No. 338, 2001Supreme Court of Delaware.
Decided: November 9, 2001
Court Below: Superior Court of the State of Delaware, in and for New Castle County; C.A. No. 01X-02-001SW
Appeal dismissed.
Unpublished opinion is below.
IN RE SEARCH WARRANT FOR LAW OFFICE COMPUTER/AG/DSP Joint Investigation, DSP Complaint No. 03-01-002900 No. 338, 2001 Supreme Court of the State of Delaware. Submitted: October 31, 2001 Decided: November 9, 2001
Before VEASEY, Chief Justice, WALSH and HOLLAND, Justices.
ORDER
This 9th day of November 2001, it appears to the Court that:
(1) The Office of the Public Defender (“the Public Defender”) filed this appeal from a decision of the Superior Court dated June 22, 2001. The Superior Court’s decision dismissed the Public Defender’s petition for return of seized property on the ground that the petition was moot. The State represented to the Superior Court that the seized property, a computer hard drive used by an employee of the Public Defender, had not been examined or searched and that it wished to return the hard drive to the Public Defender. Among other things, the Superior Court’s decision ordered the Public Defender to retrieve the hard drive.
(2) The Clerk of this Court issued a Rule to Show Cause directing the Public Defender to show cause why the appeal should not be dismissed as moot. Based upon the Public Defender’s response and the State’s reply thereto, we remanded this matter to the Superior Court to: (a) clarify the effect of its dismissal of the Public Defender’s petition on the continuing validity of the search warrant; and (b) clarify the manner in which it intended the seized property to be returned to the Public Defender and to address the Public Defender’s assertion that the Superior Court’s dismissal of its petition does not return the Public Defender to its pre-seizure position.
(3) The Superior Court has issued its decision following remand.
The Superior Court has concluded as a matter of fact and law that the search warrant at issue is no longer executable in light of its dismissal of the Public Defender’s petition based on the State’s explicit representations that the computer hard drive has not and will not be searched by the Department of Justice or the police. The Superior Court further held that it only ordered the Public Defender to retrieve the hard drive because of the representations of an Assistant Public Defender who stated that the Public Defender planned to retrieve the hard drive if the trial court declined to decide its petition on the ground of mootness. The Superior Court found that representation to be binding of the Public Defender. The Superior Court further held, however, that in the event the Public Defender does not retrieve the hard drive, the State, based on its own representations, is legally bound to physically deliver the hard drive to the Public Defender, if necessary. The trial court thus concluded that its dismissal of the Public Defender’s petition has in effect restored the Public Defender to its pre-seizure position.
(4) The parties filed supplemental memoranda in this Court in response to the Superior Court’s decision on remand. Having considered the parties’ respective decisions, we find it manifest that the Superior Court’s dismissal of the Public Defender’s petition was entirely correct. Once the State represented to the trial court that it would return the computer hard drive and that the computer hard drive had not and would not be searched, and the Superior Court concluded that the underlying search warrant was not executable, the Public Defender’s petition seeking return of the computer hard drive became moot. Because there is no longer an actual controversy that is capable of judicial resolution, this appeal also must be dismissed as moot.[*]
NOW, THEREFORE, IT IS ORDERED that this matter is DISMISSED as moot.