I remember seeing this on one cop show years ago and I’ve seen variations of it on others. A suspect’s house is searched and the cops find six or seven bodies in various states of dismemberment plus a mountain of evidence to show that the guy has been killing for years. However, it turns out that the search was illegal for some reason, can’t recall why, and the all the evidence is deemed inadmissible. As the cops have no other evidence the case is thrown out. (In the shpw I think the cops got the guy some other way).
Could this really happen, ie a serial killer go scot-free because of an illegal search, no matter if they find a whole stack of corpses? And if it is theoretically possible has it ever actually happened in real life?
Not quite the same, and rather controversial, but I think the general consensus is that OJ got off because of faulty handling of evidence, even though most people (including the jury, perhaps) thought he did it.
I found this article after a quick google search. So yes, a murder charge can be dismissed from a technicality.
IANAL, but most definitely yes. What gets excluded in an illegal search is specific evidence. Let’s take a much simpler hypothetical case. I just decide one day to randomly kill someone in the town I live. Using a gun I have, I hunt someone down, shoot them in the head, and kill them. The police have absolutely no clue about motive, no suspects, witnesses, etc. since this was just a random killing by me. Then one year later for whatever reason the police do a blatantly illegal, warrantless search of my home (let’s assume the warrant was for my neighbor’s home looking for drugs, and they kick in the wrong door), and find the gun I used to kill the person. Ballistics matches the bullet to my gun.
I am charged with the murder. The judge throws out my gun as evidence, as it was seized in an illegal search. At that point, the prosecution has zero evidence against me. I can’t be linked to the crime scene (no witnesses), and as this was a random killing the prosecution couldn’t even show motive. In this hypothetical, legally how could I not go free?
Bona-fide criminals go free every day on techicalities.
A good defense attorney specializes if finding them.
OTOH he wages a psychological defense. (Garagos?).
What you are talking about is called the exclusionary rule. Many google-able sites will explain better than I ever could, and will refer you to Mapp v. Ohio
In Mapp (IIRC), the cops grabbed a bunch of folks and beat the crap out of them until one confessed to the crime (I believe sexual assault). The Judge said “Whoa, beating confessions out of people isn’t right!” The cops said “There’s nothing you can do about it, and why do you care , anyway?” To which the Judge replied “Oh, yeah? I’ll throw the whole confession out!” and the exclusionary rule was born.
This is, in my opinion, a classic example of law enforcement abusing their (technically legal) authority, and the result is a new rule that hampers the efforts of honest but imperfect cops for years to come.
deus, Esq.
Totally got the facts of Mapp wrong. Disregard entire 2d paragraph. Mapp is an exlusionary rule case, but has nothing to do with prisoner detention or abuse.
deus, way too out of practice at crim. law :smack:
I hate the idea of letting criminals go on technicalities, but the legal system should not allow illegal searches or confessions-by-beatings. If we allow one to slip through the system, then what’s to stop any cop from illegally raiding your house or beating a confession out of you? If legal precedent establishes that such a procedure is admissible (the ends justifying the means), then what’s the point of the 4th amendment?
I know it’s a travesty to let known criminals go, but we must protect our constitutional freedoms and make sure law enforcement and other governmental bodies follow the correct procedures when apprehending a criminal.
Yep. And often when prosecutors realize that there are serious problems with a case, they just won’t file charges, and hold back hoping further evidence comes along that won’t be excluded. For example, consider the hypothetical random murder I mentioned above. Any prosecutor with a clue who realized that my gun was seized when the cops broke down the wrong door would know that if he tried bringing the case into court, the gun would get excluded and I would be set free. At that point the double jeopardy rule would mean I’d be off scott free forever. A smart prosecutor at that point would just wait and hope other admissable evidence could be found.
Chambers v. Florida 60 S. Ct. 472 (U.S. 1940) for a group of 20+ people held for five days until some of them confess.
