Background
While driving on a stretch of Interstate 70 north of Dayton, Ohio, Robert Robinette was stopped for speeding. After verifying that Robinette had no prior violations, the officer asked Robinette to step out of his car before issuing him a verbal warning. The officer handed over Robinette's driver's license, and then asked him if he had any drugs or weapons in his car. Robinette said he did not. The officer asked Robinette if he could search the car, and Robinette agreed. The officer found a small amount of marijuana and a tablet of ecstasy. Robinette was arrested for possession of a controlled substance.
Before trial, Robinette moved to suppress the evidence seized from his car, but the trial court denied that request. Robinette then pleaded no contest to the charge. On appeal, the Ohio District Court of Appeal reversed the conviction, ruling that the search resulted from an illegal detention. The Ohio Supreme Court affirmed, ruling that the police must end a traffic stop by informing a motorist that they are free to leave before attempting to engage the motorist in a consensual interrogation or search their car. The U.S. Supreme Court agreed to review the case.
Majority opinion
Chief Justice William Rehnquist, writing for the majority, stated that "The touchstone of the Fourth Amendment is reasonableness," and reasonableness is measured by examining the totality of the circumstances. This kind of fact-specific inquiry does not accommodate bright-line rules, as the Court has repeatedly held. In fact, in Schneckloth v. Bustamonte , 412 U.S. 218 (1973), the Court had rejected a rule similar to the one adopted by the Ohio Supreme Court in this case. In Schneckloth the Court refused to adopt a rule that a search predicated on a suspect's consent is unreasonable unless the suspect knew he had the right to refuse to consent to the search. The Court reasoned it would be impractical to require the police to explain to a suspect in any detail his right to refuse consent to a search. For the same reason, the Court reasoned it would be "unrealistic to require police officers to always inform detainees that they are free to go before a consent to search may be deemed voluntary." Rather, voluntariness is a fact to be determined from all the circumstances surrounding the search.
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg concurred in the judgment of the Court. Ginsburg emphasized that the Court's holding only construed the Fourth Amendment, and that in light of the particular circumstances present in Ohio—where stops similar to Robinette's were frequently used as a pretext to search for drugs—the Ohio Supreme Court was free to adopt the first-tell-then-ask rule it articulated as part of Ohio law, without imposing that requirement on the rest of the states.
In United States criminal law, probable cause is the standard by which police authorities have reason to obtain a warrant for the arrest of a suspected criminal or the issuing of a search warrant. It is also the standard by which grand juries issue criminal indictments. The principle behind the standard is to limit the power of authorities to perform random or abusive searches, and to promote lawful evidence gathering and procedural form during criminal arrest and prosecution. The standard also applies to personal or property searches.
Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1 (1968), was a landmark decision of the Supreme Court of the United States in which the Court ruled that the Fourth Amendment's prohibition on unreasonable searches and seizures is not violated when a police officer stops a suspect on the street and frisks him or her without probable cause to arrest, if the police officer has a reasonable suspicion that the person has committed, is committing, or is about to commit a crime and has a reasonable belief that the person "may be armed and presently dangerous."
A Terry stop in the United States allows the police to briefly detain a person based on reasonable suspicion of involvement in criminal activity. Reasonable suspicion is a lower standard than probable cause which is needed for arrest. When police stop and search a pedestrian, this is commonly known as a stop and frisk. When police stop an automobile, this is known as a traffic stop. If the police stop a motor vehicle on minor infringements in order to investigate other suspected criminal activity, this is known as a pretextual stop. Additional rules apply to stops that occur on a bus.
A traffic stop, commonly called being pulled over, is a temporary detention of a driver of a vehicle by police to investigate a possible crime or minor violation of law.
Georgia v. Randolph, 547 U.S. 103 (2006), is a case in which the U.S. Supreme Court held that without a search warrant, police had no constitutional right to search a house where one resident consents to the search while another resident objects. The Court distinguished this case from the "co-occupant consent rule" established in United States v. Matlock, 415 U.S. 164 (1974), which permitted one resident to consent in absence of the co-occupant.
