On May 16, 2011 the United States Supreme Court delivered an opinion that drastically changes the rights afforded to citizenry under the Fourth Amendment. The case, Kentucky v. King, involves officers smelling marijuanna inside a home and entering the home (forcefully) without a warrant. The officers entered the home under the guise that they believed that they heard sounds indicative of evidence being destroyed. While there are several legal issues present in the case the crux of the case is - did the police have exigent circumstances to enter the home without a warrant?
The majority of the Supreme Court Justices said yes. Only one Justice, Justice Ginsberg, dissented saying that the actions of the officers violated our rights to be free from search and seizure under the Fourth Amendment.
One of the most distubing points of the opinion to me was that the Court acknowledged that many states hold that even with exigent circumstances, the officers cannot circumvent the Fourth Amendment if the officers acted in bad faith and actually created the exigent circumstances.
Let me give an example of an exigent circumstance. Say an officer runs upon a burning building and believes that someone is trapped inside. The officer can legally enter the home without a warrant to save the unlucky occupant. In addition, since the officer has legally entered the home to save the occupant, any evidence the officer sees or obtains while inside the burning building can be used against the occupant (or whomever) in Court. I doubt that any legal scholors would say that the officers entry into the buring building under these circumstances could be considered "unreasonable".
Lets take it a step further now. Say an officer has been observing a suspected criminal for some time and cannot seem to get enough evidence to obtain a search warrant for the suspects home. What if the officer sets the suspects house on fire then enters the residence under the 'exigent circumstances" rule, saying that he believed that someone was inside the buring building. This extreme example is clearly a case of "bad faith" on the part of the officer.
The Supreme Court's decision in Kentucky v. Harris does away with the "bad faith" precautions. Under the decision in Harris, the intent of the officers in the creation or explotation of the exigent circumstances are not relevant in determining the validity of the warrantless entry.
In 2009, the Supreme Court said that search incident to arrest were limited to 'searching for furtherance of the crime committed" (see Arizona v. Gant). Having been in law enforcement for over a decade, prior to the decision in Gant, you never heard of officers testifying that they searched 'for evidence in furtherace of the crime committed". Since the Gant decision it seems like I hear officers testify to that rational weekly.
So after todays decision I fully expect to see more cases of warrantless entry into private residences without a warrant under the guise of "belief that evidence was being destroyed". You can mark my words on this one....
