Officer Gung Ho Case Summary

The case starts off by Officer Gung Ho being on foot patrol during the day shift. He receives a call from dispatch about possible drug sales occurring on Main Street. Officer Ho sees three individuals standing on the corner. Officer Ho approaches them and asks what they are doing. Dan, one of the individuals, and another begin to walk away leaving the third person, Junkie Jane. The officer asks if Jane has any drugs on her, Jane says “no”, but admits to using them. Ho then leaves Jane and starts to follow Dan, suspecting him of being the cocaine distributor. Officer Ho asks Dan to stop, Ho then searches Dan’s bag as Dan goes inside his home. Officer Ho finds a loaded firearm and a small bag of marijuana inside the bag. Officer Ho then walks

Robinette 519 U.S. 33 (1996) case, the court ruled that the fourth amendment search to valid consent is that the consent be voluntary and voluntariness is a question of fact to be determined from all the circumstances. The issue with Officer Gung Ho is that he was in a police uniform, yelling for Dan to stop, this alone can be an intimidation factor, and now Ho is asking to search Dan’s bag. Dan may not know he can refuse the right for Officer Ho to search his bag because the officer does not have probable cause to search his bag in the first place. Therefore any evidence found in the bag could be suppressed in court and in the violation on his fourth amendment

The reason it worked for the Draper case and not this current case is because the criminal informant was verified and passed the two- prong test based on his basis of knowledge and his credibility and reliability. Also in Illinois v. Gates 462 U.S. 213 (1983), the anonymous tip that was used for the search warrant was invalid because the court ruled that the anonymous person’s basis of knowledge was not able to be found, therefore it did not pass the Spinello-Angular two- prong test. Dispatch received a call about a complaint from an unknown person saying that there may be possible drug sales happening on Main Street. This alone is not sufficient evidence to give Officer Gung Ho his probable cause to make a search or seizure of anyone, but it does give him enough reasonable suspicion to question anyone who looks like they may be possibly selling drugs, allowing him to question those three individuals. In the Hudson v. Michigan 126 S. Ct. 2159 (2006), the courts ruled that a knock and announce violation alone is insufficient to require suppression of the evidence and that the exclusionary rule would not be valid for the case. Officer Ho did not knock to enter Dan’s home but according to this case and the circumstances, Officer Ho could have been safe