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Fourth Amendment Law Enforcement

The Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution protects citizens from unreasonable searches and seizures and provides that warrants may only be granted upon findings of probable cause. The Fourth... more +
The Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution protects citizens from unreasonable searches and seizures and provides that warrants may only be granted upon findings of probable cause. The Fourth Amendment applies to the States via the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.  Important areas of Fourth Amendment jurisprudence flow from questions surrounding the definitions of "search" and "seizure," the applicability of the Amendment to so-called "stop and frisk" situations, the level of control that must be exerted by law enforcement before an individual is deemed "seized," and the "exclusionary rule," just to name a few.    less -
Husch Blackwell LLP

Supreme Court Rejects "Moment-of-Threat" Rule in Section 1983 Excessive Force Suit

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In Barnes v. Felix, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously held that courts evaluating Fourth Amendment excessive-force claims in Section 1983 lawsuits against law enforcement officers must consider the “totality of the...more

Dorsey & Whitney LLP

The Supreme Court Update - May 15, 2025

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The Supreme Court of the United States issued one decision today: Barnes v. Felix, No. 23-1239: This criminal procedure case concerns the proper scope of analysis for Fourth Amendment excessive force claims....more

EDRM - Electronic Discovery Reference Model

En Banc Fourth Circuit Geofence Decision is Splintered

In U.S. v. Chatrie, __ F. 4th __, 2025 WL 1242063 (4th Cir. Apr. 30, 2025)(en banc), the Court issued a per curiam affirmance of the District Court’s geofence decision. Fourteen judges joined in that decision. There were...more

Marshall Dennehey

A Neck-Hold Is Not Clearly-Established Excessive Force

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Moore v. Oakland County, Michigan, 126 F.4th 1163 (6th Cir. 2025) - This § 1983 lawsuit was filed against a police officer after a confrontation during a traffic stop in which the plaintiff resisted compliance. Despite the...more

McAfee & Taft

Gavel to Gavel: Warrants and the workplace

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Law enforcement agents are not all-powerful in the United States; their power is restricted by the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution. Although primetime police dramas often paper over the details, every...more

Venable LLP

Online Applications Are Tracking Your Location, and the Government Wants That Information. Is That Lawful?

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When you use your cellphone to search for businesses near you, you may opt into data collection about your location with an accuracy of within a few hundred feet. Often, unless you affirmatively opt out later, that data...more

Falcon Rappaport & Berkman LLP

Not So Fast, Court Tells New York City Sheriff’s Office – Court Issues Injunction Ordering Immediate STOP to “Unconstitutional”...

Recently, New York State Supreme Court Justice Thomas Marcelle ordered an immediate halt to warrantless searches of licensed hemp retailers. These searches had been conducted in connection with raids targeting smoke shops and...more

Gardner Law

How to Protect Your Business During a Search Warrant Execution

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Responding to Law Enforcement and Safeguarding Your Interests - In this final installment of our series on government investigations, we tackle the most daunting scenario: the execution of a search warrant at your...more

Rodemer Kane Attorneys at Law

Colorado DUI Checkpoints: 5 Jaw-Dropping Truths Every Driver Must Know

In Colorado, law enforcement conducts DUI and DWAI screenings at temporary traffic stops known as sobriety checkpoints. These checkpoints allow law enforcement to briefly contact and interact with all the drivers...more

BakerHostetler

First Circuit Adds Another Notch to the IRS’ Belt - Upholds Power To Summons Information from Virtual Currency Exchanges

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Anyone who thought blockchain would keep their cryptocurrency transactions private from the IRS needs to think again. According to the First Circuit’s recent holding, cryptocurrency users do not have a Fourth Amendment...more

WilmerHale

The Impact and Future of the Fifth Circuit’s New Hard-Line Stance on Geofence Warrants

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On August 9, 2024, the Fifth Circuit issued its decision in United States v. Smith, No. 23-60321, broadly holding: “that the use of geofence warrants … is unconstitutional under the Fourth Amendment.” This categorical holding...more

Robins Kaplan LLP

To Seize or Not to Seize: Campus Protests and Police Uses of Force

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Dozens of college and university campuses experienced protests in April and May of 2024 due to the ongoing conflict in the Middle East. Many were peaceful, but some turned violent — and they engendered a wide variety of law...more

WilmerHale

Outlier or Trend? A Possible Narrowing of the Border Search Exception for Electronic Devices

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As we wrote in a note back in December 2020, the border search exception to the Fourth Amendment is a powerful investigative tool relied on by law enforcement to gather critical physical and digital evidence because it allows...more

Zuckerman Spaeder LLP

How many times can the same police department arrest you on a warrant that bears your name but is plainly not intended for you?

