Law Commons^™

The Mosaic Theory In Fourth Amendment Jurisprudence: The Last Bastion Of Privacy In A Camera-Surveilled World, Auggie Alvarado

St. Mary's Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Arrests: Legal And Illegal, Daniel Yeager

Georgia State University Law Review

The Fourth Amendment prohibits unreasonable searches and seizures. An arrest—manifesting a police intention to transport a suspect to the stationhouse for booking, fingerprinting, and photographing—is a mode of seizure. Because arrests are so intrusive, they require roughly a fifty percent chance that an arrestable offense has occurred. Because nonarrest seizures (aka Terry stops), though no “petty indignity,” are less intrusive than arrests, they require roughly just a twenty-five percent chance that crime is afoot.

Any arrest not supported by probable cause is illegal. It would therefore seem to follow that any arrest supported by probable cause is legal. But it …

Private Police Regulation And The Exclusionary Remedy: How Washington Can Eliminate The Public/Private Distinction, Jared Rothenberg

Washington Law Review

Private security forces such as campus police, security guards, loss prevention officers, and the like are not state actors covered by the Fourth Amendment’s prohibition against unreasonable searches and seizures nor the Fifth Amendment’s Miranda protections. As members of the umbrella category of “private police,” these private law enforcement agents often obtain evidence, detain individuals, and elicit confessions in a manner that government actors cannot, which can then be lawfully turned over to the government. Though the same statutory law governing private citizens (assault, false imprisonment, trespass, etc.) also regulates private police conduct, private police conduct is not bound by …

Was Atwater V. Lago Vista Decided Correctly? The Fourth Amendment's Shadow And Simulacra Of Police Brutality And The American Dream, Charles Lincoln

Barry Law Review

No abstract provided.

A New Test For The New Crime Exception, Colin Miller

Utah Law Review

The new crime exception to the Fourth Amendment exclusionary rule allows prosecutors to introduce evidence connected to new crimes committed by defendants who were illegally detained and/or questioned. Unfortunately, as illustrated in this Article, courts largely have applied this new crime exception without any analytical framework or regard for the severity of the initial police misconduct or the defendant’s response. Moreover, courts have begun applying the new crime exception to crimes such as giving a fake name in response to an un-Mirandized interrogation following a lawful arrest.

By doing so, courts have allowed the new crime exception to swallow two …

Gone Fishing: Casting A Wide Net Using Geofence Warrants, Ryan Tursi

Washington Law Review

Technology companies across the country receive requests from law enforcement agencies for cell phone location information near the scenes of crimes. These requests rely on the traditional warrant process and are known as geofence warrants, or reverse location search warrants. By obtaining location information, law enforcement can identify potential suspects or persons of interest who were near the scene of a crime when they have no leads. But the use of this investigative technique is controversial, as it threatens to intrude upon the privacy of innocent bystanders who had the misfortune of being nearby when the crime took place. Innocent …

Beware What You Google: Fourth Amendment Constitutionality Of Keyword Warrants, Chelsa Camille Edano

Washington Law Review

Many Americans have potentially had their privacy rights invaded through invisible, widespread police searches. In recent years, local and federal governments have compelled Google and other search engine companies to produce the personal information of users who have conducted a search query related to a crime. By using keyword warrants, the government can conduct a dragnet search for suspects, imposing suspicion on users and exposing their personal information. The keyword warrant is a symptom of the erosion of the Fourth Amendment protection against suspicionless searches. Not only is scholarship scarce on keyword warrants, but also instances of these warrants are …

The Fourth Amendment And The Problem Of Social Cost, Thomas P. Crocker

Northwestern University Law Review

The Supreme Court has made social cost a core concept relevant to the calculation of Fourth Amendment remedies but has never explained the concept’s meaning. The Court limits the availability of both the exclusionary rule and civil damages because of their “substantial social costs.” According to the Court, these costs primarily consist of letting the lawbreaker go free by excluding evidence or deterring effective police practices that would lead to more criminal apprehension and prosecution. But recent calls for systemic police reform by social movements have a different view of social cost. So too do calls for reforming qualified immunity. …

The Computer Got It Wrong: Facial Recognition Technology And Establishing Probable Cause To Arrest, T.J. Benedict

Washington and Lee Law Review

Facial recognition technology (FRT) is a popular tool among police, who use it to identify suspects using photographs or still-images from videos. The technology is far from perfect. Recent studies highlight that many FRT systems are less effective at identifying people of color, women, older people, and children. These race, gender, and age biases arise because FRT is often “trained” using non-diverse faces. As a result, police have wrongfully arrested Black men based on mistaken FRT identifications. This Note explores the intersection of facial recognition technology and probable cause to arrest.

