In the past week, Wood & Nathanson has helped strike two significant blows for freedom in cases involving police arrests and searches of motorists. Wood & Nathanson alumna Attorney Claire Ward convinced the Supreme Judicial Court to rule that the police must have reasonable suspicion that a suspect is both armed and dangerous before pat frisking them. Also, Attorney Wood and a team of ACLU lawyers drafted an amicus brief that helped convince the SJC to rule for the first time that police cannot routinely impound and search the car of an arrested motorist when a sober, qualified driver is available to take possession of the car.
Amicus Brief: Right to Alternative to Police Impounding Your Vehicle
On October 17, Attorney Wood co-authored an amicus brief on behalf MACDL and the ACLU in a Fourth Amendment case. The brief argues that police must notify people that they may propose an alternative to impoundment of their vehicle before the police may impound it. This is critical because impoundment inevitably leads to an invasive inventory search and because impoundment is an unreasonable financial burden on poor people if there is reasonable alternative to impoundment.