Fourth Amendment Commons^™

The Post-Tsa Airport: A Constitution Free Zone?, Daniel S. Harawa

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.

Facebook Is Not Your Friend: Protecting A Private Employee's Expectation Of Privacy In Social Networking Content In The Twenty-First Century Workplace, Cara Magatelli

The Journal of Business, Entrepreneurship & the Law

This Comment explores the implications SNS postings have on private employers concerning the off-duty, non-work related conduct of their employees. This argument recognizes that an employee is entitled to engage in whatever legal off-duty conduct he chooses, so long as the behavior does not damage his employer's legitimate business interests. An employer should not be able to use information gleaned from an employee's SNS postings, unrelated to an employer's business interests, to punish an employee for her choices outside the work place. Disciplining or terminating an employee for his off-duty lifestyle choices permits the morals and standards of the employer …

Anonymity, Faceprints, And The Constitution, Kimberly L. Wehle

All Faculty Scholarship

Part I defines anonymity and explains that respect for the capacity to remain physically and psychologically unknown to the government traces back to the Founding. With the advent and expansion of new technologies such as facial recognition technology (“FRT”), the ability to remain anonymous has eroded, leading to a litany of possible harms.

Part II reviews the existing Fourth and First Amendment doctrine that is available to stave off ubiquitous government surveillance and identifies anonymity as a constitutional value that warrants more explicit doctrinal protection. Although the Fourth Amendment has been construed to excise surveillance of public and third-party information …

Neurotechnologies At The Intersection Of Criminal Procedure And Constitutional Law, Amanda C. Pustilnik

Faculty Scholarship

The rapid development of neurotechnologies poses novel constitutional issues for criminal law and criminal procedure. These technologies can identify directly from brain waves whether a person is familiar with a stimulus like a face or a weapon, can model blood flow in the brain to indicate whether a person is lying, and can even interfere with brain processes themselves via high-powered magnets to cause a person to be less likely to lie to an investigator. These technologies implicate the constitutional privilege against compelled, self-incriminating speech under the Fifth Amendment and the right to be free of unreasonable search and seizure …

Maryland V. King: Terry V. Ohio Redux, Tracey Maclin

UF Law Faculty Publications

In Maryland v. King, the Supreme Court addressed whether forensic testing of DNA samples taken from persons arrested for violent felonies violated the Fourth Amendment. The purpose behind DNA testing laws is obvious: collecting and analyzing DNA samples advances the capacity of law enforcement to solve both "cold cases" and future crimes when the government has evidence of the perpetrator's DNA from the crime scene. In a 5-4 decision, the Court, in an opinion by Justice Kennedy, upheld Maryland's DNA testing statute, and presumably the similar laws of twenty-seven other states and the federal government. Although Justice Kennedy's opinion suggests …

Maryland V. King: Terry V. Ohio Redux, Tracey Maclin

Faculty Scholarship

In Maryland v. King, the Supreme Court addressed whether forensic testing of DNA samples taken from persons arrested for violent felonies violated the Fourth Amendment. The purpose behind DNA testing laws is obvious: collecting and analyzing DNA samples advances the capacity of law enforcement to solve both "cold cases" and future crimes when the government has evidence of the perpetrator's DNA from the crime scene.

In a 5-4 decision, the Court, in an opinion by Justice Kennedy, upheld Maryland's DNA testing statute, and presumably the similar laws of twenty-seven other states and the federal government.

Although Justice Kennedy's opinion suggests …

Constitutional Cacophony: Federal Circuit Splits And The Fourth Amendment, Wayne A. Logan

Vanderbilt Law Review

Despite their many differences, Americans have long been bound by a shared sense of constitutional commonality. Federal constitutional rights, however, can and do often vary based on geographic location, and a chief source of this variation stems from an unexpected origin: the nation's federal circuit courts of appeals. While a rich literature exists on federal circuit splits in general, this Article provides the first empirical study of federal constitutional law circuit splits. Focusing on Fourth Amendment doctrine in particular, the Article highlights the existence of over three dozen current circuit splits, which result in the unequal allocation of liberty and …