White v. State of Texas 60 S.Ct. 1032 (U.S. 1940) for a rape case in which a defendant is taken into the woods by law enforcement agents and beaten into confessing.
Both pre-Mapp cases.
kdeus, seriously obsessing about my earlier mistake.
Assuming such evidence is found (they go talk to rfgdxm’s ex-girlfriend from the time and she says he told her he did it and gives them the polaroid picture he took of himself proudly standing over the body), could the defense get that thrown out too as that evidence was found as a direct result of the original illegally obtained evidence, ie rfgdxm’s identity as the murder weapon owner? I mean they never would have gone digging up dirt on you if they didn’t get tipped off from that gun. Or would they be waiting for evidence that turns up without them needing to know you did it? How much has watching Law and Order screwed up my understanding of such things ?
Jeez, kdeus, no one has ever made a mistake on this board before. Watch it!
Any lawyers around? I had thought that any evidence that was discovered solely based on an illegal search is inadmissable.
I’ve heard it (ok, on Law & Order) referred to as ‘fruit of the poison tree’. Its still poison as far as being evidence and not allowed during trial as evidence or as reason for further warrants.
You know, this whole concept of “getting off on a technicality” is bogus. The law is entirely based on technicality; it is supposed to be that way. Every person ever convicted, was convicted on a technicality; if the day comes when I can be convicted on an “ambiguity”, our system of justice is through. So let’s have no more beefing about “getting off on a technicality”; that is the way the system is designed, that’s the way it should work, and we should all be thankful it does.
So if the ‘fruit of the poisonous tree’ principle is correct presumably they could never convict a guy who, as in rfgdxm’s post, had his house searched by mistake, even if they found a whole heap of bodies, as any future evidence turned up would be found as a direct result of the interest aroused by the first search.
BTW would they have to give they guy his bodies back?
This legal site suggests that the ‘fruit of the poisonous tree’ principle has limits.
“The fruit of the poisonous tree is a metaphor, seeOregon v. Elstad, 470 U. S. 298, 303 (1985), that is misleading when taken out of context. It is a more limited doctrine than its broad metaphor seemingly suggests.”
I’ve noticed that the OPs location is Portsmouth England, which means that the American law that has been cited at him is irrelevant, given that there is no doctrine of ‘fruits of the poison tree’ in English law. Since there is no right to due process, the courts have been quite lax about their evaluation of where evidence has come from. The original thinking at common law is that the courts duty was only to look at the evidence presented before it, not where it had originated from.
It is true that the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1988 and Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights [right to a fair trial] has made the courts slightly more protective then before, but only really when they believe that the accuseds right to a fair trial has been substantially impinged. This is a finding that they have been reluctant to make.
Following the House of Lord’s decisions in *R v. Keenen * and R v. Sang it is quite clear that the courts will not look at how evidence is obtained unless they are satisfied that the way the evidence was obtained was disproportionate compared to its evidentiary value. The only real factor that is considered in this test in actual fact is the motives of the police. If the police acted in good faith, then not withstanding the failure to follow procedural rules, the evidence will be admitted into court due to its significant probative value.
In short, murderers are very unlikely to get away on technicalities in the UK. American law is all well and good, but the protections enumerated by the US Constitution only apply in American, and watching cop shows filmed there is not the best way to understand the process in a non-us jurisdiction.
Any evidence discovered in the future would only be excluded if it was only discovered as a direct result of the earlier, illegal search. If it was found independently, it would not be affected by the earlier suppression.
Another exception is the “inevitable discovery” rule. If what they found illegally would have been discovered eventually without the illegal search, it may be allowed at trail.
Things like this are why cops have to be constantly on top of current case law. It would be horrible to have someone get away with murder just because I didn’t handle the case correctly.
Yes, but many countries have some kind of rules about what can be approved as proof in a trial and what can’t.
They tend to be clearer than in the US too, in my experience… or just applied more consistantly.