New Mexico's Emergency Assistance Doctrine
New Mexico criminal defense lawyers and district attorneys will need to study State v. Ryon, 2005 NMSC 005 (2005), to learn the contours and discover the hidden gems in the recently announced New Mexico emergency assistance doctrine. In Ryon, the New Mexico Supreme Court announced the emergency assistance exception to the warrant requirment and distinguished it from the community caretaker exception. The Ryon Court, at once, expanded and limited the holdings in State v. Nemeth, 2001 NMCA 029, 130 N.M. 261, 23 P.3d 936 (extending community caretaker exception to warrantless home entries)
The Ryon Court established a three part test to determine whether the emergency assistance doctrine applies:
1) An objective, life-thretening emergency in a residence:
The objective standard for a warrantless and non-consensual entry into a home, however, requires a higher degree of urgency than the Nemeth decision may have conveyed. The emergency assistance doctrine applies specifically to warrantless intrusions into the home. The emergency assistance doctrine requires an emergency, a strong perception that action is required to protect against imminent danger to life or limb, an emergency that is sufficiently compelling to make a warrantless entry into the home objectively reasonable under the Fourth Amendment.
2) A subjective motivation to preserve life:
The emergency assistance doctrine is not applicable, however, unless the entry is motivated by the perceived need to act immediately in order to save a life.
3) A nexus between the place searched and the emergency.
The Ryon Court made clear that the doctrine is not limited to cases in which the community caretaker function is exercised in the non-criminal setting. In other words, the exception may apply in any criminal investigation. But, as previously stated, the Ryon appears to reject the Nemeth opinion for its lower emergency level allowing an intrusion into the home.