Courts rarely, if ever, examine FRT’s role in establishing …

Tech And Authoritarianism: How The People’S Republic Of China Is Using Data To Control Hong Kong And Why The U.S. Is Vulnerable, Bryce Neary

Seattle Journal of Technology, Environmental & Innovation Law

The aim of this article is to analyze and compare current events in the People's Republic of China and the United States to discuss the moral dilemmas that arise when establishing the boundary between national security interests and individual privacy rights. As we continue to intertwine our lives with technology, it has become increasingly important to establish clear privacy rights. The question then becomes: at what point should individuals sacrifice their rights for what the government considers the "greater good" of the country?

Further, this article analyzes the development of U.S. privacy law and its relationship to national security, technology, …

The Second Amendment In A Carceral State, Alice Ristroph

Northwestern University Law Review

No abstract provided.

Bitcoin Searches And Preserving The Third-Party Doctrine, Christine A. Cortez

St. Mary's Law Journal

Abstract forthcoming.

Preview—United States V. Cooley: What Will Happen To The Thinnest Blue Line?, Jo J. Phippin

Public Land & Resources Law Review

The Supreme Court of the United States ("Supreme Court") will hear oral arguments in this matter on Tuesday, March 23, 2021. This case presents the narrow issue of whether a tribal police officer has the authority to investigate and detain a non-Indian on a public right-of-way within a reservation for a suspected violation of state or federal law. The lower courts, holding that tribes have no such authority, granted James Cooley’s motion to suppress evidence. The Supreme Court must decide whether the lower courts erred in so deciding. While the issue before the Supreme Court is itself narrow, it has …

School “Safety” Measures Jump Constitutional Guardrails, Maryam Ahranjani

Seattle University Law Review

In the wake of George Floyd’s murder and efforts to achieve racial justice through systemic reform, this Article argues that widespread “security” measures in public schools, including embedded law enforcement officers, jump constitutional guardrails. These measures must be rethought in light of their negative impact on all children and in favor of more effective—and constitutionally compliant—alternatives to promote school safety. The Black Lives Matter, #DefundthePolice, #abolishthepolice, and #DefundSchoolPolice movements shine a timely and bright spotlight on how the prisonization of public schools leads to the mistreatment of children, particularly children with disabilities, boys, Black and brown children, and low-income children. …

No Longer Innocent Until Proven Guilty: How Ohio Violates The Fourth Amendment Through Familial Dna Searches Of Felony Arrestees, Jordan Mason

Cleveland State Law Review

In 2013, the United States Supreme Court legalized DNA collection of all felony arrestees upon arrest through its decision in Maryland v. King. Since then, the State of Ohio has broadened the use of arrestee DNA by subjecting it to familial DNA searches. Ohio’s practice of conducting familial DNA searches of arrestee DNA violates the Fourth Amendment because arrestees have a reasonable expectation of privacy in the information that is extracted from a familial DNA search and it fails both the totality of the circumstances and the special needs tests. Further, these tests go against the intention of the …

Justice Sonia Sotomayor: The Court’S Premier Defender Of The Fourth Amendment, David L. Hudson Jr.

Seattle University Law Review

This essay posits that Justice Sotomayor is the Court’s chief defender of the Fourth Amendment and the cherished values it protects. She has consistently defended Fourth Amendment freedoms—in majority, concurring, and especially in dissenting opinions. Part I recounts a few of her majority opinions in Fourth Amendment cases. Part II examines her concurring opinion in United States v. Jones. Part III examines several of her dissenting opinions in Fourth Amendment cases. A review of these opinions demonstrates what should be clear to any observer of the Supreme Court: Justice Sotomayor consistently defends Fourth Amendment principles and values.

