Do Police Need a Warrant to Search Property

Jennifer Springer

BUSN201

Business Law - Final Paper

Do Police Need a Warrant to Search Property

On February 15, 2014 the Supreme Court ruled it would honor the Fourth Amendment’s warrant requirement when one cotenant refuses a warrantless search prior to being arrested, and then police receiving consent by the other cotenant to search the property.

If a person’s health and safety are threatened by a domestic abuser, exigent circumstances would justify immediate removal of the abuser from the premises. Domestic abuse is indeed a serious problem in the United States, appropriate policy responses to this scourge may include fostering effective counseling, providing public information about, and ready access to, protective orders, and enforcing such orders diligently.

Although in some cases a warrantless search would be unconstitutional, Police would need to know the difference when a warrant is required. I believe that a warrantless search by police is constitutional and meets the reasonableness of the IV Amendment, as long as one present cotenant gives consent and there is probable cause. A warrantless search can help minimize criminal activity. As well as help those in domestic disputes and or child abuse situations.

There have been many cases that have involved warrantless search cases over the years. Starting with Amos v. United States (1921), Amos was indictment for six counts. Not guilty on the first four counts, but guilty on the fifth, charging him with having removed whisky on which the revenue tax had not been paid to a place other than a government warehouse, and also on the sixth, which charged him with having sold whisky on which the tax required by law had not been paid. He requested the private property of his, which it was the District Attorney intended to use in evidence at the trial and which had been seized officers in a search of his home and store, made unlawfully and without warrant of any kind, in violation of his rights under the...