Are the police permitted to search a house without a warrant purely because a suspect was caught outside that house?
Would that constitute a legal search or would it be inadmissable as evidence in court?
catsix:
In this case, the suspect started out in the house, then fled into the back yard when the police arrived. Under those circumstances, the house is considered an area incident to the arrest, and the police are permitted to search it without a warrant. Any evidence found is admissible.
If, on the other hand, the suspect was walking down the street when he saw the police, and fled into some unconnected person’s back yard, the house belonging to that back yard would not be incident to the arrest.
Interestingly enough, however, any evidence gleaned from a warrantless search of the house in that second case would likely be admissible against the suspect, assuming it had some connection to him. This is because a person may not vicariously assert another’s Fourth Amendment rights. Any evdience found would not be admissible against the residents of the home searched, because they had a legitimate expectation of privacy. But the Fourth Amendment wouldn’t prevent it being used against the back yard lurker. (If the evidence found in the house were connected to the suspect, then it really wouldn’t turn out to be an “unconnected” house after all, I suppose).
- Rick
No it doesn’t
from The Word Detective we have:
Rick: You and I are forgetting that we seem to be talking sense to people who really aren’t interested in listening to it. After all, they seem to already automatically hate police officers; therefore, any thing said in defense of the police is malarkey, as far as they’re concerned.
Monty:
Even if that’s true, there’s another participant: the Gentle Lurking Reader. He is reading this board to entertain himself, to be sure, but also in the hope that he’ll learn things he didn’t know before. Even if The Ryan, to take an example, had remained unswayed by the correct information concerning trespass, the Gentle Lurking Reader now has the full and correct picture.
Reason enough to keep correcting error when it appears, sez I.
- Rick
No,nonono…
I know because my uncles ex-wifes new boyfriend’s mechanic’s hookers’ pimp’s lawyer used to be a C.O.P.
emkay?!
:rolleyes: <rolleyes inserted
Well then who’s gonna buy the donuts?
Where was the ‘prosecution’ in the example being discussed? And if you meant ‘persecution’, whining on about how persecuted you are because someone might not respond well to a ‘fuck off’ is juvenile - you know, teenage fantasy land stuff, like I mentiond before? Oh by the way, in America we also have the right to keep and bear arms, but I’d consider carefully before excercising that right around a cop who’s making an arrest.
Basic English lesson for the day: Refraining from telling someone to ‘fuck off’ is not the same thing as ‘treating them like royalty’ in the ordinary meaning of those words. Similarly, refraining from telling someone to ‘fuck off’ and ‘genuflecting’ are not synonymous either. Every day at work, for example, I refrain from telling dozens of people to ‘fuck off’ without genuflecting or doing anything that a sane person would regard as treating them like royalty.
To reiterate, telling someone to ‘fuck off’ is not the same thing as ‘failure to respect them’. Anyway, from Ashtor’s original description I didn’t get the impression that he was standing around making statements, but rushing around ranting and raving with a lot of bogus mention of consitutional rights. A calm reiteration of what you object to (and based on a real understanding of what arrest, search incident to an arrest, etc. mean) is universally going to be more effective, not just when dealing with the police. And rushing around the police with body language that says ‘I’m going to attack’ (which I’d guess Ashtor did) is just stupid.
Lots of people can make your world Hell to varying degrees, telling them to ‘fuck off’ tends to encourage them to do so, and whining that someone might decide to use their position of power to make you regret your ‘fuck off’ (without actually breaking any laws, mind you) is again juvenile. The world doesn’t revolve around you, and if you give other people a hard time they tend to be inclined to return the favor.
What abuse of power specifically are you referring to? Also, does similar abuse of power in response to being told to fuck off make these same people hate, well, pretty much anyone in a position of power over them, or is it just cops?
Rick: Damn, you’re right. Not only that, you’re damn right.
It’s just cops, well, I would tend to be more concerned about cops than other authority figures. Mostly because they (and other LEOs) are the only group of people around who can point a gun at me, then slap on some handcuffs, throw me in the back of a car, drive me away, and leave me to languish in a box for 12 hours. I’m no mind reader, but the comments above that Ashtar was “lucky” suggest something more than “Gee, he could have given you a stern lecture!” If that’s all everyone was worried about, I happily retract my comments.
This is not a matter of being more persuasive in arguing your case, I agree that politeness is the right course, in all sorts of interpersonal dealings. It’s the idea that saying the wrong thing will get you in trouble. There was no reason to think that Ashtar was in danger of being arrested (or anything), until he got rude. The expectation then became that the cop would do something exceedingly unpleasant to him, that otherwise would not have happened.