Recent Developments, Peyton Hildebrand

Arkansas Law Review

In a 5-4 opinion, the United States Supreme Court once again denied a Bivens action. This case involved a tragic crossborder shooting by a border patrol agent standing on United States soil, who shot and killed a young boy standing on Mexican soil. Petitioners, the boy’s parents, sought relief under Biven2, arguing the agent’s action violated the Constitution. However, the Court determined the cross-border shooting was a new Bivens context, which required an analysis of whether any special factors “counseled hesitation” for the cause of action to be extended. The Court concluded Bivens was inappropriate because several factors “counseled hesitation”—namely, …

Recalibrating Suspicion In An Era Of Hazy Legality, Deborah Ahrens

Seattle University Law Review

After a century of employing varying levels of prohibition enforced by criminal law, the United States has entered an era where individual states are rethinking marijuana policy, and the majority of states have in some way decided to make cannabis legally available. This symposium Article will offer a description of what has happened in the past few years, as well as ideas for how jurisdictions can use the changing legal status of cannabis to reshape criminal procedure more broadly. This Article will recommend that law enforcement no longer be permitted use the smell of marijuana as a reason to search …

Using Technology The Founders Never Dreamed Of: Cell Phones As Tracking Devices And The Fourth Amendment, R. Craig Curtis, Michael C. Gizzi, Michael J. Kittleson

University of Denver Criminal Law Review

No abstract provided.

Cell Phones Are Orwell's Telescreen: The Need For Fourth Amendment Protection In Real-Time Cell Phone Location Information, Matthew Devoy Jones

Cleveland State Law Review

Courts are divided as to whether law enforcement can collect cell phone location information in real-time without a warrant under the Fourth Amendment. This Article argues that Carpenter v. United States requires a warrant under the Fourth Amendment prior to law enforcement’s collection of real-time cell phone location information. Courts that have required a warrant prior to the government’s collection of real-time cell phone location information have considered the length of surveillance. This should not be a factor. The growing prevalence and usage of cell phones and cell phone technology, the original intent of the Fourth Amendment, and United States …

The Criminal Continues To Go Free When The Constable Blunders: Testing The Boundaries Of Curtilage—State V. Chute, 908 N.W.2d 578 (Minn. 2018), Akina Khan

Mitchell Hamline Law Review

No abstract provided.

Judges Do It Better: Why Judges Can (And Should) Decide Life Or Death, Andrew R. Ford

Dickinson Law Review (2017-Present)

Following its decision in Furman v. Georgia, the Supreme Court of the United States has attempted to standardize procedures that states use to subject offenders to the ultimate penalty. In practice, this attempt at standardization has divided capital sentencing into two distinct parts: the death eligibility decision and the death selection decision. The eligibility decision addresses whether the sentencer may impose the death penalty, while the selection decision determines who among that limited subset of eligible offenders is sentenced to death. In Ring v. Arizona, the Court held for the first time that the Sixth Amendment right to …

Warrantless Searches Of Electronic Devices At U.S. Borders: Securing The Nation Or Violating Digital Liberty?, Ahad Khilji

Catholic University Journal of Law and Technology

The steady increase of U.S. citizens traveling with smart phones and other electronic devices has been met with the rise of searches and seizures by CBP officers at U.S borders. Although only less than 0.1% of all travelers may actually be subjected to a search while entering the United States, when comparing the statistics between a six month period in 2016 with the same period in 2017, electronic device searches have almost doubled from 8,383 to 14,993. Approximately one million travelers to the U.S. are inspected by the CBP every day. Out of this population, nearly 2,500 electronic devices are …

Property, Persons, And Institutionalized Police Interdiction In Byrd V. United States, Eric J. Miller

Loyola of Los Angeles Law Review

During a fairly routine traffic stop of a motorist driving a rental car, two State Troopers in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, discovered that the driver, Terrence Byrd, was not the listed renter. The Court ruled that Byrd nonetheless retained a Fourth Amendment right to object to the search. The Court did not address, however, why the Troopers stopped Byrd in the first place. A close examination of the case filings reveal suggests that Byrd was stopped on the basis of his race. The racial feature ofthe stop is obscured by the Court’s current property-basedinterpretation of the Fourth Amendment’s right to privacy.

