Criminal Procedure

1. Criminal Procedure Class Five

2. Today’s Topics • Special Needs: Drug Searches • Special Needs: Road Blocks • Inventory • Border Searches • Consent • Introduction to Exclusionary Rule

3. Special Needs: Drug Testing

4. Preliminary Considerations • Generally two types of regulatory schemes Specific triggering event Entirely random • Searches of persons in civil-based context • No warrant • No probable cause

5. Revisit New Jersey v. T.L.O. • Held warrantlesssearch of student’s purse was reasonable • School administrator had reasonable suspicion to believe student had cigarettes • Special need: Maintaining school discipline

6. Later Developments • Supreme Court began using same concepts when analyzing drug testing searches • Unlike New Jersey v. TLO, in drug testing programs, there is no individual suspicion keyed to particular person

7. Skinner v. Railway Labor Executives Association • Regulatory Scheme: Mandatory testing for all railroad personnel involved in certain train accidents • Suspicionless • Supreme Court upheld

8. Preliminary Considerations • How does drug testing implicate Fourth Amendment? Note: Testing was carried out by private employer • Why is the conduct a search? • What is the “special need” beyond normal law enforcement?

9. “Reasonable” Without Individualized Suspicion • Minimal expectation of privacy • Compelling state interest (which cannot be accommodated by requiring individual suspicion) • Effective means of deterring drug use • Assist in safeguarding public • Too difficult to require after serious accident

10. Von Raab • Regulatory scheme: urinalysis as condition of employment in three areas • What is the triggering event? • Why is no warrant needed? • How significant is lack of documented drug problem among covered employees?

11. ACTON • School district policy: random urinalysis of students participating in athletic programs • Acton was seventh grade student; parents refused to sign consent; filed suit seeking declaratory and injunctive relief

12. Case Specific Facts • History of drug use in community • Other methods tried • Parental and community involvement • Testing methods • Consequences of failure • Interaction with law enforcement

13. Preliminary Analysis • If no clear practice when Fourth Amendment adopted, “reasonableness” means balancing individual intrusion against promotion of legitimate government interest • If undertaken by law enforcement to discover evidence of criminal wrongdoing, usually requires warrant based on probable cause

14. Preliminary Analysis • Warrant not needed to show reasonableness of all government searches • If warrant not required, then probable cause may not be required as well

15. Application • Special needs in school • Student’s privacy interest • Character of intrusion • Nature and immediacy of government need balanced against specific means to address • Contrast with suspicion-based program

16. Chandler • Statutory scheme: Drug testing of candidates for public office • Thirty days before qualifying for nomination or election, candidate had to submit negative results for urinalysis • Specific named drugs tested • Affected wide range of offices from the governor through the judiciary, members of the legislature, and various agencies

17. Georgia Claims Two Special Needs • Sovereign power under 10th Amendment • Incompatibility of unlawful drug use and holding high state office

18. Contrast with Von Raab • Unique context “symbolic” v. “special” need

19. Holding • Where public safety is not generally in jeopardy, Fourth Amendment precludes suspicionless search • Query: How long does this rule last? Has it been subsequently undercut?

20. Board of Education v. Earls (2002) • Expands Acton to suspicionless testing of high school students for any extracurricular activity

21. Ferguson v. City of Charleston (2001) • Invalidated drug testing of pregnant mothers as violating prohibition against non consensual, warrantless, suspicionless searches

22. Concepts • Nature of special need asserted for justification • Role of law enforcement • Significance of “benign” motive

23. Special Needs? - - Road Blocks

24. Road Blocks are Seizures (Stops) • Purposes tied to public transportation: License checks, sobriety checkpoints • Purposes tied to crime detection: Drug searches

25. Individual Stops • Reasonable suspicion necessary to stop car and detain driver in order to check license and registration

26. Permanent and Temporary Checkpoints • Program design: All motorists passing through checkpoints stopped and briefly examined for signs of intoxication. If seem drunk, diverted to another area for further checking • Each detention lasted 25 seconds • “Special needs” or Terry?

