Something Rots in Law Enforcement and It’s the Search Warrant: The Breonna Taylor Case

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Blanche Cook

2017 ◽  
Vol 30 (1) ◽  
pp. 153-175
Author(s):  
Vinesh Basdeo

The requirements and safeguards for a valid search warrant in South African criminal procedure are critically analysed in this article. The existence of safeguards to regulate the way in which law enforcement officials may enter the private sphere of ordinary citizens is one of the features that distinguish a constitutional democracy from a police state. South African experience has been notoriously varied in this regard. Many generations of systemised and egregious violations of personal privacy established norms for citizens that seeped generally into the public administration and promoted amongst a great many officials habits and practices inconsistent with the standard of conduct now required by the Bill of Rights. Today, law enforcement officials must be highly skilled in the use of investigative tools and extremely knowledgeable about the intricacies of the law. One error in judgment during initial contact with a suspect can, and often does, impede the investigation and could affect the fairness of the trial. For example, an illegal search may so contaminate evidence obtained that it will not be admitted as evidence in court. In addition to losing evidence for prosecution purposes, failing to comply with constitutional mandates often leads to liability on the part of the law enforcement official.



2020 ◽  
Vol 46 (4) ◽  
pp. 375-411
Author(s):  
Ryan Knox

The opioid crisis is one of the largest public health problems in the history of the United States. Prescription drug monitoring programs (“PDMPs”)—state databases containing the records of all prescriptions for controlled substances written in the state—have emerged as a means to track opioid prescribing and use. While PDMPs are typically used as a tool for physicians to inform their prescribing practices, many states also permit law enforcement to access PDMPs when investigating controlled substance distribution, often without prior judicial approval. Such law enforcement use of PDMPs raises serious questions of patient privacy. The Fourth Amendment protects individuals from unreasonable searches and seizures where they have a reasonable expectation of privacy and has been interpreted to require law enforcement have probable cause and a search warrant before infringing upon an individual’s reasonable expectation of privacy. Several courts have held that patients have no reasonable expectation of privacy, or a severely diminished expectation of privacy, in their prescription drug records held in PDMPs. As support, courts rely on the third-party doctrine because the information is disclosed to physicians and then held by the state; the highly regulated nature of the prescription drug industry; and the statutory framework of the Controlled Substances Act. Such analysis disregards patients’ expectation of privacy in their personal health information, the confidentiality in the physician-patient relationship, and the resulting patient incentives not to seek care. Therefore, this Article argues that law enforcement must have probable cause and a search warrant to access PDMPs because the exceptions to the Fourth Amendment’s probable cause and warrant requirements do not apply.



2018 ◽  
Vol 14 (3) ◽  
pp. 792-804
Author(s):  
Adam Dobrin ◽  
Seth W Fallik ◽  
Brian P Mello

Abstract This research examines American police operations by Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) units. In this study, SWAT unit proactive search warrant deployments in Maryland over a 4-year period (2010–13) were analysed to see if they were influenced by violent crime rates, property crimes rates, vice crime rates, and the number of sworn law enforcement officers across four models (two random effects and fixed effects models). The results reveal an inverse relationship between proactive vice type arrests and SWAT unit proactive search warrant deployments. The results are discussed as they inform SWAT unit policies in a democracy.



Author(s):  
Joseph R. Budd ◽  
Michael W. Littrell

Intelligence gathering by law enforcement officers has been used in the conviction of criminals for many years in the United States. Law enforcement officers must ensure that the information gathered and seized does not violate the Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution. However, officers, even though acting in the spirit of the law, may not be in legal compliance. This chapter identifies and discusses the requirements of a search warrant, the legally accepted exceptions to the search warrant requirements in the United States, and reviews several historical and modern United States Supreme Court cases on the gathering of intelligence by officers.



Author(s):  
H. M. Sagara ◽  
S. A. Schliebe ◽  
M. C. Kong

Particle analysis by scanning electron microscopy with energy-dispersive x- ray analysis is one of the current methods used in crime laboratories to aid law enforcement in identifying individuals who have recently fired or handled a firearm. During the discharge of a firearm, the high pressure caused by the detonation of the cartridge materials forces a portion of the generated gases through leaks in the firing mechanism of the weapon. These gases contain residues of smokeless powder, primer mixture, and contributions from the projectile itself. The condensation of these hot gases form discrete, micrometer-sized particles, which can be collected, along with dry skin cells, salts, and other hand debris, from the hands of a shooter by a simple adhesive lift technique. The examination of the carbon-coated adhesive lifts consist of time consuming systematic searches for high contrast particles of spherical morphology with the characteristic elemental composition of antimony, barium and lead. A detailed list of the elemental compositions which match the criteria for gunshot residue are discussed in the Aerospace report.







1998 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Finn ◽  
Julie Esselman Tomz


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