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Criminal Law > Search & Seizure III; Warrantless Searches > Flashcards

Search & Seizure III; Warrantless Searches Flashcards

1
Q

Some some exceptions to the Warrant Rule?

7 are listed

A
  • plain view
  • consented searches
  • searches incident to arrest
  • exigent circumstances
    • automobile exception
    • emergency exception
    • hot pursuit
    • non-criminal searches
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2
Q

Over time, exceptions to warrant searches has increased so much that it almost overwhelms the rule. However, two well established guidelines makes not having a warrant a violation. What are they?

A
  1. Warrantless searches are presumed unreasonable
  2. Arguably, reasonableness has become the true touchstone
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3
Q

What would allow a warrantless search to be reasonable?

A
  • in plain view
  • consented
  • probable cause
  • exigency
  • some other good reason
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4
Q

True or False

Searches conducted without warrants far exceen those with warrants

A

True

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5
Q

Plain View Exception

Rules to Follow

A
  • police may seize an object in palin view, feel, hearing, or smell without a warrant
    • no reasonable expectation of privacy
  • police must have legal right to be there
    • public place, consent, warrant, administrative, or exigency
  • officers must have probable cause to believe that items in plain view are contraband before they may search or seize them, thus incriminating nature of evidence must be readily apparent, requiring no further investigation
    • inadvertent discovery (immediately apparent”
    • unless have probable cause for broader search
  • does not authorize an exploratory search
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6
Q

California v Ciraolo

476 US 207 (1986)

A
  • Dante Carlo Ciraolo grew marijuana plants in his backyard shielded from view by two fences
  • plants were seen by officer from an airplane at 1,000’ w/o a warrant
  • Chief Justice Burger concluded this constitutional due to people easily being able to see it if they were high up thus plain view
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7
Q

Florida v Riley

488 US 445 (1989)

A
  • Michael riley was convicted when police in a helicopter 400’ high spotted marijuana growing in a green house beside his mobile home
  • court declared that he had not reasonable expectation of privacy because it was viewable from passing air traffic
    • not a search = constitutional
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8
Q

Kyllo v US

533 US 27 (2001)

A
  • thermal imagery was used to find marijuana plants growing in an attic
  • Justice Scalia held the search unconstitutional w/o a warratn and the device was not commonly available to the public
    • this holding will be out of date when technology became generally available
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9
Q

Consent Exception

Rules to Follow

A
  • consent acts a waiver of the requirement
  • search limited to scope of consent
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10
Q

What are the requirements to searching under consent?

A
  1. Voluntary
    1. product of free will (can be withdrawn)
    2. actual or apparent authority
    3. confine search to place authorized
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11
Q

Who can give consent?

A
  • actual authority
    • anyone with reasonable expectatio of privacy in place; can be common or joint among several people
  • apparent authority
    • good faith and reasonable
  • conflicts of consent
    • normally cannot waive another’s right
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12
Q

Search Incident to Arrest (SITA) Exception

Rules to Follow

A
  • an arrest requires probable cause
    • seizure and detention
    • intention to arrest
    • arrest authority
    • understanding by the person arrested
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13
Q

An arrest is based upon probable cause of a crime while a search incident to arrest (SITA) is justified on what 2 grounds?

A
  1. danger to the officer
  2. potential destruction of evidence
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14
Q

What happens when a person is searched incident to arrest and they are carrying a “container”?

A
  • generally, opaque containers considered to be within a person’s reasonable expectation of privacy
  • may secure the container from loss or destruction based on reasonable suspicion
  • cannot open and search inside container w/o a warrant
    • unless exception applies
    • automobile exception
    • its seized so one has time to get a warrant
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15
Q

What is a Protective Sweep?

A

A limited search that police are allowed to donduct when they arrest someone The purpose is to allow officers to ensure their own safety, and that of those on the scene, by searching in the vicinty of the arrest. the search is for people who may pose a treat. The search is limited by time and place. A somewhat braoder sweep may be conducted if they have a reasonable suspicion of a danger or threat.

