Police have to let you know that you’re free to go (so long as you actually are free to go).

 State v. Spies (HSC September 16, 2025). Jonathan Spies was stopped by the police as he stepped out of his truck in the Foodland parking lot in Waimea on the Big Island. Sierra Valderrama was in the passenger seat. The officer had him sit in the back of his pickup while backup showed up. When they did, they told Spies they had a warrant to search his person—and nothing else. They did not have a warrant to search the vehicle.

 

They executed the warrant and had Valderrama get out of the truck. The police found nothing on Spies. Officer Justin Gaspar asked Spies if he could search his truck. Spies did not respond with a “yes” or “no” answer. He said something to the effect of “it’s all in there” or “everything that you guys are looking for is in there.” Officer Gaspar asked him  to clarify what he meant and Spies said that it was in his wallet. Spies did not consent to a search of the truck. The police held him for another three minutes after executing the warrant. The police did not inform Spies of his Miranda rights and did not tell him that he was free to go.

 

After Spies’ incriminating statements, Officer Gaspar arrested him and Valderrama. The truck was impounded and taken to a station in South Kohala. The police got a warrant to search the truck and found over an ounce of suspected methamphetamine. Officer Gaspar went back to Spies, informed him of his Miranda rights, and interrogated him. Spies gave more incriminating statements. He was indicted for promoting a dangerous drug in the first degree.

 

The circuit court, with the Hon. Judge Robert D. S. Kim presiding, ruled that Spies’s statements at the Foodland parking lot and later at the police station were voluntary and admissible. Spies filed a motion in limine challenging the evidentiary foundation of the suspected methamphetamine. The motion was denied without prejudice; the circuit court explained that it would rather “look through and determine point by point the qualifications of the expert and the results of the expert report.”

 

In the three-day jury trial that followed, the prosecution called Hayley Rousch and Sophia Schiefelbein, criminalists from the “HPD Crime Lab.” Spies objected to their testimony.

 

Roush testified about the tests used to identify the substance, and a separate analysis to determine the exact weight. Over Spies’s objection based on “Motion in Limine 1,” the circuit court admitted the documents showing that the devices used by the lab were in proper working order and accredited.

 

Then Schiefelbein testified. She has an undergraduate degree in chemistry and conducted “scientific tests” on the substance seized by the police. Over Spies’s objection, the circuit court ruled that she was an expert “in the area of controlled substances and analysis.” She testified that she performed the tests on the substance and concluded that it contained methamphetamine. Spiese was found guilty and sentenced to 20 years in prison. He appealed.

 

The ICA vacated the judgment of conviction based on the prosecution’s failure to show that Schiefelbein was trained in accordance with the manufacturer’s requirements in the three devices used to test the substance. While she testified that she was trained by the HPD Crime Lab, she failed to specify if that training was done by representatives from each manufacturer. And nothing in her testimony showed that her training complied with the manufacturer's requirements. It rejected the other points of error raised by Spies. Both parties petitioned for a writ of cert.

 

The foundation needed to get a test result in at trial depends on whether the operator was an “expert” or a layperson. Expert testimony is governed by HRE Rule 702:

 

Testimony by experts. If scientific, technical, or other specialized knowledge will assist the trier of fact to understand the evidence or to determine a fact in issue, a witness qualified as an expert by knowledge, skill, experience, training, or education may testify thereto in the form of an opinion or otherwise. In determining the issue of assistance to the trier of fact, the court may consider the trustworthiness and validity of the scientific technique or mode of analysis employed by the proffered expert.

 

The HSC recognized two competing tests to lay foundation of a machine’s test results. When an expert uses the machine, there’s a three-prong test that must be met: (1) the qualifications of the expert; (2) whether the expert used “valid techniques” to get the test result; and (3) proof that the “measuring instrument is in proper working order.” State v. Long, 98 Hawaii 348, 355, 48 P.3d 595, 602 (2002).

 

But when a layperson uses a scientific instrument—like a police officer using a laser gun to determine a vehicle’s speed—a different test is used to lay that foundation. In that situation, the proponent must show that the layperson was using the machine in accordance with the approval of the machine’s manufacturer. State v. Assaye, 121 Hawaii 204, 215, 216 P.3d 1227, 1228 (2009).

 

The HSC clarified the Long test controlled here:

 

[W]e hold that, to lay a sufficient foundation for the admission of scientific test results through expert testimony, the State need only establish, by a preponderance of the evidence, “(1) the qualifications of the expert; (2) whether the expert employed ‘valid techniques’ to obtain the test result; and (3) whether ‘the measuring instrument is in proper working order.’”

 

It, therefore, held that the ICA erred in vacating the judgment for the failure to include manufacturer-approved foundation. That is for laypersons.

