The Abandonment of Digital Devices
Our cell phones and laptops normally are subject to a reasonable expectation of privacy, meaning that police cannot search them without a search warrant or an applicable exception to the […]
September 12, 2022
Update on Pole Cameras and the Fourth Amendment
When an officer attaches a video camera to a utility pole and uses it to monitor a suspect’s home continuously for several months, is that a “search” within the meaning […]
June 25, 2018
Supreme Court Rules that Obtaining Cell Site Location Information Is a Search
On Friday, the Supreme Court issued a long-awaited opinion in Carpenter v. United States. The Court held that when law enforcement obtains long-term cell site location information from a suspect’s […]
May 21, 2018
Supreme Court: Driver of Rental Car, Not Listed on Rental Agreement, Has Reasonable Expectation of Privacy
A week ago today, the Supreme Court of the United States resolved a circuit split and ruled that a person driving a rental car, but not listed on the rental […]
December 13, 2017
Questions and Resources about Searches of Cloud Storage
If a law enforcement officer obtains a search warrant for a suspect’s cell phone, may the officer use the phone to access cloud storage to which it is linked? For […]
July 12, 2016
Pole Camera Surveillance Under the Fourth Amendment
Placing a video camera on a utility pole and conducting surveillance can be a useful law enforcement tool to gather information without requiring an in-person presence by officers at all […]
May 17, 2016
May an Officer Assume a False Identity Online in Order to “Friend” a Suspect?
Officers are allowed to misrepresent their identities in the course of their investigations: they may pose as drug buyers, or prostitutes, or members of an organized crime syndicate. Is the […]
January 24, 2012
The Supreme Court on GPS Tracking: U.S. v. Jones
Yesterday, the United States Supreme Court decided United States v. Jones, the important GPS tracking case I previously blogged about here. (The case was captioned United States v. Maynard at […]
May 18, 2011
Do Multi-Unit Dwellings Have Curtilage?
The curtilage of a home is the area “directly and intimately connected with the [home] and in proximity” to it. State v. Courtright, 60 N.C. App. 247 (1983). In other […]
May 9, 2011
Guests’ Expectation of Privacy in Garages and Outbuildings
I’ve had a couple of questions recently about something that I’d never considered before: whether a guest has “standing” to contest a search of the outbuildings associated with a host’s […]
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