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16
Q

What is an exception to the 4th Amendment requiring officers to have warrants before searching homes?

A

Protective Sweet Doctrine

ANY evidence found that is in plain view will be used against defendant at trial.

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17
Q

Chimel v California

395 US 752 (1969)

A
  • officers with an arrest (not search) warrant was let into house by wife of accused
  • once the accused arrived he denied the officers’ request to look around but they did it anyway
  • if the search was within the immediate control of the person being arrested, then the search would have been lawful BUT since officers searched the entire house then the search was unconstitutional
18
Q

Vehicile Search Incident to Arrest

A
  • officer may search area, including containers, within reach of person arrested for weapons or contraband
19
Q

What is an Inventory Search?

A
  • when police catalogs the contents of the car
    • no probable cause or reasonable suspicion is necessary for this administrative function
    • closed containers may be opened
    • if anything is found, then it can be lawfully seized
  • happens during “vehicle search incident to arrest”
  • the officer may imound the car if the driver is arrested or if the car is in an unsafe condition
20
Q

Automobile Exception

A
  • based upon two bases
    • exigency
    • reduced reasonable expectation of privacy
  • applies to “mobile conveyances” i,e, cars, trucks, planes, boats etc
21
Q

What are the three requirements to search an automobile?

A
  • vehicle must be in public place (not in garage or curtilage)
  • readily mobile - appears operational
  • probable cause to believe that contraband or evidence of a crime will be located in the vehicle
22
Q

Carroll Doctrine

A
  • permits a police to search an entire motor vehicle and any containers inside it if there is probable cause to believe the vehicle contains…
    • contraband
    • the fruits
    • instrumentalities
    • evidence of criminal activity
23
Q

Florida v Harris

568 US 237 (2013)

A
  • officer stopped harris in his truck for an expired tag
  • Harris denied consent for car to be searched
  • dog sniffed car and was alerted
    • search of car found drugs and Harris was arrested and then released on bail
  • Harris was stopped again for broken tail-light
  • dog was alerted but no drugs was found
    • Harris moved to suppress the search for lack of probable cause
  • Justice ELena Kagan stated that the dog’s certification and continued training were adequate in providing probable cause
24
Q

Riley v California

573 US (2014)

A
  • Riley was stopped for a traffic violation
    • led to his arrest on weapons charges
  • his cellphone was seized and was digitally searched
  • Justice Roberts held police need a warrant to search a cellphone
25
Q

Reasonalbe Articulable Suspicion

A
  • a legal standard of proof that is less than “probable cause” but more than “a hunch”
    • allows brief stops and detentions but is insufficient for full searches
  • meands that other people would think the same circumstances that would allow a person to be stopped and searches.
    • based on specific and articulable facts (suspicion)
    • suspicion must be associated with the specific individual
      • individualized suspicion
26
Q

Describe the Spectrum of Certainty

A

Starting Up Going Down

Known

Beyond Reasonable Doubt

Preponderance of the Evidence

Probable Cause

Reasonable Suspicion

Hunch

Unknown

27
Q

Stop and Frisk

A
  • an officer may walk up to anyone and ask questions
28
Q

Terry Stop

(investigative detention)

A
  • police may detain someone if they have an individualized, reasonable, articualbe suspicion that criminal activity is affot
    • allows an officer to probe into whether probable cause exists in the situation
    • may only detain him for as long as it takes to confirm or dispel the suspicion
29
Q

Frisk

(pat down of outer clothing)

A
  • after a valid stop, if an officer, for this protection, has a reasonable suspicion that the person may have a weapon, may frisk the person to search for a weapon
    • extended to plain feel of immediately apparent contraband
    • waive 4th amendment rights if voluntarily consent to the search
30
Q

Exigency

Emergency Exception

A
  • exigency and public safety almost always trump individual privacy rights but must be legitimate emergency and will be limited to the period of exigency
31
Q

