Arrest warrants can make you a Virginia police search target

Arrest warrants (AWs) enable police to target you for a stop and a fishing trip or otherwise to seek evidence of criminal activity beyond the warrant itself. As a Fairfax criminal lawyer, I am unsurprised that the Virginia Court of Appeals recently affirmed the Schedule I/II drug possession conviction of Robert Copley, Jr., who unsuccessfully appealed from his conditional guilty plea agreement that enabled him to appeal the denial of his motion to suppress the warrantless search of his vehicle that followed an informant’s tip and a positive drug dog / drug canine sniff. Copley v. Commonwealth of Virginia, Record No. 1237-24-1 (Va. App. 2025) (unpublished).

An open arrest warrant makes you a sitting police target

An open arrest warrant makes you a sitting police target — and even a moving police target — as the case may be. If you unlawfully possess drugs / controlled substances, other contraband, or other evidence of a crime while an open AW exists against you, you are increasing the risk that said evidence will be found and used against you. In Copley’s situation, a police informant advised law enforcement about Copley’s driving another person to the courthouse while unlawfully possessing a controlled substance. On that tip, police stopped the car Copley was driving, knowing he had an open AW, ran a drug dog outside Copley’s vehicle, and the drug dog alerted to drugs. Copley. Copley’s appeal does not contest the stop of his car nor the drug dog sniff and alert, but instead argues that the automobile exception to the Constitution’s Fourth Amendment’s search warrant requirement, did not apply here once the purpose of the stop (serving an open AW) was satisfied. In denying Copley’s appeal, the Virginia Court of Appeals devotes significant ink to addressing informant reliability, when instead Copley could at least as easily simply relied on drug canine Fourth Amendment probable cause-to-search caselaw and the Carroll v. United States, 267 U.S. 132 (1925) general permission for motor vehicles — as movable vessels — to be searched without a search warrant when probable cause exists to do so.

What should I do if arrested and prosecuted for an alleged Virginia drug crime?

If you are placed under arrest and prosecuted for an alleged Virginia drug crime, know your Constitutional right to remain silent, for an attorney, and to decline to consent to searches. Obtain the best possible lawyer you can for your defense. Fully discuss the allegations, evidence, applicable law, plan, strategy and full defense with your Virginia criminal defense lawyer.

Fairfax criminal lawyer Jonathan Katz relentlessly pursues your best defense against Virginia felony, misdemeanor and DUI prosecutions. For your free in-person confidential consultation with Jon Katz about your Virginia court-pending prosecution, call 703-383-1100, Info@KatzJustice.com, and (text) 571-406-7268.