Search warrant for blood test is not invalidated by failure to inform magistrate of defendant’s request for a breath test

People v. Santa Clara County Superior Court (Cal. Ct. App., May 14, 2026, No. H053051) 2026 WL 1347413, at *1

Summary: Does an officer’s failure in a search warrant application to inform the magistrate of the defendant’s request for a breath test invalidate the warrant authorizing seizure of a blood sample to test the defendant’s blood alcohol level. The Court concluded it does not.

Feghhi was arrested after his vehicle, speeding at 130 miles per hour on Highway 101 in Gilroy, rear-ended a vehicle driven by Vanessa Arellano, killing her. Officers obtained a warrant to draw a blood sample from Feghhi after he initially refused—though later consented—to submit to a chemical test. The blood sample, taken more than three hours after the accident, revealed a blood alcohol concentration (BAC) of 0.14 percent.

Feghhi was charged by information with murder, gross vehicular manslaughter, and driving with a BAC over 0.08 percent and causing injury.

Feghhi moved to quash and traverse the search warrant authorizing the seizure of his blood sample and to suppress the resulting evidence. He argued that the warrant affiant misrepresented and/or omitted the circumstances of Feghhi’s purported refusal to submit to a chemical test, when, in fact, the transcript of the officer’s body-worn camera recording shows Feghhi was willing to submit to a breath test. The district attorney opposed Feghhi’s motion, arguing that he had not met his burden to justify a Franks  hearing because, even assuming the magistrate was informed of Feghhi’s willingness to take a breath test, the warrant was supported by probable cause.

The respondent superior court granted the motion to quash and traverse after concluding the magistrate would not have issued the warrant if the affidavit had disclosed Feghhi’s consent to a breath test.

Petitioner filed a petition for a writ of mandate seeking reversal of the trial court’s order traversing the search warrant and suppressing the evidence of Feghhi’s BAC (petition). Even assuming deliberate omission of the defendant’s consent to a breath test from the warrant affidavit, Feghhi has not demonstrated that correcting the alleged omission would have changed the probable cause analysis or rendered issuance of the warrantunreasonable  under the Fourth Amendment.  The Court directed that a peremptory writ of mandate issue ordering the court to vacate its order granting the motion to traverse and quash search warrant and suppress evidence, and enter a new order denying the motion.

Motion to quash

Feghhi filed a motion to quash and traverse the search warrant and to suppress evidence pursuant to section 1538.5, subdivision (i) arguing that Officer Marquez “intentionally misled the magistrate into a mistaken belief that [ ] Feghhi had refused a chemical test so that police could obtain a blood sample, where none was necessary given that [ ] Feghhi had repeatedly asserted his legal right to choose a breath test.” Feghhi argued  that the transcript of the body-worn camera footage of his arrest showed that he had “immediately and unambiguously requested a breath test” after being admonished that he had a right to choose a blood or breath test and had “explicitly asserted his right to submit a voluntary evidentiary breath test at least six times.” Feghhi requested an evidentiary hearing pursuant to Franks to prove the deliberate falsity and reckless omission of statements in the search warrant affidavit. Feghhi also filed a section 995 motion to dismiss the information, arguing there was insufficient evidence to support the implied malice murder charge and for the information to be refiled “to charge the offense that was supported by the evidence.”

Feghhi’s return asserts, citing the transcript of the body-worn camera footage of his arrest and attached to the motion, that after Feghhi was read the admonition, he engaged in a colloquy with Officer Marquez wherein Feghhi admitted he was “ ‘a little bit scared of needles’ ” and “ ‘want[ed] [to] do a breath[a]lizer test.’ ” Feghhi argues that by seeking and obtaining a search warrant for a blood draw after he repeatedly requested a breath test and by misrepresenting his purported refusal to submit to a chemical test, the officers violated both California’s implied consent law and Feghhi’s constitutional rights. Feghhi asserts that misrepresenting the need to obtain a physically intrusive blood draw when a breath test was available and of similar evidentiary value was unreasonable under the Fourth Amendment and rendered the results of the search inadmissible.

Legal Principles and Standard of Review governing suppression of evidence

“ ‘In California, issues relating to the suppression of evidence derived from governmental searches and seizures are reviewed under federal constitutional standards.’ ” (People v. Macabeo (2016) 1 Cal.5th 1206, 1212, 211 Cal.Rptr.3d 34, 384 P.3d 1189.)

The Supreme Court in Franks recognized a defendant’s right to challenge a search warrant “where the defendant makes a substantial preliminary showing that a false statement knowingly and intentionally, or with reckless disregard for the truth, was included by the affiant in the warrant affidavit, and if the allegedly false statement is necessary to the finding of probable cause, the Fourth Amendment requires that a hearing be held at the defendant’s request.” (Franks, supra, 438 U.S. at pp. 155–156, 98 S.Ct. 2674.) Franks fheld that if the defendant at the hearing shows reckless disregard by a preponderance of the evidence “and, with the affidavit’s false material set to one side, the affidavit’s remaining content is insufficient to establish probable cause, the search warrant must be voided and the fruits of the search excluded to the same extent as if probable cause was lacking on the face of the affidavit.” (Id. at p. 156, 98 S.Ct. 2674.)

California courts apply Franks to deliberate omissions of material facts from an affidavit for a search warrant. “ ‘A defendant can challenge a search warrant by showing that the affiant deliberately or recklessly omitted material facts that negate probable cause when added to the affidavit.’ ” (People v. Sandoval (2015) 62 Cal.4th 394, 409, 196 Cal.Rptr.3d 424, 363 P.3d 41, quoting People v. Eubanks (2011) 53 Cal.4th 110, 136, 134 Cal.Rptr.3d 795, 266 P.3d 301 (Eubanks).) Our high court has explained that, “ ‘[t]hough similar for many purposes, omissions and misstatements analytically are distinct in important ways…. An affidavit need not disclose every imaginable fact however irrelevant. It need only furnish the magistrate with information, favorable and adverse, sufficient to permit a reasonable, common sense determination whether circumstances which justify a search are probably present.  ‘[A]n affiant’s duty of disclosure extends only to “material” or “relevant” adverse facts.’ ‘[F]acts are “material” and hence must be disclosed if their omission would make the affidavit substantially misleading.” (Sandoval, at p. 410, 196 Cal.Rptr.3d 424, 363 P.3d 41.)

The Trial Court Erroneously Granted Feghhi’s Motion To Traverse the Search Warrant and Suppress the BAC Evidence

For purposes of a Franks hearing to quash and traverse the warrant, it was Feghhi’s burden to show that correcting the affidavit’s contents to include the omitted information rendered the affidavit insufficient to support a probable cause finding. (Miles, supra, 9 Cal.5th at p. 576, 263 Cal.Rptr.3d 144, 464 P.3d 611 .) Feghhi’s motion did not engage in the requisite analytical exercise. Nor does he propose, in response to the petition and order to show cause, how informing the magistrate of his request to take a breath test in lieu of a blood test would have adversely impacted the affidavit’s showing of probable cause for issuance of the warrant for a blood draw.

The constitutionality of the blood test search does not rely on any exception to the warrant requirement. The general rule is that a search conducted pursuant to a warrant supported by probable cause issued by a neutral and detached magistrate is “reasonable” under the Amendment’s terms.

Feghhi has not met his burden to show that the fact of his consent to a breath test was material to the magistrate’s evaluation of probable cause under the warrant. Feghhi also has not shown, on the specific facts of this case, that the issuance of a warrant for his blood sample was unreasonable. Feghhi did not meet his burden for a Franks hearing or the granting of his suppression motion.

The trial court’s contrary conclusion was error.

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