Ping
The continued flushing of our Constitutional rights is in full swing.
Seems like another reason weighing against getting married nowadays. Wife gets mad at you? There goes your 4th amendment rights...
“...may not object to a search when he is not at home.”
I didn’t read the article, but I hope this means that the occupant consents IS home that they can perform a search. (Still not right imho.)
I hope it doesn’t mean “Ok Frank, the guy just left for work - break down the door.”
WTF? It should take BOTH occupants' permission or all bets are OFF. How can one occupant's rights negate the rights of the other? This is a disgusting ruling. FUSCROTUS!
Freepers ought to be careful about aligning themselves with Ginsburg, Kagan & Sotomayor...
Even this is defended.....
Yuck, so the police can arrest you on a trivial charge. And then they can search your residence at will without a warrant?
This is a bad ruling.
Which leads to an interesting thought exercise. What would signage do in this situation. Something like “Posted - No search of this location is allowed without a warrant”.
Wow. What an horrific decision. This SCOTUS has done more to tank our Constitutional rights than any other in history.
Based on my understanding of this decision, isn’t the Supreme Court questionably assuming, in these times of widespread ignorance of the Constitution, that occupants are aware of their 4th Amendment-protected rights? Perhaps a 4th Amendment-equivalent of Miranda warning is needed?
Nice. Asshats. What was the last one they got right (citizens over trough-feeders)? Citizens United?
This is a very tricky decision. In past, some courts have ruled that minors can authorize a search of their parents’ home. Likewise, if an adult has “apparent authority” over the place based on what facts are known to the officers on the scene.
In practice, I fear this will turn into a situation where police will be met at the door by two people who refuse them authority to search. So they arrest one of them, and suggest they will arrest the other, unless they agree to the search.
Likewise, people will be coerced by police. “Am I under arrest?”
“That depends if you consent to a search or not. If you don’t, we will detain you until we get a warrant to search, but it might take a few hours. But if you let us in now, we should be done in a few minutes.”
this is unconstitutional bullcrap.
complete and full reset required.
"We therefore hold that an occupant who is absent due to a lawful detention or arrest stands in the same shoes as an occupant who is absent for any other reason," Alito said.
Case closed.
The following information has just arrived via the LII's direct Project HERMES feed from the Supreme Court. A list of links for today's material is followed by the syllabus for any case which had one.
| Syllabus |
Opinion [Kagan] |
Dissent [Breyer ] |
|---|---|---|
Syllabus
NOTE: Where it is feasible, a syllabus (headnote) will be released, as is being done in connection with this case, at the time the opinion is issued. The syllabus constitutes no part of the opinion of the Court but has been prepared by the Reporter of Decisions for the convenience of the reader. See United States v. Detroit Timber & Lumber Co., 200 U. S. 321 .
SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
Syllabus
KALEY et vir v. UNITED STATES
certiorari to the united states court of appeals for the eleventh circuit
No. 12–464. Argued October 16, 2013 —Decided February 25, 2014
Title 21 U. S. C. §853(e)(1) empowers courts to enter pre-trial restraining orders to “preserve the availability of [forfeitable] property” while criminal proceedings are pending. Such pre-trial asset restraints are constitutionally permissible whenever probable cause exists to think that a defendant has committed an offense permitting forfeiture and that the assets in dispute are traceable or otherwise sufficiently related to the crime charged. United States v. Monsanto, 491 U. S. 600 .
After a grand jury indicted petitioners, Kerri and Brian Kaley, for reselling stolen medical devices and laundering the proceeds, the Government obtained a §853(e)(1) restraining order against their assets. The Kaleys moved to vacate the order, intending to use a portion of the disputed assets for their legal fees. The District Court allowed them to challenge the assets’ traceability to the offenses in question but not the facts supporting the underlying indictment. The Eleventh Circuit affirmed.
Held: When challenging the legality of a §853(e)(1) pre-trial asset seizure, a criminal defendant who has been indicted is not constitutionally entitled to contest a grand jury’s determination of probable cause to believe the defendant committed the crimes charged. Pp. 5–21.