Illinois v. Caballes, 543 U.S. 405 (2005), was a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court held that the Fourth Amendment is not violated when the use of a drug-sniffing dog during a routine traffic stop does not unreasonably prolong the length of the stop.
Florida v. Bostick, 501 U.S. 429 (1991), was a United States Supreme Court case that overturned a per se rule imposed by the Florida Supreme Court that held consensual searches of passengers on buses were always unreasonable. The Court ruled that the fact that the search takes place on a bus is one factor in determining whether a suspect feels free to decline the search and walk away from the officers.
Consent searches are searches made by police officers in the United States based on the voluntary consent of the individual whose person or property is being searched. The simplest and most common type of warrantless searches in the United States are searches based upon consent. No warrant, probable cause or reasonable suspicion is required to perform a search if a person, or someone else with the proper authority, consents to a search.
Brendlin v. California, 551 U.S. 249 (2007), was a decision by the Supreme Court of the United States that held that all occupants of a car are "seized" for purposes of the Fourth Amendment during a traffic stop, not just the driver.
Illinois v. Lidster, 540 U.S. 419 (2004), was a case in which the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that the Fourth Amendment permits the police to use a roadblock to investigate a traffic incident.
Whren v. United States, 517 U.S. 806 (1996), was a unanimous United States Supreme Court decision that "declared that any traffic offense committed by a driver was a legitimate legal basis for a stop."
Schneckloth v. Bustamonte, 412 U.S. 218 (1973), was a U.S. Supreme Court case that ruled that in a case involving a consent search, knowledge of a right to refuse consent is a factor in determining whether a grant of consent to a search was voluntary, the state does not need to prove that the person who granted consent to search knew of the right to refuse consent under the Fourth Amendment.
Pennsylvania v. Mimms, 434 U.S. 106 (1977), is a United States Supreme Court criminal law decision holding that a police officer ordering a person out of a car following a traffic stop and conducting a pat-down to check for weapons did not violate the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution.
United States v. Mendenhall, 446 U.S. 544 (1980), was a United States Supreme Court case.
Heien v. North Carolina, 574 U.S. 54 (2014), is a decision by the United States Supreme Court, ruling that a police officer's reasonable mistake of law can provide the individualized suspicion required by the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution to justify a traffic stop. The Court delivered its ruling on December 15, 2014.
United States v. Watson, 423 U.S. 411 (1976), was a case decided by the Supreme Court of the United States that decided that a warrantless arrest in public and consenting to a vehicle search did not violate the Fourth Amendment.
Rodriguez v. United States, 575 U.S. ___ (2015), was a United States Supreme Court case which analyzed whether police officers may extend the length of a traffic stop to conduct a search with a trained detection dog. In a 6–3 opinion, the Court held that officers may not extend the length of a traffic stop to conduct a dog sniff unrelated to the original purpose of the stop. However, the Court remanded the case to the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit to determine whether the officer's extension of the traffic stop was independently justified by reasonable suspicion. Some analysts have suggested that the Court's decision to limit police authority was influenced by ongoing protests in Ferguson, Missouri.
United States v. Drayton, 536 U.S. 194 (2002), was a case in which the United States Supreme Court clarified the applicability of Fourth Amendment protections to searches and seizures that occur on buses, as well as the function of consent during searches by law enforcement. During a scheduled stop in Tallahassee, Florida, police officers boarded a Greyhound bus as part of a drug interdiction effort and interviewed passengers. After talking to two of the passengers and asking if they could "check [their] person", officers discovered the two passengers had taped several packages of cocaine to their legs. At trial, the passengers argued that officers violated their Fourth Amendment rights against unreasonable searches and seizures because the police engaged in coercive behavior and never informed them that their participation in the drug interdiction efforts was voluntary.
Birchfield v. North Dakota, 579 U.S. ___ (2016), was a case in which the Supreme Court of the United States held that the search incident to arrest doctrine permits law enforcement to conduct warrantless breath tests but not blood tests on suspected drunk drivers.
This article is a chronological list of United States criminal case law articles on Wikipedia that discuss the Fourth Amendment constitutional provision against unreasonable search and seizure in its relation to consent to search.
