If I got pulled over and asked to step out of the vehicle for whatever reason and the police officer wanted to search me and I consented. The thing is, I had some unopened letters addressed to me with stamps on them in my hands, can he search the envelopes as well as myself? Or is that against Federal Law? Does he have to ask for permission to open your mail as well?
I suppose if you consented to it it would be ok, but he would need to have a warrant to search anything if you didn’t consent.
AFAIK, not even the spouse of someone the mail is addressed to can open it legallly, unless they have power of attorney. I think they might be able to with a warrent specifying what the envelope would look like, but otherwise I don’t think they can legally open postmarked mail not addressed to them. (Not just stamped, if it’s been delivered to you via the United States Postal Service, it would have canceled stamps/a postmark.)
If you consent to the search, you’re hosed.
What I’m not sure about is if they were addressed to your roommate… in that case I don’t know if you have sufficient legal privileges over the mail to consent to the search.
Uh, seriously not true.
I’ll demand a cite for that.
The law for searching vehicles and persons differs from the law for searching residences.
Your response would be broadly correct if the cops had knocked on the door to the OP’s residence. Your response isn’t even in the ballpark of being correct in regards to a motor vehicle search.
I was thinking that since the envelopes were sealed, and had a postmark, and not addressed to the investigating officers, that they had no legal right to open the envelopes, in the United States at least. The laws regarding who can open mail are very specific. I’m pretty sure that in cases of child porn or other illicit things in the mail they must have a very specific search warrent describing what the missive in question looks like. I don’t think they have room to be very vague either.
Mr. Slant is correct that constitutional jurisprudence differentiates between vehicle and non-vehicle searches. However, one can consent to any search one wants to.
So you’ve consented to the search. The cop finds the letters, says, “can I open these?” and you consent, then you have no basis for complaint.
I suspect your question is whether your blanket consent to search goes so far as to include him opening letters and reading them. No clue, and my cursory research (really, really cursory) doesn’t find a case on point. I’d suggest that the envelopes are like containers, and are too small to contain weapons. Therefore, they couldn’t be searched with reasonable suspicion; you’d instead need a warrant. Unless, of course, consent goes so far as to include them. Tautological, I know, but there you are.
I’m not inclined to analogize further tonight; I’ll leave that to some scrappy law student who wants to slog through the jurisprudence.
Oh, and TNWPsycho7490, this is a great thread we’ve done before about vehicle searches. I think it lays out the vehicle issues, and also talks a bit about the difference between probable cause (which is what you need to get a warrant) and reasonable suspicion, a lesser standard that still permits some searches. Pay particular attention to pravnik, Random, and Bricker. And welcome to the Dope.
I don’t think municipal police officers can open sealed mail in a casual residence search. Even if consent for the search is given. Only if the warrent specifies pretty exactly what the letter/evidence they are searching for looks like can they do so. Maybe Federal agents can open sealed mail in their investigations, I am not so sure of that. Otherwise it’s a federal offense.
ETA: I know we have some members who are spouses of mail carriers, and I think also some who are mail carriers themselves. They could probably pull up the pertinent statutes on this, and interpret them. I don’t think I’m far off on this though.
I read the entire thread Campion linked to, and if this gets things too off topic, I’ll start a new thread.
Mr. Slant, I was under the impression that your car is considered a legal extension of your home. Would this be a question of state law?
Yes it is. I mean it is a question of state law. It is not an extension of your home. For instance if there is a search warrant for a home it doesn’t mean you can search the car too, even if it is parked there, unless it is spelled out in the warrant. State law and state court precedents change what can be done during a search. I know here in New Jersey we have very strict limits on searches. Valid warrantless searches in other states give you the trunk. Here you need a search warrant for the trunk even in cases where you can search the passenger compartment without a warrant. In most states a cop can ask for a consent search from anyone, here it first has to rise to the level of articulable suspicion before a consent search can even be asked for.
As for the OP, consent trumps everything. About the only defense against anything found in a consent search is that the consent was coerced. The in-car camera usually takes care of that argument. Without consent I don’t see anyway it would be valid to open mail unless it is specified in a search warrant (even with consent I don’t see a reason why I personally would feel the need to go into someone’s mail during a vehicle search). Warrants will have the reason for the search spelled out. If it is for drugs, guns or hand grenades the officer would have a hard time explaining why he was looking in an envelope for a RPG launcher. If it was in a fraud investigation and they are looking for paperwork it would probably be covered in the warrant.
Look at your cite. It talks about mail that is being posted. Either in an authorized mailbox or at some other point in the process. Mail sitting in your mailbox falls under the federal law. Mail sitting on your kitchen table is just your property. I am not an expert in this particular area and it has not come up in real life for me yet so someone may be able to prove me wrong with some precedents that I haven’t heard of.
If the police officer took the envelope out of my hand, and, without opening the envelope, used his sence of touch to see if their was any hard objects in the envelope, is this technically a “search”?
(He gives my envelope a “pat down”.)
Why does he take it out of your hand? Are you being arrested? Is it a consent search? Are you being mugged?
There are a number of unfounded claims made in the posts above.
Zabali_Clawbane: please think this through. I’m visiting your house, and, looking at the unopned mail on your kitchen table, say, “Hey - I see you got a letter from Cecil Adams!”
