State of New Jersey v. Stanley Cliff Smith, a/k/a
Jerry Johnson (A-68-10; 066806)
The question of suppression of the telephone records
and the evidence developed from those records involves
a two-step analysis, involving both the inevitable
discovery doctrine and the independent source rule.
The independent source here is the murder weapon once
that was recovered, the police would, through their
normal investigatory steps, have inevitably been led
to defendant. The Appellate Division concluded
correctly that the trial court should not have granted
the motion to suppress. In addition, the Court finds
no prosecutorial misconduct warranting a new trial.
