrant and made no showing of an exception from the warrant requirement when Sergeant Smith partially entered defendant’s residence to stop him from closing his front door. That conduct of the police infringed upon the “firm line at the entrance to the house” when applying the protections of the Fourth Amendment. Kirk, supra, 536 U.S. at 638, 122 S. Ct. at 2459, 153 L. Ed. 2d at 602 (quoting Payton, supra, 445 U.S. at 590, 100 S. Ct. at 1382, 63 L. Ed. 2d at 653).