Making The Most Of United States V. Jones In A Surveillance Society: A Statutory Implementation Of Mosaic Theory, Christopher Slobogin

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

In the Supreme Court's recent decision in United States v. Jones, a majority of the Justices appeared to recognize that under some circumstances aggregation of information about an individual through governmental surveillance can amount to a Fourth Amendment search. If adopted by the Court, this notion sometimes called "mosaic theory"-could bring about a radical change to Fourth Amendment jurisprudence, not just in connection with surveillance of public movements-the issue raised in Jonesbut also with respect to the government's increasingly pervasive record-mining efforts. One reason the Court might avoid the mosaic theory is the perceived difficulty of implementing it. This article …

Predictive Policing And Reasonable Suspicion, Andrew Ferguson

Scholarly Articles in Law Reviews & Journals

Predictive policing is a new law enforcement strategy to reduce crime by predicting criminal activity before it happens. Using sophisticated computer algorithms to forecast future events from past crime patterns, predictive policing has become the centerpiece of a new smart-policing strategy in several major cities. The initial results have been strikingly successful in reducing crime.This article addresses the Fourth Amendment consequences of this police innovation, analyzing the effect of predictive policing on the concept of reasonable suspicion. This article examines predictive policing in the context of the larger constitutional framework of “prediction” and the Fourth Amendment. Many aspects of current …

Notes On Borrowing And Convergence, Robert L. Tsai, Nelson Tebbe

Faculty Scholarship

This is a response to Jennifer E. Laurin, "Trawling for Herring: Lessons in Doctrinal Borrowing and Convergence," 111 Colum. L. Rev. 670 (2011), which analyzes the Supreme Court's resort to tort-based concepts to limit the reach of the Fourth Amendment's exclusionary rule. We press three points. First, there are differences between a general and specific critique of constitutional borrowing. Second, the idea of convergence as a distinct phenomenon from borrowing has explanatory potential and should be further explored. Third, to the extent convergence occurs, it matters whether concerns of judicial administration or political reconstruction are driving doctrinal changes.

The U.S. Supreme Court Gets It Right In Arizona V. Gant: Justifications For Rules Protect Constitutional Rights, Shenequa L. Grey

St. Thomas Law Review

The purpose of this article is to demonstrate how the justifications or rationales for legal principles form the basis for compliance with the Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution; and that therefore, failure to comply with those justifications leads to unconstitutional searches and seizures. Strict compliance with the underlying justifications prevents the courts from circumventing the Constitution by establishing a rule, then expanding it beyond its intended purpose. This article demonstrates and reiterates that compliance with the underlying justifications for establishing rules is essential to protecting individual constitutional rights. In addressing these issues, Part I of this article gives …

Notes On Borrowing And Convergence, Robert Tsai, Nelson Tebbe

Scholarly Articles in Law Reviews & Journals

his is a response to Jennifer E. Laurin, "Trawling for Herring: Lessons in Doctrinal Borrowing and Convergence," 111 Colum. L. Rev. 670 (2011), which analyzes the Supreme Court's resort to tort-based concepts to limit the reach of the Fourth Amendment's exclusionary rule. We press three points. First, there are differences between a general and specific critique of constitutional borrowing. Second, the idea of convergence as a distinct phenomenon from borrowing has explanatory potential and should be further explored. Third, to the extent convergence occurs, it matters whether concerns of judicial administration or political reconstruction are driving doctrinal changes.

