State v. Harding: Municipal Police Authority and the Fresh Pursuit Statute

As early as 1551, during the reign of King Edward VI, courts held at common law that, except in cases of fresh pursuit, the power of a sheriff or justice of the peace does not extend beyond his jurisdiction. Recognizing the importance of jurisdictional boundaries as limits on a sheriff's authority, the Barons of the Exchequer denounced the possibility of "two several sheriffs in one same county," observing that "in this realm there are divers authorities, and none may exceed his limits or bounds." Modern state statutes setting forth the powers of local police continue to limit the extra-jurisdictional authority of local law enforcement officers. Absent legal authorization to act outside his jurisdiction, a local police officer who has passed beyond his municipal boundary stands in the same position as a private citizen. In State v. Harding the Maine Supreme Judicial Court, sitting as the Law Court, expanded extra-jurisdictional municipal police authority through a broad reading of Maine's fresh pursuit statute. The Harding court recognized the authority of a municipal police officer acting under the fresh pursuit law to conduct an extra-jurisdictional investigation for the purpose of obtaining probable cause needed to make an arrest. The court held that under Maine's fresh pursuit statute, the officer's authority to make the arrest could be measured "at the moment of arrest and by the nature of the offense upon which the arrest was effected, regardless of the offense which the officer set out to investigate." The court expansively interpreted the fresh pursuit statute, failing to assess properly that statute's relationship with other Maine law which strictly limits extra-jurisdictional municipal police authority. Denying Harding's claim that the arrest was unlawful under the statute, the court reached a result at odds with prior Maine law and the legislative intent behind the fresh pursuit act.