Appellate panel hears challenge to pretrial drug-monitoring patches in Snohomish County cases

An appellate panel heard oral argument on July 9, 2026, in the consolidated appeals of Simone Bailey Cobb and Andrew Toombs, who challenge trial-court orders requiring continuous drug-monitoring patches as conditions of pretrial release in Snohomish County District Court. Joseph Alcadery, an attorney with the Washington Appellate Project representing Cobb and Toombs, told the court the patches intrude on constitutionally protected privacy interests and were imposed without the requisite "authority of law."

Alcadery told the panel, "Article 1, section 7 recognizes an individual's right to privacy with no express limitations, and it prohibits the state from disturbing an individual's private affairs without authority of law." He argued the state conceded the patches were intrusive, that no warrant justified the intrusions, and that the state offered no recognized exception to the warrant requirement applicable under Washington law.

The central legal question before the court is whether existing statutory language and court rules supply the express authorization appellants say is required before imposing an intrusive monitoring device on pretrial releasees. Alcadery urged the court to decline to import balancing tests used for probationers, saying Washington precedent limits use of those tests in the pretrial context and that pretrial releasees retain "the same privacy rights as ordinary citizens."

Amanda Campbell, deputy prosecuting attorney for Snohomish County, urged the court to uphold the monitoring conditions. She said statutes and court rule together provide valid authority for the patch in this circumstance and warned that the appellants' approach could invalidate monitoring tools used for DUI defendants. "A drug patch is not that intrusive," Campbell told the panel, arguing that urine analyses require exposing private parts and reveal sensitive medical information, whereas sweat patches are external and, once protocols are in place, require less intrusive testing.

The bench and counsel also discussed the limits of the technology and its practical effects. The court noted that the patch does not test for alcohol and that, as counsel said, a wearer may need to wear the device for about "10 to 12 days" with results that can take about "7 days" to return—facts Alcadery and Campbell used to debate whether the patch functions primarily as an accountability deterrent or as an investigative tool for future prosecution.

Campbell also pointed the panel to trial-court findings memorialized in written orders, arguing those findings (including prior DUI history and, in one instance, an allegation that a defendant drove on a sidewalk) supported the trial court's determination that the defendants posed a risk of committing a violent offense under the statutory definition used by the trial court.

Alcadery replied that even if the court were to apply a balancing or narrow-tailoring inquiry, precedent such as Evans suggests the patch is not narrowly tailored and that less invasive alternatives exist. He emphasized the continuous collection of sweat and related personal data (counsel noted companies providing the service require identifying information such as Social Security and health records) and asked the panel to reverse the trial-court orders imposing the patches.

The panel took the matter as submitted after oral argument. No immediate decision was announced.

What happens next: The Court of Appeals will issue a written opinion at a later date resolving whether the monitoring patches may be imposed as pretrial conditions under Article I, Section 7 of the Washington Constitution.