Birchfield v. North Dakota

Birchfield v. North Dakota
Supreme Court of the United States
Argued April 20, 2016 Decided June 23, 2016
Full case name	Danny Birchfield, Petitioner v. State of North Dakota
Docket no.	14-1468
Citations	579 U.S. 438 (more) 136 S. Ct. 2160; 195 L. Ed. 2d 560
Argument	Oral argument
Opinion announcement	Opinion announcement
Case history
Prior	On writ of certiorari to the Supreme Court of North Dakota
Holding
1. The Fourth Amendment permits warrantless breath tests incident to arrests for drunk driving but not warrantless blood tests. 2. Motorists who refuse to submit to a blood test may face civil but not criminal penalties.
Court membership
Chief Justice John Roberts Associate Justices Anthony Kennedy · Clarence Thomas Ruth Bader Ginsburg · Stephen Breyer Samuel Alito · Sonia Sotomayor Elena Kagan
Case opinions
Majority	Alito, joined by Roberts, Kennedy, Breyer, Kagan
Concur/dissent	Sotomayor, joined by Ginsburg
Concur/dissent	Thomas
Laws applied
U.S. Const. amend. IV

Birchfield v. North Dakota, 579 U.S. 438 (2016) is a case in which the Supreme Court of the United States held that the search incident to arrest doctrine permits law enforcement to conduct warrantless breath tests but not blood tests on suspected drunk drivers.^[1]