 

The police have to tell you when you’re free to go . . . “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers and effects against unreasonable searches, seizures and invasions of privacy shall not be violated[.]” Haw. Const. Art. I, Sec. 7. The HSC rejected Spies’s argument that being detained after the police executed the search warrant on his person violated his constitutional right to be left alone.

 

The police here executed a search warrant on Spies’s person. They came up with nothing. Spies argued that once that ended, they had to let him go and the detention afterward was unreasonable and unconstitutional. “Once a search warrant has been fully executed and the fruits of the search secured, the authority under the warrant expires and further governmental intrusion must cease.” State v. Chaisson, 486 A.2d 297, 303 (N. H. 1984). Continued detention can only be justified with “independent reasonable suspicion to be constitutional.” State v. Estabillio, 121 Hawaii 261, 273, 218 P.3d 749, 761 (2009).

 

The detention may continue, however, if the suspect consents. State v. Kearns, 75 Haw. 558, 569, 867 P.2d 903, 908 (1994). That requires the police to (1) inform the person that “he or she had the right to decline to participate in the encounter and could leave at any time, and (2) the person thereafter voluntarily participated in the encounter.” Id. at 571, 867 P.2d at 909.

 

But this scenario, according to the HSC, did not happen here. The police were justified in initially detaining Spies because of the warrant. The better rule for this situation comes from State v. Robinette, 653 N.E.2d 695, 699 (Ohio 1995), rev’d on other grounds in Ohio v. Robinette, 519 U.S. 33 (1996).

 

[T]he right . . . to be secure in one’s person and property requires that citizens stopped for traffic offenses be clearly informed by the detaining officer when they are free to go after a valid detention, before an officer attempts to engage in a consensual interrogation. Any attempt at consensual interrogation must be preceded by the phrase “At this time you are free to go,” or by words of similar import.

 

Id. at 696.

 

. . . but not if there’s reasonable suspicion to keep holding you. Of course, the police did not do that either. They never told him he was free to go. According to the HSC, however, that did not matter because the police still had reasonable suspicion to hold him for those three extra minutes. Reasonable suspicion arises when the officer can point to “reasonable and articulable facts that criminal activity is afoot.” Kearns, 75 Haw. at 569, 867 P.2d at 908. It is measured objectively and based on the totality of the circumstances. State v. Spillner, 116 Hawaii 351, 358, 173 P.3d 498, 505 (2007).

 

In this case, the HSC relied on Officer Gaspar’s “training and experience” about drug dealers and his run ins with Spies:

 

Officer Gaspar testified that he knew from his prior investigation of Spies that Spies sold a confidential informant heroin in a controlled purchase. Further, Officer Gaspar knew that drug dealers tend to keep drugs in close proximity to them. Officer Gaspar also averred in his affidavit in support of his warrant application that he knew from his training and experience that drug dealers “commonly conceal or transport illegal narcotics and its related paraphernalia in vehicles, fanny packs, or other bags which they keep near them.” More specifically, Officer Gaspar averred that he “corroborate[d] through several reliable confidential informants and also Vice Officers that SPIES commonly carries and distributes narcotics from this pickup truck.”

 

That was enough for the HSC to justify the continued, three-minute detention. And then, once he made the statement about contraband in the truck, there was probable cause to arrest. In the end, the HSC adopted the rule in Robinette and held it did not apply here because the police were justified in holding him after they executed the search warrant.

 

What about the incriminating statement itself? Then the HSC examined the incriminating statement about the drugs being in the truck. That issue turned on whether Officer Gaspar was required to Mirandize. The Miranda warnings are required when the suspect is in custody and subjected to interrogation. State v. Hoffman, 155 Hawaii 166, 172, 557 P.3d 895, 901 (2024). There is no doubt that Spies was in custody when Officer Gaspar asked him if he could search the truck. The issue turned on if the question was “interrogation.”

 

“Interrogation” refers to express questioning and any words or conduct “reasonably likely to invoke an incriminating response.” Id. at 175, 557 P.3d at 904. The first statement—“its’s all in there—was an incriminating response to the question of whether Spies would allow the police to search the truck. The HSC adopted the rule from the ICA in State v. Rippe, 119 Hawaii 15, 193 P.3d 1215 (App. 2008). The answer to Officer Gaspar’s question was “yes” or “no” and it did not suggest that Officer Gaspar was trying to engage in something more.

 

The same went for the follow up question. Officer Gaspar asked Spies to clarify by asking him “what?” And he said it’s in “the black wallet.” That was likely to elicit an incriminating response and at that point Spies needed to be Mirandized. But then, the HSC ruled that the error was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. See State v. Baker, 147 Hawaii 413, 435, 465 P.3d 860, 862 (2020). The evidence at trial was “overwhelming and compelling” and that was enough for the HSC to not disturb the conviction.