State of South Dakota v. Oakley B. Engesser

Summary

The Supreme Court of South Dakota affirmed Oakley B. Engesser’s convictions for vehicular homicide and two counts of vehicular battery. The court held that the warrantless blood draw was constitutional under exigent circumstances, found any error in admitting a trooper’s opinion about Engesser’s truthfulness harmless, upheld the exclusion of exculpatory hearsay, and affirmed the refusal to give spoliation-related jury instructions.

Holdings

1. An involuntary, warrantless blood draw is constitutionally permissible without a prior or immediate subsequent formal arrest when exigent circumstances exist and the officer has probable cause to arrest, probable cause to believe the blood evidence will be obtained, and the draw is performed by a reliable method in a reasonable, medically approved manner. The objective circumstances supplied probable cause and exigency here, so the blood-test result was admissible.
2. The trial court erred or acted improperly in permitting the trooper to testify at length that Engesser was lying, but any error was harmless because the objection asserted at trial did not preserve the character-evidence and reputation arguments raised on appeal, the testimony was offered partly to explain the trooper's interview statement, and the jury was instructed that it alone determined witness credibility.
3. The circuit court did not abuse its discretion by excluding testimony recounting an unavailable witness's telephone statement that Finley had been driving when she and Engesser left the bar. The proponent failed to establish sufficient circumstantial guarantees of trustworthiness, and the statement was only marginally relevant to who was driving two hours later.
4. A spoliation or adverse-inference jury instruction is proper only when substantial evidence shows that the relevant evidence existed, was under the opposing party's control, would have been admissible, and was intentionally destroyed in bad faith. Negligent failure to preserve the Corvette and possible blood evidence did not satisfy that standard, and the denial of the instructions did not violate due process absent bad faith.

Questions Presented

1. Whether the Fourth Amendment permitted an involuntary, warrantless blood draw when Engesser was not formally arrested and the officer did not read an implied-consent warning.
2. Whether the trial court reversibly erred by allowing a police officer to testify that Engesser was untruthful during a recorded interview.
3. Whether the trial court abused its discretion by excluding proposed exculpatory hearsay under SDCL 19-16-35, Rule 804(b)(6).
4. Whether the trial court abused its discretion or violated due process by refusing jury instructions concerning the State's duty to preserve evidence and spoliation.

Disposition

affirmed