Illinois vs Wardlow

Mr. Grant, an 18-year-old black man, was walking down a street in a high-crime area where he attracted police officers’ attention. He was stopped and questioned by police officers. Then, Mr. Grant became more suspicious to the police when he started acting very nervous. Mr. Grant was requested name, address and was asked to put hands in front of him. Mr. Grant admitted he was carrying a firearm and weed and he was immediately arrested, searched and advised his legal rights.

Over time, technology has impacted the police and other law enforcement agencies with new devices for gathering evidence. These new tools have caused constitutional questions to surface. One particular case in Oregon of an individual (DLK) aroused such question. DLK was suspected of growing marijuana inside of his home. Agents used a thermal imager to scan DLK’s residence form the outside. The results indicated heat, just like the kind that is generated by special lights used for growing marijuana indoors. Constructed by the scan, a judge issued a search warrant. A warrant – a legal paper authorizing a search – cannot be issued unless there is

Police officers use search and seizure as a tool to ensure their safety, gather evidence, and arrest suspects. In police training, a search is defined as an examination of a hidden place, i.e. a person or their property, whose purpose is to find contraband (DOCJT, 2014, p. 10). A seizure is defined as the capture or arrest of a person or the confiscation of property (DOCJT, 2014, p. 10). Depending on the individual situation, a warrant may or may not be required to conduct searches and seizures. The exclusionary rule, which states that illegally seized evidence is inadmissible in court, has guided the definition of search and seizure, specifically as it pertains

In the case of Santiago v. State of New Mexico (Santiago v. State of New Mexico, 2009), security officers had responded to a fight and caught the defendant running out the front door of the Mall they were working at. The defendant was pinned to the ground and handcuffed. The security guards searched the defendant by reaching inside his pockets and removing several items, including a pill bottle containing four grams of cocaine. Shortly after, police showed up and the defendant, as well as the removed items, was turned over to police.

The Supreme Court case, Packingham v. North Carolina (2016) debates whether convicted and registered sex offenders should be limited in their social media usage on platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, which are most predominantly populated by minors. The constitutionality of North Carolina’s criminal law is being debated as it considers it a felony for any person registered as a sex offender in the state of North Carolina to have an account on social media sites such as Facebook, or any social media platforms that allow minors to have an account. The current North Carolina law is unconstitutional as it limits a clear example of free speech, and does so in a very broad and unjustified way,

III. Statement of Facts: Two Philadelphia officers observed Harry Mimms driving a car with an expired plate. They stopped the vehicle to issue a traffic ticket. One of the officers approached Mimms and asked him to step out of the car and produce his license and registration. Mimms alighted, whereupon the officer noticed a bulge under his jacket. Thinking the bulge might be a weapon, the officer frisked Mimms and discovered a loaded .38-caliber revolver. The other occupant was also carrying a gun. Mimms was indicted for carrying a concealed weapon and for unlawfully carrying a firearm without a license and convicted. Following a denial of a motion to suppress in the Court of Common Pleas in Philadelphia County, Pennsylvania, Mimms was convicted. The conviction was affirmed by the Superior Court of Pennsylvania but the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania reversed. The U.S. Supreme Court granted certiorari and reversed.

Case Procedural History: Roy Caballes tried to suppress the drugs seized in the stop by claiming that the state troopers did not have probable cause to search his vehicle. The trial judge denied the motion to suppress the seized marijuana. The trial judge held that the use of the drug dog did not prolong the duration

Her attorney argued that she should never have been brought to trial because the material evidence resulted from an illegal, warrant less search. Because the search was unlawful, he maintained that the evidence was illegally obtained and must also be excluded. In its ruling, the Supreme Court of Ohio recognized that ?a reasonable argument? could be made that the conviction should be reversed ?because the ?methods? employed to obtain the evidence?were such as to offend a sense of justice.? But the court also stated that the materials were admissible evidence. The Court explained its ruling by differentiating between evidence that was peacefully seized from an inanimate object, such as a trunk, rather than forcibly seized from an individual. Based on this decision, Mapp's appeal was denied and her conviction was upheld.

Dickerson, Timothy Dickerson was seen in a drug known area. An officer ordered a pat down to investigate. When searching for weapons, the officer felt a small lump in Dickerson’s pocket. Without further evidence, the officer reached into his pocket and found a bag of cocaine. The U.S. Supreme Court unanimously agreed that the cocaine in this case was inadmissible as evidence even though the Court held that officers were allowed to assume that an object was contraband through touch. It was stated that, “If a police officer lawfully pats down a suspect's outer clothing and feels an object whose contour or mass makes its identity immediately apparent, there has been no invasion of the suspect's privacy beyond that already authorized by the officer's search for weapons; if the object is contraband, its warrantless seizure would be justified by the same practical considerations that inhere in the plain-view

It would be true that once an officer has conducted a pat down search and determined that there are no weapons, he is not allowed to go further in searching without either consent or a warrant. On the other hand, it is not the law anywhere that such a search must be limited to the feel of a gun. Any object which might possibly be used as a weapon can be

The district court’s holding that allowing ambiguity to defeat apparent authority would unreasonably burden police officers by forcing them to clarify the consenter’s authority over every container within the area they were permitted to search should be upheld as it is one that is supported by persuasive precedent from a sister circuit of this Court. See United States v. Melgar, 227 F.3d 1038, 1042 (7th Cir. 2000). In Melgar, the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit uses Supreme Court precedent to support the position on ambiguous apparent authority stated above. See id. (citing Wyoming v. Houghton, 526 U.S. 295 (1999)). The Seventh Circuit states the Supreme

Facts: In Lexington, Kentucky, police officers followed a suspected drug dealer to an apartment building where he went. When they arrived outside of the door to the apartment where the suspect was they reportedly could smell marajuana. The police then knocked and shouted they they were there and in return they could hear what sounded like people destroying the evidence and running around. The police then knocked down the door and saw the respondent as well as drugs laying out without having to look anywhere. later the police found more drugs and paraphernalia doing a more in-depth search. “The Circuit Court denied respondent’s motion to suppress the evidence, holding that exigent

At the start of the trial, the defense appealed to Judge Friedman to try and get the weapons suppressed as evidence, because they believed that they had been obtained on violation of their defendant’s 4th amendment rights. The 4th amendment protects against unreasonable

The felonies case of Illinois versus Wardlow filed in 2000 describes the case of Chicago police officers who arrested Wardlow after they find him with a gun in a crime-prone area. In their course of routine patrols of the said high-crime area, the police converge on Wardlow who was carrying an opaque bag. On

The “conceal and carry” policy has been left to the individual states to be implemented. One of the concerns of weapon concealment is how can law enforcement legally search who is carrying a concealed weapon without infringing on their fourth amendment? Vernick, et al. explains that Illegal gun carrying, usually concealed, in public places is an important risk factor for firearm-related crime; however, within the next few years new technologies may be available that will enable the police to identify persons carrying