The U.S. Supreme Court’s recent opinion in Kentucky v. King (Case No. 09-1272, 2011) is an unnecessary expansion of a long-standing doctrine. In King, the Court held that the exigent circumstances exception to the Fourth Amendment applies to any situation in which the police are attempting to gain entry to a home, as long they do not create the exigency and have reason to believe that evidence may be destroyed if they wait to obtain a warrant.
In layman’s terms: If police have reason to believe evidence is being destroyed within a home, they do not have to get a warrant, as long as they did not do anything to cause the evidence to be destroyed. While this may seem like a fairly innocuous holding, it has profound implications for the Fourth Amendment and the ability of law enforcement officers to raid anyone’s home at will.
Your home is your castle. Ever since our laws began their fitful development in Great Britain several centuries ago, the home has always held a special status. It is provided with special protections that only an order signed by a neutral, detached magistrate can bypass. However, in King, the Court held that the certain sounds emanating from a home allowed law enforcement to bypass the warrant requirement and forcibly enter a home, since law enforcement had good reason to believe evidence of criminal activity was actually being destroyed.
This ruling is difficult to accept for two reasons. First, it turned out that the police were mistaken. They approached that particular home because they were chasing a drug dealer and believed he had entered that home. After entering the home they did not find the drug dealer, but found another person who was smoking marijuana. Their decision to enter the home was based on a mistake of fact.
Second, is it reasonable to believe that a person who is being actively chased by law enforcement would go enter an apartment and being smoking marijuana? I would think that when one is confronted by the presence of the police, the first reaction would not be to make sure that they know you are doing something illegal. The court relied on the notion that the officers’ actions were reasonable because of their belief that evidence was being destroyed in response to the officers’ presence. This makes no sense.
I have great concerns for the constant erosion of the Fourth Amendment in our nation’s highest Court. If you are being charged with a crime, don’t face it alone. Visit my website at www.shafercriminallaw.com or call me at (904)350-9333 for a free consultation.
~Robert Shafer