Exigency

Hot Pursuit Exception

A
  • arrest or arrest attempt or probable cause to believe that serious crime, normally limited to felony offenses (common law), has been committed by the person fleeing
  • some sort of chase of fleeing suspect without time to get a warrant inwhich the pursuit is immediate and continous, but there is no requirement to have the suspect under personal obsevation the entire time
  • starts in public area or ther space with no reasonable expectation or privacy
32
Q

Mincey v Arizona

437 US 385 (1978)

A
  • undercover officers conducted a raid of an apartment occupied by Rufus Mincey
  • shots were fired; an officer was killed, Mincey was wounded
  • Homicide detectives arrived to CS and conducted a 4 day search w/o warrant due to emergency of the death of a police officer
  • Search deemed Unconstitutional
    • 4 days is too long to be considered an emergency; that was enough time to get a warrant
33
Q

Brigham City v Stuart

547 US 398 (2006)

A
  • the police responded to a complaint about a loud part at 3am
  • minors were drinking outside and heard shouting inside
  • a fight broke out between a juvenile and 4 adults
    • one was punched so hard that he spit up blood
  • officers entered the home arrested the 4 and collected evidence that would incriminate them
  • Justice Roberts held that the seizure of evidence was constitutional
    • 1st time the court held eviddence obtained from a search of a home admissible despite the lack of a warrant, probable cause or even reasonable suspicion
34
Q

Searches for Non-criminal Prosecution Purposes

A
  • allowed for purposes other than for criminal investigative purpose
  • warrants not required for non-investigatory (suspicionless) purposes or of investigation of workplace or regulatory misconduct
35
Q

Administrative Searches

A
  • falls under searches for non-criminal prosecution pruposes
  • conducted to ensure copliance with regulatory schemes
  • for closely regulated business, courts have allowed unannounces warrantless inspections to protect the public
36
Q

Workplace Searches

A
  • falls under searches for non-criminal prosecution pruposes
  • work-related purposes
  • must be “reasonable”
37
Q

People v Roehler

167 Cal.App.3d 353 (1985)

213 Cal.Rptr. 353

A
  • Coroner performed autopsies on two boys and concluded that they drowned and released the bodies to a funeral home
  • Sheriff received a random call that was suspicious of their deaths
  • Sheriff obtained a warrant and retrieved the bodies from the funeral home
    • found out that the two boys died of blunt force trauma
  • a lot of variables to consider in this case including the fact the warrant was faulty due to the unknown caller
  • court concluded that the “action was a reasonable eercise of governmental power under the U.S. Constitution”
38
Q

Exclusionary Rule

A
  • a legal principle which holds that tangible and testimonial evidence obtained from an unlawful search and seizure is inadmissible for criminal prosecution
  • applies to evidence gained from an unreasonable search or seizure in violation of the 4th amendment, to improperly elicted self-incriminatory statements gathered in violation of the 5th Amendment, and to evidence gained in situations where the government violated the defendant’s 6th amendment right to counsel
  • not perfect
  • results in suppression of evidene
  • only criminals directly benefit
  • offten seen as “getting off on a technicality”
  • the only tool the courts have to correct police behavior
39
Q

Fruit of the Poisonous Tree

A
  • if the “tree” is tainted, so is its “fruit”
  • if evidence falls withing the exclusionary rule, then the rule also applied to the newly discovered evidence
  • if the primary evidence was illegally obtained, but admissible under the good faith exception, its derivatives may also be admissible
40
Q

What are some exceptions to the Exclusionary Rule?

A
  • good faith
  • independent source
  • inevitable discovery
  • attenuation
    • relationship between evidence and the unconsitiutional conduct is too remote from one another
  • use for impeachment
41
Q

Utah v Strieff

579 US (2016)

A
  • stopped strieff w/o a resonable suspicion
  • Strieff has an outstanding traffic warrant
  • a search to incident to the arrest revealed drugs and paraphenalia
  • court held evidence admissible b/c arrest warrant was a sufficient intervening event to break the chain between the unlawful stop and the discovery of the drugs - the taint of the illegal stop had een attenuated

Criminal Law (6 decks)

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