Citizens' Protection Under the Fourth Amendment
Citizens of the United States are protected by the Fourth Amendment from any kind of arbitrary government inquiries and seizures. legislation enforcement agencies are required to use warrants that demonstrate probable cause before conducting any searches, according to the legislation. The legislation also specifies the circumstances in which a warrantless search may be required. Any search that is against the aforementioned legislation is regarded as unconstitutional and invalid. The Fourth Amendment has been in force ever since December 1791, when it was included in the United States Constitution and, more specifically, the Bill of Rights. (Kerr, 2015). It advocates for people to be secure in their different settings including their property and business unless there is probable cause supported by affirmation and oath that a particular law has been broken (Talai, 2014). Law enforcement agencies are entrusted in conducting investigations, making arrests and in some cases using lethal force in performing their duties. Nonetheless, these powers are constrained by the constitution and have to be exercised within the limits of the law. In case, law enforcement agencies fail to observe the above law, they transform to law breakers.
Components of the Fourth Amendment
One of the controversial laws at loggerheads with law enforcement agencies is the Fourth Amendment. This law was intended to create a buffer between the daunting power of law enforcement agencies and citizens. The law is primarily composed of three ideal components. First, it ensures that all private concerns of all citizens are handled. Secondly, it protects this privacy by limiting any form of unreasonable search by law enforcement agencies and provides conditions under which any form of search should occur. Lastly, it provides conditions into which warrants are to be released and the specific areas that the warrant addresses including the area to be searched and persons to be seized. The Fourth Amendment protects privacy of citizens and limits the powers of the law enforcement agencies in cases where probable cause, use of warrantless searches and reasonable suspicion fail to be proved.
Application of the Fourth Amendment
The Fourth Amendment governs the interaction between the citizens and law enforcement agencies. In most cases, law enforcement agencies physical apprehension could result in stopping or arresting an individual while in other cases police officer may wish to search property or persons while conducting their investigations. The Fourth Amendment is supposed to guide the interaction mentioned earlier. In certain cases, law enforcement agencies have in the past been implicated to utilize crooked methods of getting information and evidence without following the due process of the law. For instance, in the case of Weeks v. the United States, law enforcement agencies illegally entered the house of the Mr. Fremont and collected crucial information which was later presented in court against Mr. Fremont. Although the evidence was supported the charges collected against the defendant, the law enforcement agencies failed to show probable cause which could have been utilized to provide for a warrant that would have been used to search the premise (Srinivas, 2012). The court ruled that since the material presented in the court was collected in an illegal manner, it was not permissible in court regardless of the crimes associated with Mr. Fremont. The above case utilized the principles of the exclusionary rule and probable cause. The exclusionary rule limits the use of illegally collected evidence in any court of law and directly relates to the principles of probable cause. In probable cause, law is associated with reasonable grounds for making a search. In some past cases, probable cause has been utilized to provide for warrantless searches and seizures such as in the case of Illinois v Gates where a practical and viable approach was used contrary to the common factual application of the Fourth Amendment. All arrests made by the Fourth Amendment are supposed to be based on probable cause even in cases where an arrest warrant has been issued. Lack of probable cause by law enforcement agencies renders the evidence collected suppressive and in the process limits the application of the law for law enforcement agencies.
Role of Reasonable Suspicion
Reasonable suspicion is a common legal term used to justify the suspicion that a crime is being committed by an individual or an individual will perpetrate a crime (Bowers, 2014). In some instances reasonable suspicion has been utilized to prevent crime such as in the case of Texas v. Ohio where police officers employed the above principle to arrest individuals bearing illegal firearms. Reasonable suspicion is only allowed to the point that it is used in the prevention of crime. Other similar cases which have employed this principle to prevent crime include the case of Illinois v. Ward and Illinois v. Caballes. However, in some cases reasonable suspicion has been used as a form of a warrantless search and in the process has contravened the elements envisioned in the Fourth Amendment. In the past cases within the United States, there has been an outcry from specific members of the populace and more specifically the African American community which claims it has become the target for police arrests based on the aspects such as reasonable suspicion and probable cause even in cases where it has not been proven. A report by the United Nations indicates that the high number of African Americans in jail were attributed to reasonable suspicion by police officers (Cummings, 2015). In some cases, police officers would stop cars containing African Americans and carry out warrantless searches along the traffic. The case of Hein v North Carolina provides an example whereby police suspicion may be misplaced and may result in the arrest and prosecution of an innocent individual.
Warrantless Searches Under the Fourth Amendment
Warrantless searches can be conducted under the Fourth Amendment law under specific circumstances. In cases where individual consents to law enforcement agencies in a voluntary manner, a warrantless search becomes legal. However, this does not apply in specific organizational settings such as those rented by an individual like motels. Law enforcement agencies cannot search hotels and motel for criminal evidence without the use of a warrant as elucidated in the case of U.S v Jeffers. Parents can also provide consent for their children to be searched though the reverse is not allowed or not permissible. One spouse can allow searches to be conducted in a house provided the other spouse is in agreement as in the case of Georgia v Randolph (Sklansky, 2014). Although the use of warrantless searches may be permitted under the law, it is necessary to outline when the use of warrantless searches are not allowed by the Fourth Amendment. Ideally, if warrantless searches were permitted under the law, it would have provided room for the different abuses of power since law enforcement agencies would not follow principles such as the exclusionary law in collecting evidence to be presented in the court of law (Kerr, 2013). The case of Riley against the state of California provides elaborate information on the case. Riley was arrested for driving a car with a suspended driving license. Later on, the police searched the car and linked Riley to one of the criminal gangs that had been involved in an earlier shooting. The police went further to seize and search Riley mobile phone without Riley consent. This yielded important information on criminal activities associated with certain gangs. Since the police used data from the cell phone without any form of warrant and the permission of the owner, they were deemed to have broken the Fourth Amendment, and the case was subsequently dismissed on this premise.
Conclusion
The Fourth Amendment safeguards the rights of citizens against any form of seizures and searches without the due process being followed. In essence, it protects the privacy of the citizens, their property, and their business. Police utilize principles such as probable cause and reasonable suspicion to determine if a particular crime has occurred though the use of the above principles are supposed to be aligned with the Fourth Amendment. Unlawful use of warrantless searches is also not permitted under the Fourth Amendment unless consent has been provided by an individual.
References
Bowers, J. (2014). Probable Cause, Constitutional Reasonableness, and the unrecognized point of a "pointless indignity." Stanford Law Review, 66(5), 987-1050.
Cummings, S. (2015). Search & Seizure: Historical Analysis of the Fourth Amendment. Retrieved from http://vc.bridgew.edu/honors_proj/131/
Kerr, O. S. (2013). The Curious History of Fourth Amendment Searches. The Supreme Court Review, 2012(1), 67-97. http://doi.org/10.1086/670228
Kerr, O. S. (2015). The Fourth Amendment and the Global Internet. Stanford Law Review, 67(285), 286-329.
Sklansky, D. (2014). Two More Ways Not to Think About Privacy and the Fourth Amendment. Retrieved from https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2474936
Srinivas, R. V. (2012). The exclusionary rule as fourth amendment judicial review. American Criminal Law Review, 49(1), 179-225.
Talai, A. B. (2014). Drones and Jones: The fourth amendment and police discretion in the digital age. California Law Review. http://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781107415324.004
