People v. Franklin
Docket No. 152840
Trial Lawyers’ Bottom Line: Trial courts have discretion to hold a Franks hearing, even if defendant fails to make “a substantial preliminary showing.”
In 1978, the U.S. Supreme Court decided Franks v. Delaware, 438 US 154 (1978), which held that a defendant is entitled to a hearing under the Fourth Amendment if he or she “makes a substantial preliminary showing” (1) that a police officer knowingly or intentionally made a false statement in an affidavit to obtain a search warrant and (2) that the false statement was necessary to the judge’s finding of probable cause. These hearings came to be known as “Franks Hearings.” The Michigan Court of Appeals interpreted this decision to bar a trial court from holding a Franks hearing—even if the trial court wants to—unless the defendant first makes “the substantial preliminary showing.” The Supreme Court reversed this decision.
In March 2014, police officer Lynn Moore submitted an affidavit alleging drug activity at the defendant’s home. Specifically, Moore said he had witnessed drug transactions take place at the defendant’s front door and had received information from a confidential informant about the defendant’s drug dealing. The magistrate found probable cause based on the affidavit and issued a search warrant for the defendant’s home, where police found a handgun and two bags of marijuana. The defendant challenged Moore’s affidavit by submitting his own affidavit, which stated that “his front door had a locked security gate that required a key and had not been used in approximately six months.”
The defendant moved for a Franks hearing based on his affidavit. At the motion hearing (not the Franks hearing itself) the trial court denied the defendant’s motion to quash the search warrant because the officer’s affidavit—even without the allegedly false information—still established probable cause. Despite this denial, the court still granted the Franks hearing. The trial court said the officer had not provided enough information in his affidavit about why the confidential informant was credible, and the trial court wanted this evidence produced at the hearing. The prosecution objected, arguing that the defendant had not made the requisite “substantial preliminary showing” required by Franks.
At the Franks hearing, the trial court ultimately decided to suppress the information obtained under the search warrant. As a result, the trial court dismissed the charges. The prosecutor appealed, and the Court of Appeals reversed, holding that the trial court abused its discretion.
A unanimous Supreme Court (with the exception of Judge Wilder, who did not participate in the case) reversed. Justice Markman's opinion held that the Franks showing determines only when a hearing is required—in other words, if the defendant makes the substantial preliminary showing, he is entitled to a Franks hearing. The Court said that the Franks decision did not say that a trial court is barred from otherwise exercising its discretion to hold a Franks hearing. Thus, the defendant’s substantial preliminary showing is a sufficient, but not a necessary condition to justify a Franks hearing.
The Court said no federal or state law barred the trial court from holding the hearing, nor did the trial court abuse its discretion in doing so. The Court ultimately held: “Given the absence of any identified prohibition, and given the latitude Michigan trial courts enjoy regarding motion practice and evidentiary hearings generally, we conclude that trial courts possess the authority to grant discretionary evidentiary hearings on the veracity of search warrant affidavits and a trial court’s decision to hold a veracity hearing is subject to review only for an abuse of discretion."
Full opinion here.