(a) In Monsanto, this Court held that the Government may seize assets before trial that a defendant intends to use to pay an attorney, so long as probable cause exists “to believe that the property will ultimately be proved forfeitable.” 491 U. S., at 615. The question whether indicted defendants like the Kaleys are constitutionally entitled to a judicial re-determination of the grand jury’s probable cause conclusion in a hearing to lift an asset restraint has a ready answer in the fundamental and historic commitment of the criminal justice system to entrust probable cause findings to a grand jury. A probable cause finding sufficient to initiate a prosecution for a serious crime is “conclusive[e],” Gerstein v. Pugh, 420 U. S. 103 , and, as a general matter, “a challenge to the reliability or competence of the evidence” supporting that finding “will not be heard,” United States v. Williams, 504 U. S. 36 . A grand jury’s probable cause finding may, on its own, effect a pre-trial restraint on a person’s liberty. Gerstein, 420 U. S., at 117, n. 19. The same result follows when it works to restrain a defendant’s property.
The Kaleys’ alternative rule would have strange and destructive consequences. Allowing a judge to decide anew what the grand jury has already determined could result in two inconsistent findings governing different aspects of one criminal proceeding, with the same judge who found probable cause lacking presiding over a trial premised on its existence. That legal dissonance could not but undermine the criminal justice system’s integrity, especially the grand jury’s constitutional role. Pp. 5–12.
(b) The balancing test of Mathews v. Eldridge, 424 U. S. 319 —which requires a court to weigh (1) the burdens that a requested procedure would impose on the government against (2) the private interest at stake, as viewed alongside (3) “the risk of an erroneous deprivation” of that interest without the procedure and “the probable value, if any, of [the] additional . . . procedural safeguar[d],” id., at 335—if applicable here, tips against the Kaleys. Because the Government’s interest in freezing potentially forfeitable assets without an adversarial hearing about the probable cause underlying criminal charges and the Kaleys’ interest in retaining counsel of their own choosing are both substantial, the test’s third prong is critical. It boils down to the “probable value, if any,” of a judicial hearing in uncovering mistaken grand jury probable cause findings. But when the legal standard is merely probable cause and the grand jury has already made that finding, a full-dress hearing will provide little benefit. See Florida v. Harris, 568 U. S. ___, ___. A finding of probable cause to think that a person committed a crime “can be [made] reliably without an adversary hearing,” Gerstein, 420 U. S., at 120, and the value of requiring additional “formalities and safeguards” would “[i]n most cases . . . be too slight,” id., at 121–122. The experience of several Circuits corroborates this view. Neither the Kaleys nor their amici point to a single case in two decades where courts, holding hearings of the kind they seek, have found the absence of probable cause to believe that an indicted defendant committed the crime charged. Pp. 12–20.
677 F. 3d 1316, affirmed and remanded.
Kagan, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which Scalia, Kennedy, Thomas, Ginsburg, and Alito, JJ., joined. Roberts, C. J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which Breyer and Sotomayor, JJ., joined.
| Syllabus |
Opinion [Thomas] |
|---|---|
Syllabus
NOTE: Where it is feasible, a syllabus (headnote) will be released, as is being done in connection with this case, at the time the opinion is issued. The syllabus constitutes no part of the opinion of the Court but has been prepared by the Reporter of Decisions for the convenience of the reader. See United States v. Detroit Timber & Lumber Co., 200 U. S. 321 .
SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
Syllabus
WALDEN v. FIORE et al.
certiorari to the united states court of appeals for the ninth circuit
No. 12–574. Argued November 4, 2013—Decided February 25, 2014
Petitioner Walden, a Georgia police officer working as a deputized Drug Enforcement Administration agent at a Georgia airport, searched respondents and seized a large amount of cash. Respondents allege that after they returned to their Nevada residence, petitioner helped draft a false probable cause affidavit in support of the funds’ forfeiture and forwarded it to a United States Attorney’s Office in Georgia. In the end, no forfeiture complaint was filed, and respondents’ funds were returned. Respondents filed a tort suit against petitioner in Federal District Court in Nevada. The District Court dismissed the suit, finding that the Georgia search and seizure did not establish a basis to exercise personal jurisdiction in Nevada. The Ninth Circuit reversed, holding that the District Court could properly exercise jurisdiction because petitioner had submitted the false probable cause affidavit with the knowledge that it would affect persons with significant Nevada connections.
