ENVIRONMENTAL & ENERGY LAW & POLICY JOURNAL
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Court decisions related to automobile searches and seizures
a.
Fourth Amendment Rights
It is without doubt that the Fourth Amendment of the US Constitution promises the
right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses and effects, against unreasonable
searches and seizures, “and no warrant shall issue, without probable cause, supported by
oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched and the persons
or things to be seized.”1 This language might stand for the preposition that for searches
by government officials to be reasonable, they must have a warrant issued, and that
warrant must be on the basis of probable cause.2 But, the language, in practice has been
interpreted to allow warrantless searches in a number of circumstances. 3 Exceptions to
the general requirement of a warrant include when consent has been given,4 when exigent
circumstances exist,5 when evidence is in plain view of the enforcement authorities,6
when the suspect is the subject of a “Terry” stop7 and when the search is done and
performed at the time of the arrest.8 Another exception applies in cases involving
automobiles9, which I discuss below.
1
US CONST. amend. IV.
Probable cause for the issuance of a search warrant is defined as facts or apparent facts
as viewed through the eyes of an experienced police officer which would lead a man of
reasonable caution to believe that there is something connected with a violation of law on
the premises to be searched. J. SHANE CREAMER, The Law of Arrest, Search and Seizure
11 (1975).
3
See N. GARY HOLTEN & LAWSON L. LAMAR, THE CRIMINAL COURTS: STRUCTURES,
PERSONNEL, AND PROCESSES 151-153 (1991).
4
See Schneckloth v. Bustamonte, 312 U.S. 218, 228 (1973).
5
See Minnesota v. Olson, 495 U.S. 91 (1990)
6
See Horton v California, 469 U.S. 28 (1990).
7
See Terry v. Texas, 392 U.S. 1 (1968).
8
See Chimel v California, 395 U.S. 752 (1969) & New York v. Belton, 453 U.S. 454
(1981).
9
See Carroll v. United States, 267 U.S. 132 (1942).
2
It may be surprising to some, but there are certain types of searches and seizures that
are analyzed completely outside the context of probable cause altogether. For example,
police officers may automatically conducts an inventory search of items left in their care
and custody.10 Similarly, law enforcement and customs agents are given broad discretion
to conduct searches and seizures at foreign borders11. Some check-points and road-blocks
are also good in the absence of a probable cause.12 These types of governmental
intrusions are justified not by the existance of a warrant or probable cause, but rather as
an administrative or community caretaking necessity.
To some extent, 4th Amendment jurisprudence can be categorized by the case law that
has developed from each of the exceptions to the general warrant requirement and the
various types of admin and regulatory searches and seizures. Each of these areas are
governed by special rules when the search or seizure is done on an automobile. However,
the Court relied on a set of common rationales in each of these areas and principles in
deciding all search and seizure cases that are connected to autos. These guilding
standards were first articulated and developed in the the automobile search warrant
exception cases, and stand as guidelines for the courts.
b.
The Carroll Doctrine
The car exception of the requirement of a warrant was initialy a response to vehicle
mobility.13 When faced with situations involving suspected criminals and / or evidence in
10
See South Dakota v. Opperman, 428 U.S. 364 (1976).
See Michigan Dept of State Police v. Sitz, 496 U.S. 44, 450 (1990).
12
United States v. Martinez Fuerte 428 US 543 (1976)
13
Kevin Corr, A LAW ENFORCEMENT PRIMER ON VEHICLE SEARCHES, 30 Loyola University
Of Chicago Law Journal 1, 16 (1998).
11
an automobile14 that could be easily moved out of a policeman’s jurisdiction. It could
also be moved simply to another location where it might no be found again, the Court has
odopted allowing the police to search absent a warrant. This exception applies in those
cases where probable cause exists in believing that evidence of a crime will be found if a
vehicle search is conducted. Thus the two main ingredients to the exception are bona fide
probable cause and immediate exigency.
The foundating decision for the aformentioned automobile exception is Carroll v United
States.15
This Carroll case involved the warrant-less search of an car believed to be carrying
bootleg alcohol during the the 1920s, when it was the Prohibition Era are alcohol was
illegal.The expected bootleg brew, upon searching the car, was found and seized.16 The
defendant, of course, later challenged the search and the admission of the liquor into
evidence.17 In its decision, The Supreme Court took time to analyze earlier cases and the
Farmers desires in drafting the Fourth Amendment language.18 In clear and unmistakable
language, the court stated that in deconstructing the Fourth Amendment vehicles are
I use the terms “automobile,” “car,” and “vehicle” interchangeably without any
indented difference in definition. Fourth Amendment case law in this area seems to apply
to all motorized vehicles, including air and watercraft and motor homes. See California v.
Carney, 471 U.S. 386, 393 n.2 (1985).
15
Carroll v. United States, 267 U.S. 132 (1925)
16
Federal prohibition agents were on a regular tour of duty patrolling the highway
between Detroit and Grand Rapids, looking for violators of the Prohibition Act, when
they spotted a car driven by George Carroll and John Kiro, two suspected bootleggers.
The agents stopped the vehicle and conducted a warrantless search on the belief that the
car contained bootleg liquor hidden inside the seat. The police found that the upholstery
seat filling had been removed, and discovered a substantial amount of liquor. Carroll and
Kiro were convicted of transporting “intoxicating spirituous liquor.”
17
Catherine A. Shepard, Search and Seizure: From Carroll to Ross, the Odyssey of the
Automobile Exception, 32 Cath. U. L. Rev. 221, p225 (1982).
18
Carroll, 267 U.S. 132, [get page #s for this].
14
treated differently than dwellings and other like structures.19 The court’s justification for
this difference was really high mobility of the vehicle.20 Mobility was clearly a factor in
Mr. Carroll’s case because the car was initially observed on the highway and then
stopped on the highway.21 In a large number of cases, Carroll has since been followed,
applied, and approvingly cited many times22, and almost never criticized or distinguished.
Id. at 151. (where the Court stated that “the guaranty of freedom from unreasonable
searches and seizures by the Fourth Amendment has been construed, practically since the
beginning of the government, as recognizing a necessary difference between a search of a
store, dwelling house, or other structure in respect of which a proper official warrant
readily may be obtained and a search of a ship, motor boat, wagon, or automobile for
contraband goods, where it is not practicable to secure a warrant, because the vehicle can
be quickly moved out of the locality or jurisdiction in which the warrant must be
sought.”)
20
Id.
21
Id. 160.
22
See Chambers v Maroney, 399 U.S. 42, 49-50 (1970) (amusingly listing some of the
cases that have followed in the “tyre tracks” of Carroll).
19