The Inviolate Home: Housing Exceptionalism In The Fourth Amendment, Stephanie M. Stern

All Faculty Scholarship

The ideal of the inviolate home dominates the Fourth Amendment. The case law accords stricter protection to residential search and seizure than to many other privacy incursions. The focus on protection of the physical home has decreased doctrinal efficiency and coherence and derailed Fourth Amendment residential privacy from the core principle of intimate association. This Article challenges Fourth Amendment housing exceptionalism. Specifically, I critique two hallmarks of housing exceptionalism: first, the extension of protection to residential spaces unlikely to shelter intimate association or implicate other key privacy interests; and second, the prohibition of searches that impinge on core living spaces …

‘Move On’ Orders As Fourth Amendment Seizures, Stephen E. Henderson

Faculty Articles

If a police officer orders one to move on, must the recipient comply? This article analyzes whether there is a federal constitutional right to remain, and in particular whether a police command to move on constitutes a seizure of the person for purposes of the Fourth Amendment. Although it is a close question, I conclude that the Fourth Amendment typically does not restrict a move on (MO) order, and that substantive due process only prohibits the most egregious such orders. It is a question of broad significance given the many legitimate reasons police might order persons to move on, as …

The 'High Crime Area' Question: Requiring Verifiable And Quantifiable Evidence For Fourth Amendment Reasonable Suspicion Analysis, Andrew Ferguson, Damien Bernache

Scholarly Articles in Law Reviews & Journals

This article proposes a legal framework to analyze the "high crime area" concept in Fourth Amendment reasonable suspicion challenges.Under existing Supreme Court precedent, reviewing courts are allowed to consider that an area is a "high crime area" as a factor to evaluate the reasonableness of a Fourth Amendment stop. See Illinois v. Wardlow, 528 U.S. 119 (2000). However, the Supreme Court has never defined a "high crime area" and lower courts have not reached consensus on a definition. There is no agreement on what a "high-crime area" is, whether it has geographic boundaries, whether it changes over time, whether it …

The Liberal Assault On The Fourth Amendment, Christopher Slobogin

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

As construed by the Supreme Court, the Fourth Amendment's reasonableness requirement regulates overt, non-regulatory government searches of homes, cars, and personal effects-and virtually nothing else. This essay is primarily about how we got to this point. It is fashionable to place much of the blame for today's law on the Warren Court's adoption of the malleable expectation of privacy concept as the core value protected by the Fourth Amendment. But this diagnosis fails to explain why even the more liberal justices have often gone along with many of the privacy-diminishing holdings of the Court. This essay argues that three other …

Constitutional Law—The Fourth Amendment Challenge To Dna Sampling Of Arrestees Pursuant To The Justice For All Act Of 2004: A Proposed Modification To The Traditional Fourth Amendment Test Of Reasonableness, Kimberly A. Polanco

University of Arkansas at Little Rock Law Review

No abstract provided.

Constitutional Law—Fourth Amendment—Knock And Announce: The Ninth Circuit Knocks And The Supreme Court Announces A Re-Emphasis On The Case-By-Case Analysis.United States V. Banks, 540 U.S. 31 (2003), Erin Elizabeth Cassinelli

University of Arkansas at Little Rock Law Review

No abstract provided.

Making The Right Gamble: The Odds On Probable Cause, Ronald J. Bacigal

Law Faculty Publications

Again, is there probable cause to detain, arrest or search each passenger? Is there probable cause to search each passenger's luggage, their autos parked at the airport and their residences? This article seeks the answer to the hypotheticals in sources ranging from the judiciary's own pronouncements on probable cause to linguistics, history mathematics and cognitive psychology.

Punishment And Procedure: A Different View Of The American Criminal Justice System, William T. Pizzi

Publications

No abstract provided.

The Fourth Amendment's Forcing Of Flawed Choices: Giving Content To Freedom For Residents Of Public Housing - Pratt V. Chicago Housing Authority, 848 F. Supp. 792 (N.D. Ill. 1994), Erika George

Faculty Scholarship

In April 1994, the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois issued a preliminary injunction halting the "Operation Clean Sweep" program operated by the Chicago Housing Authority ("CHA"). ³ The court did so over the protestations of some of those most affected, the public housing residents subjected to the CHA's searches. ⁴ Pratt v. Chicago Housing Authority⁵ attracted the attention of the nation and President William Clinton, who requested that the Justice Department investigate ways to strengthen security in public housing without offending the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments of the United States Constitution.