Although …

Is Your Smartphone Conversation Private? The Stingray Device’S Impact On Privacy In States, Katherine M. Sullivan

Catholic University Law Review

“Where are you” is a common question to receive on your cellphone, but it is up to you whether or not to respond with an answer. No longer does this question need to be asked due to advancements in surveillance technology. When pinpointing a criminal suspect, the question can be answered by local and state agencies, without the person of interest knowing, by using a StingRay device. The main question to be asked is does the conduct of locating a criminal suspect’s exact location without a warrant, violate an individual’s Fourth Amendment Constitutional right to be free from unreasonable searches. …

The Fourth Amendment In The Age Of Persistent Aerial Surveillance, John Pavletic

Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology

If Big Brother made movies, persistent aerial surveillance would be its masterpiece. Small airplanes are rigged with high-tech cameras that can continuously transmit real-time images to the ground. The aircraft is able to monitor an area of thirty square miles for ten hours at a time. This technology allows video analysts to zoom in and track the location of vehicles, and even people. It was originally designed for military use during the Iraq War, but since then, it has been adapted for civilian applications. In 2016, the Baltimore Police Department contracted with Persistent Surveillance Systems to carry out a trial …

The Private Search Doctrine And The Evolution Of Fourth Amendment Jurisprudence In The Face Of New Technology: A Broad Or Narrow Exception?, Adam A. Bereston

Catholic University Law Review

The advent of new technology has presented courts with unique challenges when analyzing searches and seizures under the Fourth Amendment. Out of necessity, the application of the Fourth Amendment has evolved to address privacy issues stemming from modern technology that could not have been anticipated by the Amendment’s drafters. As part of this evolution, the Supreme Court devised the “private search” doctrine, which upholds the constitutionality of warrantless police searches of items that were previously searched by a private party, so long as the police search does not exceed the scope of the private-party search. However, courts have struggled to …

Civil Liberty Or National Security: The Battle Over Iphone Encryption, Karen Lowell

Georgia State University Law Review

On June 5, 2013, Edward Snowden released what would be the first of many documents exposing the vast breadth of electronic surveillance the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the National Security Agency (NSA) had been conducting on millions of United States citizens. Although the federal agencies had legal authority under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) to collect metadata from companies such as Verizon, many Americans considered this data collection to be a massive invasion of privacy.

Equipped with the knowledge of sweeping domestic surveillance programs, citizens and technology firms fighting for strong privacy and security protection, have started …

Knock And Talk No More, Jamesa J. Drake

Maine Law Review

The Supreme Court has set out a roadmap for challenging one of the most common and insidious police tactics used today: the knock-and-talk. The path is short and clear and it leads to the inescapable conclusion that the knock-and-talk—as it is actually employed in practice—is unconstitutional. Although the Court has yet to squarely consider the issue, some Justices have already taken pains to say, in dictum, that knock-and-talks are lawful. Practitioners should not be dissuaded. What this faction of the Court describes is a highly romanticized—and utterly inaccurate—conception of what a knock-and-talk actually entails. The sort of activity that these …

Mass Suppression: Aggregation And The Fourth Amendment, Nirej Sekhon

Georgia Law Review

The FourthAmendment's exclusionary rule requires that
criminal courts suppress evidence obtained as a result of
an unconstitutionalsearch or seizure. The Supreme Court
has repeatedly stated that suppression is purely
regulatory, not remedial. Its only purpose is to deter
future police misconduct, not to remedy past privacy or
liberty harms suffered by the defendant. Exclusion, in
other words, is for the benefit of community members who
might, sometime in the future, be subject to police
misconduct like that endured by the defendant.
Exclusion's regulatory purpose would be greatly aided if
criminal courts could identify when a suppression motion
involved Fourth Amendment …