Suppression Hearings in New York

What is a suppression hearing?

A pretrial hearing where a judge decides whether the police obtained evidence lawfully. The grounds are set out in CPL 710.20, and the procedure in CPL 710.60. Officers testify under oath, they are cross-examined, and the court makes findings of fact and conclusions of law on the record.

If the judge suppresses the evidence, the prosecution cannot use it at trial, and anything derived from it may fall with it. Because most cases rest on a gun, drugs, a statement or an identification, losing that evidence frequently ends the prosecution.

These are often the only contested hearings in a criminal case, and they are where a case is usually won.

What are the named hearings?

New York practice names hearings after the case that established them. This is the vocabulary you will hear in court.

Hearing	What it decides
Mapp	Whether physical evidence came from an unlawful search or seizure
Huntley	Whether a statement was voluntary, and whether Miranda was given and validly waived
Wade	Whether an identification procedure such as a lineup, showup or photo array was unduly suggestive
Dunaway	Whether the arrest was supported by probable cause. The most valuable one to win, because everything downstream can fall with it
Ingle	Whether the vehicle stop was lawful
Rodriguez	Whether an identification was merely confirmatory, meaning the witness already knew the person well. If the People fail, a full Wade hearing follows
Payton	Whether police entered a home to make a routine arrest without a warrant
Darden	Whether a confidential informant actually exists and supplied enough for probable cause. Heard privately, with defense counsel excluded
Alfinito	Whether the sworn statements in a search warrant application were truthful

In driving cases a further hearing is commonly held on the foundation for the chemical test: whether it was properly administered, whether the machine was calibrated and whether the operator was qualified. That is a separate question from whether the stop was lawful, and the two are frequently confused.

Are Sandoval and Molineux suppression hearings?

No, despite being lumped in with them constantly. Nothing gets suppressed at either.

• A Sandoval ruling decides what the prosecution may ask the defendant about prior convictions and bad acts if he chooses to testify. It shapes whether testifying is realistic.
• A Molineux ruling decides whether the prosecution may introduce uncharged crimes or prior bad acts in its own case, for some purpose other than showing criminal propensity.

Both are evidentiary rulings about admissibility at trial, not about police conduct.

Who has the burden of proof?

This is stated backwards on most websites, and the correct answer is split.

Issue	Who must prove what
Search and seizure	The People have the burden of going forward to show the police acted lawfully. The defendant then carries the ultimate burden of proving illegality by a preponderance
Voluntariness of a statement	The People, beyond a reasonable doubt, and it never shifts
Consent to a search	The People, by clear and convincing evidence
Suggestive identification	The People carry a minimal burden of production; the defendant then bears the burden of persuasion
Standing	The defendant, who must show a legitimate expectation of privacy

The People’s burden matters more than the word “preponderance” suggests. If they fail to carry the burden of going forward, suppression is granted without the defendant proving anything. The Court of Appeals has repeatedly reversed where officers offered conclusions instead of facts, holding that summary assurances that the police had reached a conclusion will not do.

What are the four levels of a police encounter?

New York uses a graduated framework from People v. De Bour, 40 N.Y.2d 210 (1976). Each level of intrusion requires more justification, and an officer who escalates without it has acted unlawfully.

Level	What police may do	What they need
1	Request information	An objective, credible reason, not necessarily suggesting criminality
2	Pointed, accusatory questioning	A founded suspicion that criminal activity is afoot
3	Forcibly stop and detain, and frisk if they reasonably suspect a weapon	Reasonable suspicion of a felony or misdemeanor
4	Arrest	Probable cause

The framework is alive and doing work. Recent Court of Appeals decisions have suppressed evidence where officers pursued the wrong person on a mistaken identification, and where a handful of innocuous observations did not add up to reasonable suspicion. The Second Department, which governs Nassau County, held in 2026 that equivocal observations of someone apparently casing a location, combined with flight, did not justify pursuit.

Do police need probable cause to pull you over?

