UNITED STATES SUPREME COURT CASES
FOR LAW ENFORCEMENT
TOP 11
CATEGORY – SEARCH AND SEIZURE
Primary Holding
Under the Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, a police officer may stop a suspect on the street and frisk him or her without probable cause to arrest, if the police officer has a reasonable suspicion that the person has committed, is committing, or is about to commit a crime and has a reasonable belief that the person “may be armed and presently dangerous.”
Detective Martin McFadden
CATEGORY – USE OF FORCE
Primary Holding
Under the Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, a police officer may use deadly force to prevent the escape of a fleeing suspect only if the officer has a good-faith belief that the suspect poses a significant threat of death or serious physical injury to the officer or others.
CATEGORY – SEARCH AND SEIZURE
Primary Holding
After a recent arrest, the police may search a recent occupant’s vehicle if the arrestee is within reaching distance of the passenger compartment during the search or if it is reasonable to believe evidence related to the crime is present in the vehicle.
CATEGORY – SEARCH AND SEIZURE
Primary Holding
The motor vehicle exception was first established by the United States Supreme Court in 1925, in Carroll v. United States. The motor vehicle exception allows officers to search a vehicle without a search warrant if they have probable cause to believe that evidence or contraband is in the vehicle. The exception is based on the idea that there is a lower expectation of privacy in motor vehicles because of the regulations under which they operate. Also, the ease of mobility creates an inherent exigency to prevent the removal of evidence and contraband.
CATEGORY – USE OF FORCE
Primary Holding
When a person claims that police used excessive force during an investigatory stop, arrest, or other type of seizure, the claim must be reviewed using the “objective reasonableness” standard under the Fourth Amendment, not under a standard of substantive due process.
CATEGORY – INTERVIEW AND INTERROGATION
Primary Holding
Under the Fifth Amendment, any statements that a defendant in custody makes during an interrogation are admissible as evidence at a criminal trial only if law enforcement told the defendant of the right to remain silent and the right to speak with an attorney before the interrogation started, and the rights were either exercised or waived in a knowing, voluntary, and intelligent manner.
CATEGORY – SEARCH AND SEIZURE
Primary Holding
“When a policeman has made a lawful custodial arrest of the occupant of an automobile, he may, as a contemporaneous incident of that arrest, search the passenger compartment of that automobile,” and “the police may also examine the contents of any containers found within the . . . compartment.”
CATEGORY – SEARCH AND SEIZURE
Primary Holding
A warrantless entry is valid when based upon the consent of a third party whom the police, at the time of entry, reasonably believe has common authority over premises but who in fact does not.
CATEGORY – SEARCH AND SEIZURE
Primary Holding
The order to get out of the car, issued after the respondent was lawfully detained, was reasonable and thus permissible under the Fourth Amendment. The State’s proffered justification for such order — the officer’s safety — is both legitimate and weighty, and the intrusion into respondent’s personal liberty occasioned by the order, being, at most, a mere inconvenience, cannot prevail when balanced against legitimate concerns for the officer’s safety.
CATEGORY – SEARCH AND SEIZURE
Primary Holding
The prosecution is not allowed to present evidence that law enforcement secured during a search that was unconstitutional under the Fourth Amendment.
CATEGORY – SEARCH AND SEIZURE
Primary Holding
In Payton v. New York (1980), the Supreme Court ruled that, without a warrant or consent, police cannot enter a suspect’s home for a routine felony arrest, emphasizing the strong protection the Fourth Amendment affords to individuals’ homes.