Question

The 4th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution reads:

“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 on probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be searched.”

For the most part, in order for police to enter a home in order to look for evidence of illegal activity they must have a warrant. However, there are exceptions to the warrant requirement. In other words, there are times when authorities may legally search your property without first obtaining a warrant.

Explain ONE legal exception to the warrant requirement. Give a specific example of the exception. Do you agree that the exception should be legal? Why or why not?

Answer 1

An arrest is found to exception the Fourth Amendment because it was not supported by probable cause or a valid warrant. Any evidence obtained through that unlawful arrest, such as a confession, will be kept out of the case.

Fourth Amendment case law deals with three central issues: what government activities constitute "search" and "seizure"; what constitutes probable cause for these actions; how violations of Fourth Amendment rights should be addressed.

When law enforcement officers violate an individual's constitutional rights under the Fourth Amendment, and a search or seizure is deemed unlawful, any evidence derived from that search or seizure will almost certainly be kept out of any criminal case against the person whose rights were violated.

The Fourth Amendment has been held to mean that a search or an arrest generally requires a judicially sanctioned warrant, because the basic rule under the Fourth Amendment is that arrests and "searches conducted outside the judicial process, without prior approval by judge or magistrate, are per se unreasonable".In order for such a warrant to be considered reasonable, it must be supported by probable cause and be limited in scope according to specific information supplied by a person (usually a law enforcement officer) who has sworn by it and is therefore accountable to the issuing court. The Supreme Court further held in Chandler v. Miller (1997): "To be reasonable under the Fourth Amendment, a search ordinarily must be based on individualized suspicion of wrongdoing. But particularized exceptions to the main rule are sometimes warranted based on 'special needs, beyond the normal need for law enforcement'. … When such 'special needs' are alleged, courts must undertake a context-specific inquiry, examining closely the competing private and public interests advanced by the parties."The amendment applies to governmental searches and seizures, but not those done by private citizens or organizations who are not acting on behalf of a government.In Ontario v. Quon the Court applied the amendment to a municipal government in its capacity as an employer, ruling that the City of Ontario had not violated the Fourth Amendment rights of city police officers by obtaining from the communications company and reviewing transcripts of text messages sent using government-provided pagers.

When law enforcement officers violate an individual's constitutional rights under the Fourth Amendment, and a search or seizure is deemed unlawful, any evidence derived from that search or seizure will almost certainly be kept out of any criminal case against the person whose rights were violated. For example:

• An arrest is found to violate the Fourth Amendment because it was not supported by probable cause or a valid warrant. Any evidence obtained through that unlawful arrest, such as a confession, will be kept out of the case.
• A police search of a home is conducted in violation of the homeowner's Fourth Amendment rights, because no search warrant was issued and no special circumstances justified the search. Any evidence obtained as a result of that search cannot be used against the homeowner in a criminal case.

NO I DON'T SUPPORT,TO BE LEGAL   because ,

Here’s is an example of how definitions have been readjusted to serve the national security state’s overriding needs: the Department of Justice (DOJ) created a Post-Constitutional interpretation of the Fourth Amendment that allows it to access millions of records of Americans using only subpoenas, not search warrants.

Some background: a warrant is court permission to search and seize something. As the Fourth Amendment makes clear, it must be specific: enter Thomas Anderson’s home and look for hacked software. Warrants can only be issued on “probable cause.” The Supreme Court defined probable cause as requiring a high standard of proof, or to quote its words, “a fair probability that contraband or evidence of a crime will be found in a particular place.”

A subpoena on the other hand is nothing more than a government order issued to a citizen or organization to do something, most typically to produce a document. Standards for issuing a subpoena are flexible, as most executive agencies can issue them on their own without interaction with a court. In such cases, there is no independent oversight.

The legal standards derived from the 4th Amendment provide constitutional protection to individuals in the following situations, among others:

• An individual is stopped for police questioning while walking down the street.
• An individual is pulled over for a minor traffic infraction, and the police officer searches the vehicle's trunk.
• An individual is arrested.
• Police officers enter an individual's house to place him or her under arrest.
• Police officers enter an individual's apartment to search for evidence of crime.
• Police officers enter a corporation's place of business to search for evidence of crime.
• Police officers confiscate an individual's vehicle or personal property and place it under police control.

Potential scenarios implicating the Fourth Amendment, and law enforcement's legal obligation to protect Fourth Amendment rights in those scenarios, are too numerous to cover here. However, in most instances a 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 level of "probable cause" that an individual has committed a crime.