Constitutional Law

Our government has a standing constitution which guarantees that no person shall be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law. The prosecution might make an argument that this rule might apply only to U.S citizens. However, the text of the Fifth Amendment affords this guarantee to all persons, not merely U.S citizens. Mr. Kaliskasparov entered this country legally and has a permanent resident status. A long line of Supreme Court cases have established that aliens who enter the country legally receive certain protections, including the guarantees of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendment. This allows our client protection from government custody, detentions and imprisonment without a trial and a judgment of guilt just as United States citizens enjoy.

The prosecution argues that Trooper Dollar accidently discovered the adhesive and later the gun, binder, and letter in the course of performing his duty as an officer of the law during the traffic stop. However, the defendant was asked to follow Trooper Dollar to the station for further investigation. This would not have been within the protocol for a regular traffic stop that the officer would have conducted had it not been for the car’s emblem being changed and the fresh adhesive on the windshield. Obviously the suspected attempt to alter the vehicle would have been within the boundaries to obtain a warrant, however the trooper did not take this step. Because the DPS Trooper is a Texas entity and not federal, Mapp v. Ohio intends that state agencies must adhere to the same guidelines as their federal counterparts. The Mapp v. Ohio decision was also meant to further prevent warrantless searches of individuals as well as their property.

In Katz v. United States the court decided that the physical intrusion of surveillance was not necessary to violate the 4th amendment. The conversation that was observed from the restaurant and the ‘Mickey Mouse’ Hamas tape were taken without a warrant by the...