Warrantless searches are searches and seizures conducted without court-issued search warrants.

According to the Fourth Amendment, the people have a right “to be secure in their persons, houses, papers and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures.” This right limits the power of the police to seize and search people, their property, and their homes.

What Happens When A Search Violates the Fourth Amendment. The exclusionary rule. If, upon review, a court finds that an unreasonable search occurred, any evidence seized as a result of it cannot be used as direct evidence against the defendant in a criminal prosecution.

American courts use the exclusionary rule to deter police officers and other government agents from abusing constitutional rights. According to the rule, courts will suppress evidence that the government obtains through unconstitutional conduct—often an unlawful search or seizure.

The prohibition of “using” such illegally obtained evidence applies to: (1) all stages of criminal proceedings; (2) direct and derivative evidence; (3) evidence obtained by private actors and evidence obtained by state officials; and (4) cases in which a third party’s rights, not the defendant’s, were violated.

Three exceptions to the exclusionary rule are “attenuation of the taint,” “independent source,” and “inevitable discovery.”

The doctrine of qualified immunity protects all government officials acting within the scope of their governmental duties, not just law enforcement officers. As a threshold manner, constitutional theories of liability are available only against the government and government officials, not against private citizens.

United States, the Court outlawed what had come to be known as the “silver platter” doctrine, which allowed evidence that state and local police had unconstitutionally seized to be handed over for use in federal criminal trials, when the police acted independently of federal agents.

In a 5-4 decision, the Court overturned the silver platter doctrine and Elkins’ conviction….

Leon, the Court created the “good-faith” exception to the exclusionary rule. The good-faith exception applies when officers conduct a search or seizure with “objectively reasonable reliance” on, for example, a warrant that is not obviously invalid but that a judicial magistrate should not have signed.

Ohio, case in which the U.S. Supreme Court on June 19, 1961, ruled (6–3) that evidence obtained in violation of the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which prohibits “unreasonable searches and seizures,” is inadmissible in state courts.

Although Mapp did not allow them to enter, they gained access by forcibly opening at least one door. Once the police were inside the house, Mapp confronted them and demanded to see their warrant. One of the officers held up a piece of paper claiming it was a search warrant.

OHIO, decided on 20 June 1961, was a landmark court case originating in Cleveland, in which the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that under the 4th and 14th Constitutional amendments, illegally seized evidence could not be used in a state criminal trial.

Ohio, 367 U.S. 643 (1961), was a landmark decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in which the Court ruled that the exclusionary rule, which prevents prosecutors from using evidence in court that was obtained by violating the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, applies not only to the U.S. federal government, but …

Decision: The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in a 5-3 vote in favor of Mapp. The high court said evidence seized unlawfully, without a search warrant, could not be used in criminal prosecutions in state courts.

Dollree Mapp (October 1923 – October 2014) was the appellant in the Supreme Court case Mapp v. Ohio (1961). She argued that her right to privacy in her home, the Fourth Amendment, was violated by police officers who entered her house with what she thought to be a fake search warrant.

And in 1961, a crucial case ensured that police must follow the Constitution when gathering evidence. In a 6-3 decision, the Supreme Court in Mapp v. Ohio ruled that evidence obtained in violation of the Fourth Amendment is inadmissible in state court.

Supreme Court Cases

• Katz v. United States, 1967.
• Terry v. Ohio, 1967.
• Michigan Dept. of State Police v. Sitz, 1989.
• City of Indianapolis v. Edmond, 2000.

Ohio. In 1914, the Supreme Court established the ‘exclusionary rule’ when it held in Weeks v. United States that the federal government could not rely on illegally seized evidence to obtain criminal convictions in federal court.

Apparently the first statement of freedom from unreasonable searches and seizures appeared in The Rights of the Colonists and a List of Infringements and Violations of Rights, 1772, in the drafting of which Samuel Adams took the lead.