New Jersey Court Rejects Google Location Data in Robbery Case

A New Jersey appeals court has overturned the use of Google location data in a robbery case, ruling that police lacked sufficient probable cause to obtain the information. The decision, issued on October 2, 2023, came in the case of Michael Hobbs, who was convicted of multiple gas station robberies based on geofence warrants served to Google. The court found that the detective’s warrant affidavit did not provide enough evidence linking Hobbs to Google’s location records.

The case involved six armed robberies at gas stations in Morris and Warren counties between January 21 and January 26, 2022. Investigators used Google’s location data to identify Hobbs, who pleaded guilty to three counts of first-degree robbery in January 2025 and was sentenced to 11 years in prison. However, the appeals court ruled that the warrant affidavit failed to establish that Hobbs carried a smartphone, had a Google account with location history enabled, or was logged into the account during the robberies.

The judges emphasized that the widespread use of smartphones alone is not enough to justify a search of Google’s geofence records. They argued that allowing such warrants based solely on the prevalence of cellphones would undermine the probable-cause requirement. The court ordered the suppression of the location data and returned the case to the trial court for further proceedings.

Assistant Deputy Public Defender Margaret McLane, representing Hobbs, had argued that the warrants were overly broad and gave police too much discretion in identifying suspects. While the appeals court did not address this specific argument, it agreed that the affidavit lacked sufficient evidence to justify the search of Google’s Sensorvault, the cloud-based storage system that holds location data.