State v. Steven T. Delap, 2016AP2196-CR, 4/20/17, District 4 (one-judge decision; ineligible for publication), petition for review granted 7/18/17, affirmed, 2018 WI 64; case activity (including briefs)
Police tried to arrest Delap outside his home on warrants for fleeing from a couple of traffic stops, but when they approached and said “stop, police,” Delap fled into his home. The police followed and arrested him inside. (¶¶3-6). Delap’s challenge to his arrest is no more successful than his attempt to flee.
Delap first argues that the arrest attempt was unlawful because it occurred within his home’s curtilage, but the facts don’t bear this out: He was in his driveway near the sidewalk, visible to anyone walking down the street, so he had no reasonable expectation of privacy and wasn’t within the curtilage. Oliver v. United States, 466 U.S. 170, 180 (1984); State v. Martwick, 2000 WI 5, 30, 231 Wis. 2d 801, 604 N.W.2d 552. (¶¶13-15).
Next he argues there was no probable cause to arrest because the police didn’t know that the person fleeing from them was the person named in the arrest warrants. Maybe, but that’s no matter: Delap’s flight in response to the officers’ command to stop provided probable cause to arrest for obstruction. (¶¶16-17).
That he fled from a command to stop also dooms his third argument, which is that the exigent circumstance of hot pursuit didn’t justify going into his home because he hadn’t committed a bailable offense and was not continuously pursued from a crime scene, State v. Ferguson, 2009 WI 50, ¶¶28-30, 317 Wis. 2d 586, 767 N.W.2d 187. (¶¶18-20).
His final argument—the arrest was unreasonable under all the circumstances—is rejected as undeveloped. (¶21).
