The Fourth Amendment

The Fourth Amendment states, "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized." A search warrant is needed when the search of your house is wanted. However there are many little situation which can deem the warrant as illegal, such as a typo on the warrant. Warrants aren't always neccessary, the following events are when a warrant does not have to be presented in order to search a premise:

Consent: Law enforcement can request to enter a person’s home or search a person’s belongings. If the person consents to the search and gives law enforcement express permission to conduct the search then a warrant is unnecessary.

Plain View Doctrine: Law enforcement does not need a search warrant to obtain evidence that is in plain sight. For example, if an officer is walking down the street and sees a person with drugs in the park then the officer may arrest that person and keep the drugs as evidence even though a search warrant was not obtained. This exception exists because individuals do not have a reasonable expectation of privacy when they are in plain view.

Emergency Situation: If the police are in hot pursuit of a felon and follow that alleged felon into a home or other private area then they do not need a warrant to obtain evidence that is in plain sight when they enter the building.

For example, a police officer may witness a robbery or an assault and begin to pursue the criminal to make an arrest. If the criminal flees and takes refuge in a private residence then the police may follow him and they do not need a search warrant to enter the home nor to collect evidence that is in plain sight or within the reach of the alleged criminal.

Police may also enter a residence without a warrant if they hear a person screaming for help or have reason to believe that a person or property is in imminent danger and that harm would result in the time it would take to obtain a search warrant.

Search Incident to Arrest: Police officers may search the body and immediate surroundings of a person whom they take into custody. The courts have allowed this exception to the search warrant rule in order to protect police officers from people who may have concealed weapons.

Keep in mind when a search should be carried out. You may have a reason to defend yourself if the search was considered illegal. It is up to you to defend yourself against little issues, and to notice if something is not how it is supposed to be. Stay aware, and you won't get in trouble with the law.

Mapp v. Ohio 1961

This Case is very important to people today because it shows that you have to be aware of when a search and seizure is legal. Dolree mapp was unaware that the police confiscated "obscene" materials without proper means to. What is very important to get out of this case is the fact that not every search is entirely necessary and if the police search your house, then you have to evaluate the reasons as to why they are there in order to determine whether the search of your belonging is a legal search according to the Fourth Amendment.

Facts of the Case:

Dolree Mapp was convicted of possessing obscene materials after an admittedly illegal police search of her home for a fugitive. She appealed her conviction on the basis of freedom of expression.

Question:

Were the confiscated materials protected by the First Amendment? (May evidence obtained through a search in violation of the Fourth Amendment be admitted in a state criminal proceeding?)

Conclusion:

The Court brushed aside the First Amendment issue and declared that "all evidence obtained by searches and seizures in violation of the Constitution is, by [the Fourth Amendment], inadmissible in a state court." Mapp had been convicted on the basis of illegally obtained evidence. This was an historic -- and controversial -- decision. It placed the requirement of excluding illegally obtained evidence from court at all levels of the government. The decision launched the Court on a troubled course of determining how and when to apply the exclusionary rule.

Kyllo vs. United States 2001

With technology always advancing it's going to get much harder and harder for people to hide the very actions within their home. This case protects people from advanced forms of technology. It states that objects that aren't in "general public use" are deemed unconstitutional. The term "general public use" means that it is not accessible to all the people within the area. This concept, however, does not constitute the right for people to act against the law. Kyllo still broke the law but he set the precedent against the government being able to charge people with crimes by using special ways. In a way, I wish that the government was allowed to go to the extent to use more advanced methods so that more criminals could be charged. What I hope is that those "uncommon" devices become more apparent in crime solving and that more people can be caught engaging in illegal activity.

Facts of the Case:
A Department of the Interior agent, suspicious that Danny Kyllo was growing marijuana, used a thermal-imaging device to scan his triplex. The imaging was to be used to determine if the amount of heat emanating from the home was consistent with the high-intensity lamps typically used for indoor marijuana growth. Subsequently, the imaging revealed that relatively hot areas existed, compared to the rest of the home. Based on informants, utility bills, and the thermal imaging, a federal magistrate judge issued a warrant to search Kyllo's home. The search unveiled growing marijuana. After Kyllo was indicted on a federal drug charge, he unsuccessfully moved to suppress the evidence seized from his home and then entered a conditional guilty plea. Ultimately affirming, the Court of Appeals held that Kyllo had shown no subjective expectation of privacy because he had made no attempt to conceal the heat escaping from his home, and even if he had, there was no objectively reasonable expectation of privacy because the imager "did not expose any intimate details of Kyllo's life," only "amorphous 'hot spots' on the roof and exterior wall."

Question:
Does the use of a thermal-imaging device to detect relative amounts of heat emanating from a private home constitute an unconstitutional search in violation of the Fourth Amendment?

Conclusion:
Yes. In a 5-4 opinion delivered by Justice Antonin Scalia, the Court held that "[w]here, as here, the Government uses a device that is not in general public use, to explore details of the home that would previously have been unknowable without physical intrusion, the surveillance is a 'search' and is presumptively unreasonable without a warrant." In dissent, Justice John Paul Stevens argued that the "observations were made with a fairly primitive thermal imager that gathered data exposed on the outside of [Kyllo's] home but did not invade any constitutionally protected interest in privacy," and were, thus, "information in the public domain."

Dred Scott vs. Sandford 1857

I decided to address this case to the readers because it is a very well known case. We have all come across this case in our American History books. I find that if you set yourself in the mentality of the people at this time you can subjectively understand their point of view in the case, however, it does not constitute their actions as right. along with the decision of the case a justice stated, ". . . . . . We think they [people of African ancestry] are . . . not included, and were not intended to be included, under the word "citizens" in the Constitution, and can therefore claim none of the rights and privileges which that instrument provides for and secures to citizens of the United States. . . ." Personally, I would disagree with the aforementioned statement because Scott was considered free and therefor was considered citizen. the consideration of race should not judge a human's inclusion of society.

Facts of the Case:
Dred Scott was a slave in Missouri. From 1833 to 1843, he resided in Illinois (a free state) and in an area of the Louisiana Territory, where slavery was forbidden by the Missouri Compromise of 1820. After returning to Missouri, Scott sued unsuccessfully in the Missouri courts for his freedom, claiming that his residence in free territory made him a free man. Scott then brought a new suit in federal court. Scott's master maintained that no pure-blooded Negro of African descent and the descendant of slaves could be a citizen in the sense of Article III of the Constitution.

Question:
Was Dred Scott free or slave?

Conclusion:
Dred Scott was a slave. Under Articles III and IV, argued Taney, no one but a citizen of the United States could be a citizen of a state, and that only Congress could confer national citizenship. Taney reached the conclusion that no person descended from an American slave had ever been a citizen for Article III purposes. The Court then held the Missouri Compromise unconstitutional, hoping to end the slavery question once and for all.