You say: “I wonder what that’s about. Go ahead and open it for me, would you?”
Do you believe I have committed a federal crime if I do?
Of course not.
Your consent to search similarly might grant the police the unfettered right to open your mail – as long as the scope of your consent includes your mail.
If the police arrive at your door and tell you that they are looking for some stolen stereo equipment, and would you mind if they looked around your house, your consent probably does not give them the right to open your mail – because no one would reasonably believe that the missing stereo equipment might be found in a #10 envelope. But if they are searching for a forged check, they might well have the ability, based on your consent, to open an envelope.
Can I muddy the waters? What if the envelope is a window envelope? Can the cop say, “I could not help but notice…” and use that as a pretext?
Sorry. I left off a lot of (assumed) details out of my question.
(I think Bricker has answered my question, without directly addressing me, though.)
I get pulled over for speeding. The police officer approaches, and after a bit, claims he smells alcohol. He asks for consent to search. I grant it.
I step out of the vehicle, holding a sealed, post marked envelope.
According to Bricker’s answer, I presume that the police officer would not be allowed to search the envelope, since I can’t hide much booze in the envelope that my power bill comes in.
But if he just takes it anyway, and “pats it down” (say, looking for crack cocaine, or something), and returns it unopened, was that a legal search? (If he opened it, I would guess no, it wasn’t.)
It seems to me that, from watching the various thrilling car chases on TV, that the way that cops use your consent to search for anything at all seems to indicate that they have wide latitude.
(Cop pulls someone over for speeding, the suspect is driving on expired tags, consents to search, and the cops prowl through the vehicle looking for anything at all… and on TV usually find something and get into a scuffle or car chase.)
There’s a principle called the “Plain View Doctrine,” and it covers what you’re asking here. Generally, if the officer can see, in plain view from where he is lawfully standing, something that gives rise to probable cause, then he may lawfully act on it. So if whatever he saw through the envelope window was sufficient to give him probable cause, then it’s admissible as evidence and is fruit of a lawful search.
OK - at this point, whether he smelled alcohol or not is irrelevant. You’ve given consent to search. Unless you’ve limited the scope of your consent somehow… e.g., “Officer, there’s no alcohol in this car at all. You’re welcome to look for any alcoholic beverages, but that’s all,” then he’s generally entitled to look anywhere for anything. (Individual state laws may limit this, but as a matter of federal constitutional protection, consent eliminates the need for a warrant, period).
Unless, as I said, you limit the scope of your consent, I wouldn’t count on it. Of course, you may always revoke your consent or limit it. If the officer takes the enevelope from you and starts to open it, you can always say, “NO, don’t look in there.”
There’s a “Plain Touch” exception that’s analgous to the “Plain View” business I mentioned above. If he felt something that gave rise to probable cause, it would likely be admissible.
Sure – because cops are trained to use the limits of the law to their advantage:
“You don’t have anything in this car I should know about, do you? Any guns, drugs, needles, anything like that?”
“No.”
“Mind if I take a look?”
Isn’t that pleasant and friendly? “Mind if I take a look?” Much more agreeable than, “Do you consent to giving up your constitutional right to freedom from search and seizure, understanding that anything I find can be used as evidence, and that you are under absolutely no compulsion to agree?”
Many people say “Sure, go ahead,” in response to the Mind if I take a look? because they feel, understandably, that it will look “suspicious” if they refuse. But of course that’s not relevant. It probably WILL look suspicious to the cop, but there’s not a damn thing he can do about it if he doesn’t have probable cause to search… and if he DOES, he’ll search anyway, no matter what you say.
If you refuse a search, can he legally hold you there while he obtains a search warrant?
Answers here will vary by jurisdiction. In my jurisdiction (Texas), an officer cannot prevent you from leaving unless there are specific articulable facts which warrant continuing the detention beyond the original purpose of the stop. So, if the cop smells marijuana, that’s reason enough to hold you until a drug dog can get there. But, if there’s nothing like that, no evasive answers, that sort of thing, then the officer can’t hold you beyond the completion of the original purpose of the traffic stop. Once he’s pulled you over, determined that your license is valid and that you don’t have a warrant, and issued a citation if he’s going to, the stop is over, and he cannot keep you there any longer.
In Texas, a detention of under three minutes was found unreasonable when the officer couldn’t point to any specific facts other than the nervousness of the driver. However, in another case where there were specific facts that warranted a continued detention, a wait of 45 minutes was held reasonable. Courts have stated that detentions of an hour or more are not unreasonable if the facts are there.
MaxTorque is right on the money. There is no bright-line test (“Holding you longer than X minutes is unreasonable…”) but as a general proposition they cannot delay you longer than it takes to complete the purpose of the original stop.
I would point out, too, that if he can get a search warrant, he can likely search you anyway – that is, the search warrant must be based on probable cause. So in order to obtain a search warrant, he must lay out his probable cause to a neutral magistrate, and if he has that probable cause, he can likely search your car. (This applies to cars, but not to houses).
The benefit of a delay is for the officer to develop additional information which will then lead to probable cause – for example, summoning the drug dog that Max mentions. A reasonable suspicion may justify a detention but not a search; the drug dog may then alert on your car and provide enough for probable cause to search.