27. Government Interest Eradicating drunk driving Individual Intrusion Extremely limited Driver can see all being stopped Locations determined by guidelines Applying Balancing Test

28. City of Indianapolis v. Edmond • Invalidates checkpoint with primary purpose to discover and interdict illegal drugs

29. Questions • Why isn’t this permissible using the rationale of border searches? • Why isn’t this permissible using the rationale applied to sobriety checkpoints? • When, if ever, might such road blocks be permissible?

30. Special Needs: Inventory Searches

31. Overview • Generally routine inventory searches are reasonable under the Fourth Amendment • Typically conducted without warrant • Typically conducted without probable cause • In most jurisdictions, standard practice for police to inventory contents of cars and containers in custody • If police discovered criminal evidence during inventory . . . plain view

32. Car Inventories • South Dakota v. Opperman • Held: Warrantless inventory search of car impounded for parking violation permissible

33. State’s Interests • Protect owner property while in police custody • Protect police from claims of lost or stolen property • Protect police and public from potential danger

34. Individual Interest • Diminish expectation of privacy in cars

35. Arrestee Property • Illinois v. Lafayette • Upheld warrantless inventory search of shoulder bag of man arrested for disturbing peace

36. Rationale • Government interest greater than for search interest to arrest • Police conduct that might be embarrassingly intrusive on street could be handled privately • Same three interests that apply to car inventories

37. Less Intrusive Means • What constitutional significance of fact that officers could have done something other than inventory the contents - - could have done something “less intrusive” • “park & lock” car • Place personal property in “bin”

38. Police Discretion • Colorado v. Bertine • Rejects less intrusive means analysis for opening containers during inventory search • Officer discretion is not controlling factor

39. Absence of Policy • This is a limitation on officer discretion • Florida v. Wells • Held: Opening locked suitcase could not be justified as inventory when agency had no policy regarding opening of locked container

40. Pretext • If officers followed guidelines and make activity looked like “inventory” existence of actual investigatory motive is irrelevant • If there are no guidelines - - or if guidelines are disregarded - - then police cannot justify search on inventory grounds

41. Some Lower Court Limitations • Not reasonable to impound car parked in locked garage at home • Not reasonable to vacuum cars interiors to “inventory” carpet fibers

42. Special Needs: Border Searches

43. General Principles • Special need beyond traditional criminal law enforcement • Evaluated under reasonableness clause • Heavy state interest • Diminished expectation of privacy

44. Location • Border • Functional equivalent • Check points (temporary or fixed) • Roving patrols

45. Officer Conduct • Routine search • More than routine search • Questions concerning citizenship • Search of automobile at checkpoint • Search of automobile by roving patrol

46. Routine Border • United States v. Ramsey • People can be stopped (seized) at international border. They and their belongings can be searched, without warrant and without individualized suspicion • Rationale? • Application to packages mailed into U.S.? • Functional equivalent of border

47. Beyond Routine Stop or Search • United States v. Montoya de Hernandez • Balloon swallowing drug smuggling suspect case • A person stopped at the border can be detained further, beyond the scope of a routine Customs search • To do so, agents must have reasonable suspicion of criminal activity • What facts gave them that suspicion here? More like custodial arrest? Terry?

48. Checkpoints • Immigration and Nationality Act • Legislative extension of border search powers • Rule: Vehicle occupants may be stopped at fixed checkpoints and briefly detained for questioning without individualized suspicion • United States v. Martinez-Fuerte

49. Vehicle Searches at Checkpoints • United States v. Ortiz • Held: Warrantless vehicle searches at checkpoints require probable cause or consent • Contrast with briefly detaining cars asks occupants about citizenship

50. Roving Patrols • Almeida Sanchez v. United States (vehicle search) • United States v. Brignoni-Ponce (stopped car to question occupants)