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State v. Fitterer11/5/2002
d he claimed the checkpoint stop was illegal, he either meant that the checkpoint was set up in violation of the Fourth Amendment or that law enforcement performed the checkpoint stop in violation of the Fourth Amendment. Additional pleading or evidence in Fitterer's motion to suppress was not required. We conclude the trial court and the State had sufficient notice of the stated suppression grounds raised by Fitterer. To conclude otherwise would exalt form over substance. See Goehring, 374 N.W.2d at 886.
However, our ruling here does not relieve a defendant of the burden of establishing a prima facie case at the motion hearing before the State is required to put on evidence. City of Jamestown v. Jerome, 2002 ND 34, 6, 639 N.W.2d 478; State v. Glaesman, 545 N.W.2d 178, 182 n.1 (N.D. 1996). Had the trial court conducted a hearing, the initial burden would have been Fitterer's to show that he was not stopped for committing a traffic violation or for a vehicle safety defect, that in fact he was stopped merely because a checkpoint was being conducted. Because we have held checkpoint stops are neither per se constitutional nor per se unconstitutional, Uhden, 513 N.W.2d at 379, such an evidentiary showing, if made at the hearing, would constitute a sufficient prima facie case to shift to the State the burden of proving the checkpoint stop was in fact conducted appropriately and pursuant to protocols that did not violate the Fourth Amendment. Jerome, 2002 ND 34, 6, 639 N.W.2d 478.
Fitterer sufficiently stated his grounds for suppression to provide the trial court and the State adequate notice of the constitutional issues he raised. He should have been afforded an opportunity to submit evidence of a prima facie case at the motion hearing. The trial court, therefore, erred when it granted the State's motion and dismissed Fitterer's motion to suppress for lack of specificity, without permitting him an opportunity to submit evidence of a prima facie case.
III.
Fitterer also argues his motion to suppress should have been granted because the State failed to provide discovery regarding the information related to the checkpoint in violation of N.D.R.Crim.P. 16. In light of the discussion above, we do not reach this issue and need not address it.
IV.
For the foregoing reasons, the trial court's judgment of conviction entered on the jury's verdict is reversed, and this matter is remanded with instructions to conduct a hearing on the motion to suppress, and for such other proceedings as may then be appropriate.
William A. Neumann
Mary Muehlen Maring
Carol Ronning Kapsner
Gerald W. VandeWalle, C.J.
I concur in the result.
Dale V. Sandstrom
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