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Nevers v. State10/28/2005
No. 5952
Before: Bryner, Chief Justice, Eastaugh, Fabe, and Carpeneti, Justices. [Matthews, Justice, not participating.]
I. INTRODUCTION
After an Alaska state trooper stopped a car for a broken headlight on the Parks Highway, the driver fled the scene on foot. The police eventually tracked him to a Wasilla residence. Officers entered the home without a warrant and arrested the driver for driving while intoxicated. The driver refused to submit to a chemical breath test, and the Division of Motor Vehicles revoked his license for three years. The driver appeals, challenging the warrantless entry and search of his home as violations of the Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution and article I, sections 14 and 22 of the Alaska Constitution, and arguing that evidence obtained against him as a result of the search must be suppressed pursuant to the exclusionary rule. The hearing officer ruled that the exclusionary rule does not apply to license revocation proceedings. The superior court affirmed. Because we hold that the exclusionary rule does not apply to driver's license revocation proceedings, we affirm.
II. FACTS AND PROCEEDINGS
A. Facts
At about 7:20 p.m. on March 2, 2002, Alaska State Trooper Nathan Bucknall observed a red Subaru with a broken headlight. Trooper Bucknall attempted to stop the vehicle, giving chase for a quarter mile as the vehicle swerved across both lanes of traffic. The Subaru then pulled over onto the shoulder and drove for another one- to two-hundred feet, at which point the driver stopped the car and fled on foot. The Subaru was registered to David Nevers.
Trooper Bucknall found two male passengers inside the vehicle, Jon Fleming and Robert Kull. The car smelled of alcohol and was littered with beer cans and bottles. Both passengers smelled of alcohol, had bloodshot and watery eyes, and swayed when talking to the officer. Upon questioning, Fleming stated that he did not know the driver, and Kull explained that they had been picked up while hitchhiking home. Fleming appears to have been less than truthful about not knowing the driver. David A. Nevers, who the police later identified as the driver, was renting a room in Fleming's house.
Trooper Bucknall took Fleming into custody based on an existing warrant for his arrest, while Trooper Doug Cook, who had arrived on the scene within two to three minutes of the stop, tracked the driver by following his footprints in the snow. While following these tracks Trooper Cook found a three-day non-resident fishing license issued to David A. Nevers lying in the snow. After following the footprints for one hour and fifteen minutes, Trooper Cook reached the front parking lot of a bar. The bartender said that a person matching the description of the driver of the Subaru had come into the bar and called for a cab, saying that his car had broken down a few miles away. The individual had a gash across his nose and told the bartender that he was from New Hampshire. Trooper Cook conveyed this information to Trooper Bucknall.
After arresting Fleming on the existing warrant, Trooper Bucknall drove to the Wasilla address where the cab company had dropped off the suspect. At the address, Trooper Bucknall observed tracks matching those of the driver of the red Subaru leading to an open back door which led into an attached garage. Bucknall learned from a passerby that the house belonged to Jon Fleming. Trooper Bucknall, joined by Wasilla police officers, knocked on the garage door and, when nobody answered, he entered the garage and then knocked on the house door inside the garage. Receiving no response, Trooper Bucknall and the Wa
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