Held: The District Court lacked personal jurisdiction over petitioner. Pp. 5–14.
(a) The Fourteenth Amendment ’s Due Process Clause constrains a State’s authority to bind a nonresident defendant to a judgment of its courts, World-Wide Volkswagen Corp. v. Woodson, 444 U. S. 286 , and requires that the nonresident have “certain minimum contacts” with the forum State, International Shoe Co. v. Washington, 326 U. S. 310 . The inquiry into the “minimum contacts” necessary to create specific jurisdiction focuses “on the relationship among the defendant, the forum, and the litigation.” Keeton v. Hustler Magazine, Inc., 465 U. S. 770 . For a State to exercise jurisdiction consistent with due process, that relationship must arise out of contacts that the “defendant himself” creates with the forum, Burger King Corp. v. Rudzewicz, 471 U. S. 462 , and must be analyzed with regard to the defendant’s contacts with the forum itself, not with persons residing there, see, e.g., International Shoe, supra, at 319. The plaintiff cannot be the only link between the defendant and the forum. These same principles apply when intentional torts are involved. See Calder v. Jones, 465 U. S. 783 –789. Pp. 5–10.
(b) Petitioner lacks the “minimal contacts” with Nevada that are a prerequisite to the exercise of jurisdiction over him. No part of petitioner’s course of conduct occurred in Nevada, and he formed no jurisdictionally relevant contacts with that forum. The Ninth Circuit reached its contrary conclusion by improperly shifting the analytical focus from petitioner’s contacts with the forum to his contacts with respondents, obscuring the reality that none of petitioner’s challenged conduct had anything to do with Nevada itself. Respondents emphasize that they suffered the “injury” caused by the delayed return of their funds while residing in Nevada, but Calder made clear that mere injury to a forum resident is not a sufficient connection to the forum. The proper question is whether the defendant’s conduct connects him to the forum in a meaningful way: Here, respondents’ claimed injury does not evince such a connection. The injury occurred in Nevada simply because that is where respondents chose to be when they desired to use the seized funds. Other possible contacts noted by the Ninth Circuit—that respondents’ Nevada attorney contacted petitioner in Georgia, that cash seized in Georgia originated in Nevada, and that funds were returned to respondents in Nevada—are ultimately unavailing. Pp. 11–14.
688 F. 3d 558, reversed.
Thomas, J., delivered the opinion for a unanimous Court.
| Syllabus |
Opinion [Alito] |
Concurrence [Scalia] |
Concurrence [Thomas] |
Dissent [Ginsburg] |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Syllabus
NOTE: Where it is feasible, a syllabus (headnote) will be released, as is being done in connection with this case, at the time the opinion is issued. The syllabus constitutes no part of the opinion of the Court but has been prepared by the Reporter of Decisions for the convenience of the reader. See United States v. Detroit Timber & Lumber Co., 200 U. S. 321 .
SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
Syllabus
FERNANDEZ v. CALIFORNIA
certiorari to the court of appeal of california, second appellate district
No. 12–7822. Argued November 13, 2013—Decided February 25, 2014
Police officers observed a suspect in a violent robbery run into an apartment building, and heard screams coming from one of the apartments. They knocked on the apartment door, which was answered by Roxanne Rojas, who appeared to be battered and bleeding. When the officers asked her to step out of the apartment so that they could conduct a protective sweep, petitioner came to the door and objected. Suspecting that he had assaulted Rojas, the officers removed petitioner from the apartment and placed him under arrest. He was then identified as the perpetrator in the earlier robbery and taken to the police station. An officer later returned to the apartment and, after obtaining Rojas’ oral and written consent, searched the premises, where he found several items linking petitioner to the robbery. The trial court denied petitioner’s motion to suppress that evidence, and he was convicted. The California Court of Appeal affirmed. It held that because petitioner was not present when Rojas consented to the search, the exception to permissible warrantless consent searches of jointly occupied premises that arises when one of the occupants present objects to the search, Georgia v. Randolph, 547 U. S. 103 , did not apply, and therefore, petitioner’s suppression motion had been properly denied.
