Page 28 - TPA Journal March April 2025

explained that the employee did not want to copy Though some facts suggested that potential evi-
the video because she was concerned that doing so dence could have been deleted automatically by
would notify Appellant. Detective Ramirez Snapchat, the court of appeals found that the
acknowledged that, although he felt obtaining a record lacked “any evidence showing or permit-
copy of the videos was “pretty urgent at that time,” ting an inference that Appellant was taking affir-
he did not seize the employee’s phone. mative steps to destroy evidence on his phone.”
On redirect, Appellant’s counsel asked what pre- Finding that the erroneous admission of the evi-
vented Detective Ramirez from obtaining a search dence seized from Appellant’s cell phone was not
warrant for Appellant’s phone earlier. Detective harmless, the court of appeals reversed and
Ramirez responded, “[h]onestly, I was hoping remanded for a new trial.
with him being a witness, he would just consent In a dissenting opinion, Justice Christopher opined
and it wouldn’t have been a big deal.” He also that the majority was wrong to apply the affirma-
acknowledged that, before seizing the phone, he tive conduct requirement to a case involving the
did not view Appellant as a suspect. When asked seizure of personal property. She noted that
whether he expected the Snapchat videos to be Turrubiate dealt with the warrantless search of a
inculpatory or exculpatory, Detective Ramirez house, which implicated a protected privacy inter-
stated, “I mean, I just believed that they were — est beyond the possessory interest a person has in
they were videos that could have contained evi- his or her personal property. Instead, Justice
dence to my investigation. I really didn’t know Christopher opined the warrantless seizure of the
what all was on there. I saw one short clip. I did- cellphone was justified under the exigent-circum-
n’t know what else was there. I mean, I really — I stances exception despite the lack of any affirma-
don’t know how to answer that, to be honest with tive conduct on the part of Appellant suggesting
you.” Detective Ramirez ultimately agreed that he the imminent destruction of evidence.
could have obtained the warrant “a lot sooner” The State Prosecuting Attorney’s Office filed a
than he did. petition for discretionary review, asking this Court
The trial court denied Appellant’s motion to sup- to review the court of appeals’ decision.
press. The State offered—and the trial court Specifically, we granted review to consider the
admitted into evidence during the guilt/innocence following questions:
phase of the trial—text messages obtained from (1) Do exigent circumstances to seize a cellular
the search of Appellant’s phone. The State did not phone for fear of unintentional loss of evidence
offer the Snapchat video into evidence, however. require that law enforcement act at the earliest
The jury found Appellant guilty of aggravated possible opportunity?
robbery and sentenced him to 17 years imprison- (2) Do exigent circumstances to seize a cellular
ment. phone for fear of intentional destruction of evi-
On appeal, Appellant’s sole argument was that the dence require “affirmative conduct” by the sus-
trial court erred by denying his motion to suppress pect?
the evidence obtained following the warrantless (3) Does the exigent circumstances exception
seizure of his cell phone. The court of appeals require proof that the evidence was unavailable
agreed, concluding that Detective Ramirez’s war- from other sources?
rantless seizure of Appellant’s phone did not fall However, the court of appeals’ decision rests on
within the exigent-circumstances exception. In the proposition that the seizure at issue was unjus-
reaching this conclusion, the court of appeals cited tified because there was no evidence of “affirma-
our opinion in Turrubiate v. State for the proposi- tive conduct” on the part of Appellant. To the
tion that the exigent-circumstances exception to extent that the court of appeals touched on the
the warrant requirement requires “proof of immi- availability of the same information from other
nent destruction based on affirmative conduct.” sources and the lack of alacrity with which

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