Civil libertarians applauded …

The Continuing Evolution Of Criminal Constitutional Law In State Courts, S. Carran Daughtrey

Vanderbilt Law Review

Although early state constitutions were important and ambitious documents for their time, the development of state constitutional law stagnated after the drafting and adoption of the federal constitution., As the doctrine of federalism has resurfaced, however, states have begun to turn to their constitutions to grant more protection for their citizens. The states' criminal constitutional laws have changed significantly and continue to evolve today.

In the 1960s, the Warren Court expanded basic protections for criminal defendants by finding that the Fourteenth Amendment incorporates the Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Amendments. The Court held that the Eighth Amendment prohibits cruel and unusual …

Putting The People Back Into The Fourth Amendment, Ronald J. Bacigal

Law Faculty Publications

This Article attempts to answer such questions by examining the evolution of search-and-seizure law in America. Although the structural nature of decision making embodied in the Bill of Rights has far-ranging implications for that entire document, I limit my consideration to the unique aspects of the Fourth Amendment. In doing so I have followed the suggestion that constitutional interpretation considers a threefold question: "Does the Constitution mean what it was meant to mean, or what it has come to mean, or what it ought to mean?" Part I examines the historical involvement of juries in search-and-seizure cases; Part II considers …

The "Wrap" On Probable Cause: The Fourth Amendment Contained, Paul L. Kaminsky

St. Thomas Law Review

Part I of this Note begins by exploring the meaning of probable cause, briefly tracing its development. Part I continues with an examination of how the Supreme Court's interpretation of the Fourth Amendment and the probable cause requirement relates to searches and seizures of containers, specifically, containers that may fall within the Sanders' footnote "exception." The relationship between the Sanders doctrine and that of the "plain view" doctrine will also be examined. In Part II, this Note presents the case of United States v. Prandy-Binett as an example of the above-mentioned doctrinal exceptions to the requirements of the Fourth Amendment …

Reasonable Expectations Of Privacy And Autonomy In Fourth Amendment Cases: An Empirical Look At "Understandings Recognized And Permitted By Society", Christopher Slobogin, Joseph E. Schumacher

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

This Article reports an attempt to investigate empirically important aspects of the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution, as construed by the United States Supreme Court. In the course of doing so, it touches upon two other topics. Most directly, it addresses the appropriate scope of the Fourth Amendment. Less directly, it raises questions about the role that empirical research should play in fashioning constitutional rules.

Using The Constitution: Separation Of Powers And Damages For Constitutional Violations, James A. Thomson

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

State Adoption Of Federal Law: Exploring The Limits Of Florida's "Forced Linkage" Amendment, Christopher Slobogin

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

This article examines the "forced linkage" between state and federal provisions that the 1983 amendment establishes in Florida. It concludes that forced linkage is ill-conceived, because it is inimical to state court independence. Accordingly, this article argues, the 1983 amendment to article I, section 12 of the Florida Constitution should be repealed. If not repealed, it should be interpreted to permit Florida courts broad discretion in developing their own stance on search and seizure law. So construed, the amendment would only require Florida courts to abide by those United States Supreme Court opinions that provide (1) an authoritative holding that …

Assaults On The Exclusionary Rule: Good Faith Limitations And Damage Remedies, Pierre J. Schlag

Publications

No abstract provided.

Recent Development, Constitutional Law: Protection Against Illegal Search And Seizure--Blackie's House Of Beef, Inc. V. Castillo, No. 79-1057 & 79-2358 (D.C. Cir. July 22, 1981), Stephen James Anaya

Publications

No abstract provided.

The Fourth Amendment In Flux: The Rise And Fall Of Probable Cause, Ronald J. Bacigal

Law Faculty Publications

This article will demonstrate the Supreme Court's inability to develop an objective methodology to derive and apply fourth amendment principles under either the traditional probable cause approach or the balancing approach. A detailed analysis of traditional probable cause will reveal that its premises are ultimately subjectively derived? This examination will also show that returning to traditional probable cause would necessitate resurrecting the unrealistic premise that an individual's privacy interest is always outweighed by the government's interest in searching if the authorities meet a static standard of probable cause. The article will then discuss the advent of the balancing approach and …