In New York, for a traffic violation, yes. This is a genuine difference from what many sources say.

The Court of Appeals held in People v. Hinshaw, 35 N.Y.3d 427 (2020), that stopping a car for a traffic infraction requires probable cause. Reasonable suspicion is enough only where the stop is based on suspicion of a crime.

Anyone writing that police need only reasonable suspicion to pull you over is describing the federal standard, not New York’s.

Do you automatically get a hearing?

No, and this catches people out.

A suppression motion must be in writing and must contain sworn allegations of fact. A court may summarily deny it where the facts alleged do not, as a matter of law, support the ground claimed. Conclusory affidavits that simply assert the search was illegal get denied without a hearing.

There is an important exception. That summary denial power does not apply to motions based on the involuntariness of a statement or a tainted identification, which is why Huntley and Wade hearings are effectively granted on request while Mapp hearings can be lost on the papers.

One further feature that surprises people: hearsay is admissible at a suppression hearing. The statute says so expressly. The rules are looser than at trial.

What is the 15 day notice rule?

Where the prosecution intends to offer a statement you made to law enforcement, or testimony from a witness who previously identified you, it must serve notice specifying that evidence within fifteen days after arraignment under CPL 710.30.

If it does not, the evidence is precluded. That is a statutory command, not a discretionary sanction, and the Court of Appeals has held the requirement is mandatory and that a lack of prejudice to the defendant does not excuse noncompliance. Late notice requires good cause, and ordinary oversight is not good cause.

An important modern point: handing the statement over in automatic discovery is not the same as serving this notice. The two obligations are independent and triggered differently. Automatic discovery requires disclosure whether or not the People intend to use the material; this notice is triggered by the intent to offer it at trial.

What happens if the motion is granted?

• Exclusion is mandatory. The court must order that the evidence be excluded.
• The taint can spread. Evidence obtained as a result of the unlawful evidence is also suppressible. This is why a successful challenge to the arrest itself is worth the most: the statements, the physical evidence and the identification can all fall together.
• The People can argue attenuation, meaning the connection between the illegality and the evidence became sufficiently remote.
• There is no good faith exception in New York. The Court of Appeals rejected it as a matter of state constitutional law, so an officer’s honest mistake does not save an unlawful search here even though it might in federal court.
• Dismissal is not automatic, but it is common. In case after case, suppression is followed by dismissal because the suppressed item was the case.

Does pleading guilty give up the issue?

No, and this is unusual. An order denying a suppression motion can be reviewed on appeal even where the conviction was entered on a guilty plea, subject to a valid appeal waiver.

Failing to make the motion at all is different. That waives the issue, with a narrow exception allowing a defendant to argue to the jury at trial that a statement was involuntary.

What has changed recently?

Two developments worth knowing:

• The home protection got broader. In February 2026 the Court of Appeals held that police cannot evade the warrant requirement by coercing someone out of their home rather than entering it. As the Court put it, where officers subject a person to a display of authority that induces them to exit under coercion, the sanctity of the home has been invaded to the same extent as a physical entry.
• Officer testimony is being scrutinized harder. Recent decisions have suppressed evidence where the prosecution offered conclusions rather than facts, including where the People could not show that an arresting officer actually received and relied on the communication said to supply probable cause.

Where are suppression hearings held in Nassau County?

• Misdemeanors, violations and traffic matters: Nassau County District Court, 99 Main Street in Hempstead, which also handles every felony arraignment.
• Felonies after indictment: Nassau County Court, 262 Old Country Road in Mineola. Note that Supreme Court, Nassau County at 100 Supreme Court Drive also hears felony criminal matters, so it is not accurate to say felony hearings happen only in County Court.

Appeals from felony convictions go to the Appellate Division, Second Department, whose decisions bind Nassau trial courts. Misdemeanor appeals go to the Appellate Term for the Ninth and Tenth Judicial Districts.

Related: what happens at an arraignment, how the speedy trial clock runs, and criminal defense in Nassau County.