Held: Randolph does not extend to this situation, where Rojas’ consent was provided well after petitioner had been removed from their apartment. Pp. 5–15.
(a) Consent searches are permissible warrantless searches, Schneckloth v. Bustamonte, 412 U. S. 218 –232, and are clearly reasonable when the consent comes from the sole occupant of the premises. When multiple occupants are involved, the rule extends to the search of the premises or effects of an absent, nonconsenting occupant so long as “the consent of one who possesses common authority over [the] premises or effects” is obtained. United States v. Matlock, 415 U. S. 164 . However, when “a physically present inhabitan[t]” refuses to consent, that refusal “is dispositive as to him, regardless of the consent of a fellow occupant.” Randolph, 547 U. S., at 122–123. A controlling factor in Randolph was the objecting occupant’s physical presence. See, e.g., id., at 106, 108, 109, 114. Pp. 5–9.
(b) Petitioner contends that, though he was not present when Rojas consented, Randolph nevertheless controls, but neither of his arguments is sound. Pp. 9–14.
(1) He first argues that his absence should not matter since it occurred only because the police had taken him away. Dictum in Randolph suggesting that consent by one occupant might not be sufficient if “there is evidence that the police have removed the potentially objecting tenant from the entrance for the sake of avoiding a possible objection,” 547 U. S., at 121, is best understood to refer to situations in which the removal of the potential objector is not objectively reasonable. Petitioner does not contest the fact that the police had reasonable grounds for his removal or the existence of probable cause for his arrest. He was thus in the same position as an occupant absent for any other reason. Pp. 9–10.
(2) Petitioner also argues that the objection he made while at the threshold remained effective until he changed his mind and withdrew it. This is inconsistent with Randolph in at least two important ways. It cannot be squared with the “widely shared social expectations” or “customary social usage” upon which Randolph’s holding was based. 547 U. S., at 111, 121. It also creates the sort of practical complications that Randolph sought to avoid by adopting a “formalis[tic]” rule, id., at 121, e.g., requiring that the scope of an objection’s duration and the procedures necessary to register a continuing objection be defined. Pp. 10–14.
(c) Petitioner claims that his expansive interpretation of Randolph would not hamper law enforcement because in most cases where officers have probable cause to arrest a physically present objector they also have probable cause to obtain a warrant to search the premises that the objector does not want them to enter. But he misunderstands the constitutional status of consent searches, which are permissible irrespective of the availability of a warrant. Requiring officers to obtain a warrant when a warrantless search is justified may interfere with law enforcement strategies and impose an unmerited burden on the person willing to consent to an immediate search. Pp. 14–15.
208 Cal. App. 4th 100, 145 Cal. Rptr. 3d 51, affirmed.
Alito, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which Roberts, C. J., and Scalia, Kennedy, Thomas, and Breyer, JJ., joined. Scalia, J., and Thomas, J., filed concurring opinions. Ginsburg, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which Sotomayor and Kagan, JJ., joined.
In a dissenting opinion, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said police should be required to honor Fernandez’s objection. The dissent, joined by Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan, added that it would not have hindered the police investigation because police already had probable cause to justify a search warrant to a judge.
She warned that the high court decision might send a dangerous message to law enforcement officials. “Instead of adhering to the warrant requirement, today’s decision tells the police they may dodge it, never mind [that there was] ample time to secure the approval of a neutral magistrate,” Justice Ginsburg wrote.
She said the decision amounted to a “drastic reduction” of Fourth Amendment protections.
“Although the police have probable cause and could obtain a warrant with dispatch, if they can gain the consent of someone other than the suspect, why should the law insist on the formality of a warrant,” Ginsburg asked. She answered her own question: “Because the Framers saw the neutral magistrate as an essential part of the criminal process shielding all of us, good or bad, saint or sinner, from unchecked police activity.”
The court is correct: All it takes is one single person to allow entry.
This rule has been around for a while.
If one resident allows access, then it is a waiver. It came about with the OLD domestic violence cases where a person inside was begging for help and the perp was telling the police to “go away.”