Cheesesteak: AFAIK, cops can’t “point a gun at [you], then slap on some handcuffs, throw [you] in the back of a car, drive [you] away, and laeve [you] to languish in a box for 12 hours” without probable cause for such an arrest. If they do all of that without justification, then there are consequences for the police, and the jurisdiction employing them, to face. And those consequences exist no matter how much you may want to pretend they don’t.
Just because you’re paranoid does not mean the world is out to get you.
And when this persecuted person is brought before a magistrate… what would he be charged with, Cheesesteak?
Get a better dictionary. The noun “cop” is a degenerate form of the noun “copper” which itself is derived from the verb “cop” (slightly circular isn’t it?) which is centuries-old English slang for “catch” or “capture”, and ironically also “steal”. It is in fact etymologically related to “capture” - they both stem from the latin verb “capere” (take, seize, catch).
I’d have expected a Straight Dope reader to be wary of etymologies that link an acronym to a word that has been in use for more than a hundred years…
DES according to my neighbor’s ex-wife’s uncle’s bodyguard, you’ve just been whooshed.
For the record, I was kinda pissed when I did the OP, and it now appears that I left a few points out.
When the Asshole Officer (henceforth referred to as A.O.) first entered my house, he was asked if he had a warrant. His reply: “I don’t need one.”
First, if what Bricker says is true (and I don’t doubt it is), then he did have a right to search the house. I would still contend that he needed to show us the warrant they had, which another officer politely showed us about 15 minutes after A.O. entered the house and refused to leave. Besides, “I don’t need one”? WTF?
Second, it is true that cops have their name and number on their badge (as several have pointed out). When my father asked what his name and number was and attempted to read it off his badge, A.O. crossed his arms in such a way as to cover his badge up. He kept his arms like this for the duration of his visit.
I’m sure I left a lot of other stuff out. Feel free to ask.
I still think that A.O. deserved a hearty “Fuck You!” Maybe that wasn’t the brightest thing to do, but he damn sure deserved it.
Well, either saying ‘fuck off’ was a dumb thing to do, or it was an act with no possibility of consequences, we can’t have it both ways. If there really were no consequences to Lord Ashtar being rude, I have said before that I happily retract my comments, since they are rendered completely meaningless. A number of posters seemed to think that there WERE possible consequences.
It needn’t be arrest and prosecution, either. It could just be the spontaneous decision to conduct a VERY thorough search of the premises, which (if I read Bricker’s comments correctly) is within their rights to do.
It’s important to keep in mind the difference between an ordinary search warrant, which must describe with particularity “the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized,” and a search incident to arrest, which does not have that requirement.
When a search warrant is served, a copy of the warrant is given to the person in charge of the property. This gives him due notice of the search conditions and limitations. If, for example, the police are searching for a stolen tractor, they may not open a locked briefcase they find on the premises; they have no reasonable expectation of finding the stolen tractor inside.
But a copy of the arrest warrant does not help the persons subject to a search incident for arrest, since the arrest warrant only names the person to be arrested, not the places he might ultimately be found.
The officer’s words were ambigious. He didn’t need a search warrant. And looking at the arrest warrant wouldn’t have helped you, except to mollify you and assure you that the predicate arrest was legal.
But there’s no reason, except obstinacy, to not show you the arrest warrant.
- Rick
Monty: were you talking about me? I don’t where you could possibly get the idea that I automatically hate police officers, and this seems like simply a way to dodge my question.
Bricker: I was trying to have a rational discussion. Apparently you were simply interested in impressing hypothetical lurkers. Perhaps that’s why we seem to be talking past each other. It is not question of whether I am swayed by your information, but whether I agree with your conclusions. You seem to think that because you have come up with a possible scenario which is consistent with the OP in which the cop is not guilty of trespass, that proves that he is innocent. However, I never claimed that there is no possibility of him being innocent. All I’m saying is that if I were on a jury, and heard Lord Ashtar’s testimony, and the defense presented no evidence, I would vote to convict.
And your explanation of how a cop in the house would be helpful in general completely ignores my clearly stated (and repeated, since it didn’t seem to register the first time) request as to how it would helpful in apprehending a suspect. “If a suspect flees, it’s much better to have four or five cops available to put the handcuffs on when he’s caught.” And wouldn’t it be even better to have those cops in the vicinity of the suspect, rather than being busy annoying the suspect’s family?
If you were on a jury, heard Lord Ashtar’s testimony, and the defense presented no evidence, you would have no chance to vote to convict. As a matter of law, the evidence is insufficient to establish criminal trespass.
If you disagree with me, then prove your case. Lay out the elements of criminal tresspass, and show me where each element is established. We’ll take Lord Ashtar’s evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution, granting to you all reasonable inferences fairly deducible therefrom.
Go ahead.
- Rick
Are you talkin’ ‘bout me? Ah say, ARE YOU TALKIN’ 'BOUT ME?