NM: Working methamphetamine lab is exigency

Officers stopped a man coming out of defendant’s house, and he said that there was a working meth lab inside. That was exigency for a warrantless entry. The dangers of the chemical process in a meth lab have been held to be exigency in New Mexico. State v. Allen, 2011 NMCA 19, 149 N.M. 267, 247 P.3d 1152 (2010), Certiorari Denied, January 25, 2011, No. 32,785:

[*16] In Calloway, we concluded that the presence of the potentially hazardous nature of the chemicals used to manufacture meth constitutes exigency. 111 N.M. at 50, 801 P.2d at 120. Fourteen years later, in dealing with a purported violation of the knock and announce rule, State v. Johnson recognized that in at least two other jurisdictions, courts have held that “where officers know there is a [meth] lab in operation, that knowledge may create exigency” because of the risk of fire, explosion, or other potential harms. 2004 NMCA 64, ¶ 11, 135 N.M. 615, 92 P.3d 61, aff’d in part, rev’d in part on other grounds, 2006 NMSC 49, 140 N.M. 653, 146 P.3d 298. Despite having made this observation, our Court ultimately determined that the officers did not possess an objectively reasonable belief of exigency because they had only the vaguest suspicion that there was a meth lab inside the dwelling. Id. ¶¶ 11-12.