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What’s in a name? If it’s in a warrant and you’re in the Eleventh Circuit, enough to arrest and jail you for three days even if you don’t match the description of the wanted person, the warrant was issued 26 years earlier...more

Baker Donelson

A Victory for Qualified Immunity. A Trend to Continue?

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Events from recent years related to alleged police misconduct raised major questions surrounding the protections afforded by qualified immunity to police officers in excessive force claims. Two recent Supreme Court decisions...more

Patterson Belknap Webb & Tyler LLP

Rare En Banc Second Circuit Says “Spread Eagle” Order Not a Search Over Spirited Dissents Decrying State of Fourth Amendment...

The Second Circuit, sitting en banc, reversed a panel decision holding that officers lacked reasonable suspicion to frisk defendant Calvin Weaver after a traffic stop. The en banc majority (Judge Nardini, who authored the...more

Rumberger | Kirk

Supreme Court Rejects Community Caretaking Doctrine to Authorize Warrantless Search of Home to Seize Firearms

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The 21st Century law enforcement officer serves a variety of public service functions, only some of which involve the enforcement of criminal laws. From some of those non-criminal public service roles, the courts have...more

Poyner Spruill LLP

Torres v. Madrid (New Excessive Force Opinion from SCOTUS)

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In a 5-3 decision authored by Chief Justice Roberts, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Torres v. Madrid that a woman who was shot while fleeing from police officers was “seized,” even though she remained at large. ...more

Dorsey & Whitney LLP

The Supreme Court - March 25, 2021

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Ford Motor Co. v. Montana Eighth Judicial Dist., No. 19-368; Ford Motor Co. v. Bandemer, No. 19-369: In two separate products liability actions, petitioner Ford Motor Company challenged the Montana and Minnesota State courts’...more

Womble Bond Dickinson

U.S. Surveillance Society Could Learn from EU Approach to Privacy

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We have learned in the past year that privacy protection can often conflict with pandemic protections, as contact tracing regimes and databases of infections and vaccinations highlight people’s personal situations in the...more

Dorsey & Whitney LLP

The Supreme Court - November 20, 2020

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United States v. Cooley, No. 19-1414: Whether the lower courts erred in suppressing evidence on the theory that a police officer of an Indian tribe lacked authority to temporarily detain and search respondent, a non-Indian,...more

Patterson Belknap Webb & Tyler LLP

Second Circuit Reverses One Conviction for Lack of Venue, Affirms Others Despite Unlawful Warrant

In United States v. Purcell, the Second Circuit (Lynch, Pooler, and Park) considered the conviction of defendant Lavellous Purcell on five counts all arising out of his operation of a prostitution business. On appeal,...more

Womble Bond Dickinson

U.S. Customs Opens Mass Searches of Data on Confiscated Traveler Smartphones, Computers

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I am an advocate of providing law enforcement officers the newest technology to do their jobs well. If there is a recording of an event, the police should be able to use it. If a stingray can capture cell phone...more

Haight Brown & Bonesteel LLP

Ninth Circuit Upholds Officers’ Qualified Immunity in Dynamic Shooting Case

In Neftali Monzon v. City of Murrieta et al. (No. 19-55164, filed July 22/2020), Plaintiffs Neftali Monzon and Marylou Monzon sued the City of Murrieta and five individually named police officers (collectively “Defendants”)...more

Sullivan & Worcester

The Fourth Amendment Downs 'Video Voyeurism' in Kraft SpaGate Case

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On Wednesday, Florida’s Fourth District Court of Appeal affirmed a lower court decision excluding video evidence that Florida prosecutors sought to use in their case against hundreds of men who allegedly patronized the...more

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