Suppression of Evidence-DNA Analysis

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WI Court of Appeals – District III

Case Name: State of Wisconsin v. Raymand L. Vannieuwenhoven

Case No.: 2022AP000882-CR

Officials: GILL, J.

Focus: Suppression of Evidence-DNA Analysis

Raymand Vannieuwenhoven appeals from a judgment convicting him, following a jury trial, of two counts of first-degree murder.1 See WIS. STAT. § 940.01 (1975-76). Raymand contends that the circuit court erred by denying his motion to suppress the results of a DNA analysis used to match his DNA profile to a DNA profile developed from a 1976 crime scene (“crime scene”). The DNA analysis was conducted after law enforcement had collected Raymand’s DNA from an envelope that he licked and voluntarily gave to law enforcement as part of a “ruse.” According to Raymand, he had a reasonable expectation of privacy in his “DNA and the information contained therein,” and law enforcement’s warrantless searches of his DNA violated his Fourth Amendment rights, regardless of his voluntarily licking the envelope and giving it to identified law enforcement personnel.

The appeals court concludes that law enforcement lawfully seized both the envelope and its contents because Raymand voluntarily consented to giving both of them, which included the DNA sample contained therein, to law enforcement. Case law supports this conclusion despite the fact that Raymand consented to giving the envelope to law enforcement under false pretenses. Once the State lawfully possessed the envelope and its contents, it was free to develop a DNA profile using the saliva from the envelope and compare that profile to the DNA from the crime scene. Under the facts of this case, once Raymand gave control of the envelope and its contents, including his saliva, to law enforcement, he surrendered any reasonable expectation of privacy in the minimally invasive DNA profile developed from that saliva sample, which the State used solely to determine whether his DNA profile matched that from the crime scene.

Affirmed.

Decided 04/30/24

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