Grady V. North Carolina Summary

The Government argued the defendants’ Fourth Amendment not violated under the constitutional because the parked vehicle was at a public lot. In some States, the Government has the authority to allow police officers to search a vehicle without the necessity of warrant. “...as long as a state is deciding law based upon its interpretation of its own constitution, the state can be more restrictive than the Supreme Court. However, if the state is interpreting the 4th Amendment of the United States Constitution, then they must follow the body of law established by the United States Supreme Court”(Policelink). The Government believes the attachment of the monitoring device for search was a responsible forfeiting act. As well as wiretapping the defendants cellular to help them enforce a predominantly well prepared investigation.

The Fourth Amendment is the first line protection against the government and their officials from violating our privacy. The Fourth Amendment provides safeguards to individuals during searches and detentions, and prevents unlawfully seized items from being used as evidence in criminal cases. The degree of protection available in a particular case depends on the nature of the detention or arrest, the characteristics of the place searched, and the circumstances under which the search takes place. This Amendment protects us in the following situations such as being questioned while walking down the street, being pulled over while driving, entering individual’s homes for arrest and searching of evidence while there. In most scenarios, police officer may not search or seize an individual or his or her property unless the officer has a valid search warrant, a valid arrest warrant, or a belief rising to the

What if police could barge into any house whenever they feel like it? In a world like this, citizens would have no privacy. People would have to be on alert 24/7 in case any unwelcomed visitors invited themselves inside without permission. The Background Essay: Search and Seizure: Did the Government Go Too Far? notes that the British government would inspect colonists’ houses for certain goods. In order to avoid such circumstances, the Fourth Amendment was added to the Constitution of the United States. The Fourth Amendment states that a search warrant and a reasonable cause is required before any government official is allowed to search another’s belongings. However, in some dire situations, a search warrant is not necessary. The Background Essay gives the examples, “…hot pursuit, public safety, danger of loss of evidence, and/or permission of the suspect,” for when police do not need to worry about taking the time to receive a search warrant. The Fourth Amendment is open to interpretation. As a result, there is a collection of various cases that need to be addressed that involve search and seizure. Such as the case of DLK. In this case, DLK’s house was searched by federal government officials with a thermal imager, which senses warmth, because he was suspected of growing marijuana. The question proposed is whether the use of such high-tech tools, like the thermal imager, count as a “search”. In a situation such as this, it is safe to say that the government went too

The Supreme Court consolidated two cases where the police gained entry into the defendants’ home without a search warrant and seized evidence found in the house. The rule of law as read out under the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendment posits that the United States Constitution has prohibited warrantless entry and search of a premise, absent the exigent circumstances, regardless the existence of a probable cause. The courts in Payton held that the Fourth Amendment made it a violation to enter a premise during an arrest absent an arrest warrant and exigent circumstances; a person’s house is a critical point to which the constitutional safeguards should be respected.

The Fourth Amendment is one of the most important constitutional protections; however, several procedural issues may arise. As seen in this case, the validity of the search warrant was questioned as well as the extent of the protection afforded. A search may be illegal even if a search warrant was issued; probable cause is

The case of Mapp vs. Ohio is one of the most important Supreme Court decisions of the last century. Until this decision, the rights against illegal search and

What constitutes a valid search and seizure? The Fourth Amendment protects Americans from unreasonable searches and seizures. Consequently, it seeks to create stability or poise between the needs of law enforcement and the privacy of people in the United States (Worrall, 2017). The justifications that arise from the law make sure that enforcement officials function within reasonable standards in their search of a suspect. This paper examines the three levels of justification that validates a Fourth Amendment search. As a result, it is necessary to explore such justifications and their applicability.

In the case of the State of North Carolina v. Lester Gerard Packingham, the question of whether a state can restrict sex offender’s from being on social media sites without restricting their constitutional rights is played out. Lester Packingham is a registered sex offender who was caught having a Facebook website profile even though it is against North Carolina state law. This paper will explore the constitutionality of N.C. Gen Stat. § 14–202.5 (2011) and will analyze the legal opinions of this case from both the Court of Appeals of North Carolina and Supreme Court of North Carolina and make an educated decision on whether the Supreme Court of North Carolina’s decision should be upheld or reversed.

On May 23, 1957, Cleveland police officers attempted to search Dollree Mapp’s house under the assumption that she had in her custody a suspected bomber and illegal gambling items. The police were turned away after Mapp requested that they first acquire a search warrant. Three hours later, the police returned to her home and forcibly raided Mapp’s house without a warrant, and found their search to be futile. Instead of the evidence they expected to find, the officers discovered pornographic materials in Mapp’s possession. To own such salacious pictures and books is an encroachment of Ohio’s state code, so Mapp was arrested and convicted for this violation. Dollree Mapp appealed her case to the Ohio Supreme Court on the basis that it was an intrusion on her rights defined in the Fourth Amendment.

Police came up to her house and asked to check her house if she were to harbor any criminals, she denied their request. Then, they sat in her house and began surveillance for a few hours. They forcibly entered her house without a warrant to corroborate any findings. “Although no suspect was found, officers did discover certain allegedly “lewd and lascivious” books and pictures, the possession of which was prohibited under Ohio state law” (Duignan). Dollree Mapp was convicted of violating the law on the basis of evidence, when she appealed to the Ohio State Supreme Court, the search has sighted the unlawfulness of the search. Ultimately, it was upheld on the precedent “Wolf v Colorado(1949) had established that the states were not required to abide by the exclusionary rule. The Supreme Court granted certiorari, and oral arguments were heard on March 29, 1961”(United States Courts). This explains the issue at hand of how the Fourth Amendment was infringed upon, but also on how state courts compare to federal

On November 8, 2011, there was an oral argument in the Supreme Court for the case of United States vs. Jones. Antoine Jones was arrested on October 24, 2005, for drug possession. Prior to detainment, police had attached a tracker to the undercarriage of his wife’s jeep without any formal judicial approval. The law enforcement then used this to follow the movements of the car for about a month. The question that arouses during this case was if the warrantless use of the tracker on Jones vehicle violated his fourth amendment rights.

In 1973, the United States Supreme Court ruled, “In the case of a lawful custodial arrest a full search of the person is not only an exception to the warrant requirement of the Fourth Amendment, but is also a reasonable search under that Amendment"

In United States v. Jones, the Court determined it was a “search under the Fourth Amendment” when an FBI task force attached a GPS tracker, for a four-week period, to a suspected drug dealer’s vehicle for surveillance purposes and thus used the GPS tracker to learn the defendant’s “totality and pattern of his movements”. It should be noted however, the Court came to their conclusion based upon a theory of trespass, that is, the act of placing the GPS tracker on the defendant’s vehicle. “The Court acknowledged that extended electronic surveillance “without an accompanying trespass” may be unconstitutional, but noted that the “present case does not require us to answer that question.””

The thermal imager used in DLK’s case is not a 4th Amendment search. The US Government explains that “the thermal imager did not detect private activity in a private place, but instead scanned a surface exposed to the public view in order to detect the physical fact of relative heat [escape]” (Document E). Which, in this case, does not infringe on any right of privacy. What the US is trying to explain is that since the home, vehicle, technology, belongings etc. were not affected by the search, or even looked upon in the first place, the scan is not considered a search. Had the scan produced images of heat circulating inside the house, the right of privacy to one’s action inside his home will be violated. To further examine, Justice Paul John

The two areas that the court wanted to pursue were: A violation of the fourth amendment and installing the global positioning system (GPS) without a valid warrant. Using the global positioning system tracked every move the Jones family made and it was an invasion of their privacy at some points during their trips to certain locations.