The Fourth Amendment provides defense against illegal search and seizures. Essentially, one can rest assured that the police will not simply enter his house without any cause or warrant, search until they find something incriminating, and then legally use that discovery to charge the person with a crime. Instead, there are many very specific rules and regulations about how something can be discovered and even damning evidence found incorrectly is thrown out (Katsh, 2013). This is an important constitutional right as it ensures that witch-hunts that aim specifically to find something illegal are never carried out and instead the law enforcement aim is to properly catch someone who is doing something wrong.
In the case, the Court did not see sufficient evidence to support the claim that the police violated the respondent’s Fourth Amendment right, prior to entering the resident. There is no evidence of threats or demands made by the police officers, that would insinuate the officer did anything wrong. Because the police in this case did not violate or threaten to violate the Fourth Amendment prior to the exigency, the Court held that the exigency did in fact justify the warrantless search. The officers re-acted upon suspicion and training (Vile, n.d.).
The Fourth Amendment protects persons against unreasonable searches and seizures. Police deal with search and seizure incidents on a daily basis; unfortunately, numerous mistakes are made and lawsuits result from this type of citizen interaction. One way to prevent an unnecessary lawsuit is to get a search warrant. What if that is not applicable to your situation? There are several search warrant exceptions that may be applied to most investigative incidents.
The Fourth Amendment is “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.” In other words, it is against the law for police to search any person without probable cause and an issued warrant. (Cartoon Surveillance) This protects the privacy of the innocent people that may not be considered guilty. However, giving the people a right to a warrant is only giving them an advantage, while the police and the government have a disadvantage. Issuing warrants take away time and privilege for police. Needing a warrant may unable police to some investigations as well. The Fourth Amendment was created for safety and privacy reasons, but has deterred the efficacy of law-enforcement; needing a search warrant makes gathering evidence harder, police investigations have been delayed, and the Exclusionary Rule causes some investigations to be inadmissible.
Imagine being eavesdropped by the government, while talking a private conversation. This would make people feel unsafe. Katz, a person who experienced it, went to court because of this.The Supreme Court agrees to hear about 100-150 cases out of 7,000 per year. Cases are brought up to the court by the people filing a complaint or the people think their rights has been deprived by other citizens(USGOV). Some of these cases are a serious topic to topic about, and most are proved by the Amendments everyone has, as basic, fundamental rights. The Fourth Amendment protects people from unreasonable searches and seizures, and a warrant is needed for searches(Oyez). Public places are locations where everyone can go, where everyone can do anything, as long as the people are not threat to the public(US Supreme Court).The FBI has the technology to spy, and navigate where people are, and uses it against threat” (FBI). Including the fact that all Amendments protect US citizens, it is imperative that Katz had been deprived of his rights by the US government.
Unreasonable search and seizure is an asset in this country. It is an asset in this country because the police have to have rules also. If America did away with the fourth Amendment there would not be any crime because the police will be able to arrest anyone without probable cause. The police would have such much power that people will be afraid to even drive through a stop sign.
The founders of the Constitution knew that it is important to protect citizens from violation of their privacy, especially to the respect of invasion of their homes. Therefore the fourth amendment came into existence to ensure that individuals rights will not be infringed. The fourth amendment and the exclusionary rule has protected individual rights against the police and other government agencies from, unreasonable search and seizures. Furthermore, the exclusionary rule has deterred police misconduct and as well as intended to discourage law enforcement from conducting illegal searches by stating that any evidence found during an illegal search will be dismissed and cannot be used against the defendant in a court of law. The supreme court case, Fremont weeks vs. United States, the Supreme Court ruled that since the evidence gathered during weeks case were through illegal means the court dismissed the case.
The Fourth Amendment states that, “the rights 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.” This means that citizens of the United States of America are entitled to privacy and freedom from the government. With most things, there are limits set out to that privacy. Police officers can search your premises, which includes your car and your property. They can do this to look for and seize stolen materials, evidence of a crime, and illegal items such as: drugs, weed, or any illegal substance. Because of the fourth amendment,
This case is regarded as one of the influential cases in the interpretation of fourth amendment. In this case, police took drug dogs to Jardines’ front porch to begin a preliminary search. The dogs then gave a positive alert for drugs, this gave the police probable cause
The Fourth Amendment the Search and Seizure amendment was first passed by Congress on September 25, 1789 (National Constitution Center) that states the right of people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures (National Constitution Center). For the first one hundred years after this amendment was
The Weeks v United States case was the Supreme Court basis in determining to incorporate the Fourth Amendment into the Fourteenth Amendment due process clause and apply the exclusionary rule in state cases. In this essay, I am going to discuss the reason why the Supreme Court determine that the exclusionary rule should apply to the state police activity. Prior to the case of Weeks v United States, the state police activity “were not limited in their conduct by the Fourth Amendment” (Ingram p.81) and the exclusionary rule of Fourth Amendments illegal search and seizure only applies to federal law enforcement officers. Basically, it means that state law enforcement officials can illegally search and seized criminal activity evidence and court don’t prohibit the use of illegally obtained evidence in the trial court.
Significance: The Supreme Court here expresses that governmental conduct like drug dog sniffing that can reveal whether a substance is contraband, yet no other private fact, does not compromise any privacy interest, and therefore is not a search subject to the Fourth Amendment. Terry v. Ohio permits only brief investigative stops and extremely limited searches based on reasonable suspicion including seizures of property independent of the seizure of the
In Wolf vs. Colorado the Supreme Court had decided that it did not. Illegally obtained evidence could be used in trials because the 4th amendment did not apply to states. The principle became known as the exclusionary
Based on an article written in the official website of Cornell University Law School titled “Fourth Amendment: An Overview” states that: "[t]he 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" (LII Staff). The Constitution, through the Fourth Amendment, shield's individuals from nonsensical pursuits and seizures by the government. The Fourth Amendment, in any case, is not a certification against all ventures and seizures, but rather just those that are regarded outlandish under the law. This is a great example for people who blame the government for allowing parent to implant microchips in their children.
Several exceptions to the Fourth amendment have been made over the past several decades, with some being understandable and others being questionable. Consenting to a search results in not needing a warrant, though this poses many exceptions and complications, i.e. the scope of the consent given, whether consent is voluntarily specified, or whether a person has the right to consent to a search of another's property. Another understandable exception is the “plain view” doctrine, where an officer (acting in legal presence) can seize plain view objects. The stipulation to this is that the officer must have had probable clause that the objects seized are contraband. Exigent circumstances, where it would be harmful or impractical to obtain a warrant