Was Hauck search legal?

FARMINGTON — Everything that police saw, touched or took from accused killer Jeremy Hauck's home should be tossed out of court because it violates his constitutional rights, his lawyer said.

In court papers obtained by the Deseret Morning News, Hauck's defense attorney asks a judge suppress all evidence recovered from the Bountiful condo.

"Regardless of their motives, the officers who entered and searched Jeremy's home without first securing a search warrant did so in violation of the Fourth Amendment," lawyer Todd Utzinger wrote in a motion filed in Farmington's 2nd District Court late Wednesday. The motion also revealed new details about the bizarre slaying.

Jeremy Hauck, 18, is charged with first-degree murder in the death of his mother, Laura. He is accused of shooting her in the head, slitting her throat and then dumping her body in a freezer in the basement of their townhouse condo in August.

After trying for days to reach her, Laura Hauck's sister called Bountiful police. The 52-year-old woman did not show up for work on Aug. 7, which also made relatives uneasy. Her car was not there.

Officers knocked on doors and windows and got no response. They looked through windows and found nothing amiss, Utzinger wrote.

"Although nobody at the scene had a key to Mrs. Hauck's home, her sister and brother-in-law wanted the officers to enter the home to check on Mrs. Hauck's welfare," he said in the motion.

Noticing a second floor window open, the Bountiful police officers contacted the fire department for a ladder. A supervising sergeant arrived on the scene.

"The situation was explained to the sergeant, and he approved entry of the home via the second story window to 'alleviate the family's concerns' about Mrs. Hauck's well-being," Utzinger said, adding that the sergeant left to continue his patrols.

Two officers went inside the condo and didn't see anything unusual on the second floor or the main floor. In Laura Hauck's basement bedroom, the motion says officers saw a "brownish-red" stain on the floor.

"The officers pulled back the bedding and uncovered a large blood stain and what appeared to be sand or cat litter. They noticed what appeared to be a 'drag path' of blood leading out of the room to a freezer in the adjacent storage/laundry room. They also noticed a shell casing," Utzinger wrote.

Contacting a Bountiful police sergeant, Utzinger claims the officers were told to refrain from conducting any more of a search.