State of Warrantless Blood Draws in the State of Texas

Texas has an implied consent statute in Texas Transportation Code Chapter 724.  Using this statute, police throughout Texas have been requiring the taking of blood from suspects of Driving While Intoxicated related offenses without first obtaining consent, obtaining a warrant, or without exigent circumstances.

In  2013, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Missouri v. McNeely, 133 S.Ct. 1552 (2013), reiterated that “where police officers can reasonably obtain a warrant before a blood sample can be drawn without significantly undermining the efficacy of the search, the Fourth Amendment mandates that they do so.”  Id. at  1561.  Since that decision, the Texas warrantless blood draw practice has come under attack.  

As of this writing, the PDR is pending before the Court of Criminal Appeals on the legality of these warrantless blood draws. Since filing the above motion on this issue, Courts of Appeal across the state have held that this statute does not create an exception to the warrant requirement. 

See more on this here on my criminal procedure blog.