WA: SW errors were merely ministerial and there was no prejudice

The procedural rules of search warrants are ministerial and not a ground to suppress without prejudice to the target. Here, even the court where the warrant supposedly issued didn’t exist any more, but that didn’t matter. No substantive violation occurred. State v. Temple, 170 Wn. App. 156, 285 P.3d 149 (2012):

¶7 Temple next argues that the police violated the warrant procedures established by court rules. He identifies the following errors: (1) the search warrant affidavit, the search warrant, the search warrant return, and the search warrant inventory were not filed with the issuing court; (2) the search warrant return was not accompanied by the inventory of property seized; (3) the police did not provide Temple with a copy of the warrant or a receipt for the property seized; and (4) the search warrant inventory was not made in the presence of any other person and falsely states that it was. He concedes insufficiency of any one of these errors alone to invalidate the warrant, absent a showing of prejudice.

¶8 However, Temple contends that the cumulative effect of these procedural deficiencies raises constitutional considerations and requires suppression. However, he does not demonstrate how the alleged errors prejudiced him. Indeed, at oral argument, counsel conceded that nothing in Temple’s trial preparation would have changed if these procedures had been followed to the letter. As we noted in State v. Parker, “The rules for the execution and return of a valid search warrant are ministerial in nature. Absent a showing of prejudice to the defendant, procedural noncompliance does not compel invalidation of the warrant or suppression of its fruits.” The courts’ ministerial rules for warrant execution and return do not “flow so directly from the Fourth Amendment’s proscription upon unreasonable searches that failure to abide by them compels exclusion of evidence obtained in execution of a search warrant.” Temple’s constitutional argument fails.

Remember my rules:

1. There are no [longer any] technicalities under the Fourth Amendment.