"No" the Supreme Court has answered in Collins v. Virginia. The case arises from an intersection of two prongs to the Fourth Amendment: (1) the protection offered a home and its immediate surroundings (called "curtilage") and, (2) the automobile (better called the motor vehicle) exception to the warrant requirement.
Here's what happened. Police became suspicious that Ryan Collins had and was operating a stolen motorcycle. They set up surveillance of Collins'residence and saw parked there at the top of the driveway a motorcycle covered by a tarp. A police officer walked up the driveway, lifted up the tarp, recorded the license plate and VIN numbers, which were then used to confirm that the motorcycle was stolen. Collins was later arrested at the house, while standing in its front door, and charged with receiving stolen property.
Collins argued that the Fourth Amendment prohibited police from walking up the driveway of his residence and examining the motorcycle. The state, having nothing better to rely upon, argued that the vehicle exception to the Fourth Amendment applied and allowed the warrantless search.
The Court held that the vehicle "exception [to the Fourth Amendment] does not permit an officer without a warrant to enter a home or its curtilage in order to search the vehicle therein."
This seems an easy case and, indeed, the ruling commanded an 8-1 majority. Unsurprisingly, Justice Alito dissented and colorfully lambasted the majority:
An ordinary person of common sense would react to the Court's decision the way Mr. Bumble famously responded when told about a legal rule that did not comport with the reality of everyday life. If that is the law, he exclaimed, "the law is a ass – a idiot." C. Dickens, Oliver Twist 277 (1867).
That is harsh and misdirected criticism since all the Court was doing was applying the very core of the Fourth Amendment's purpose:
- When it comes to the Fourth Amendment, the home is first among equals. Florida v. Jardines, 569 U.S. 1, 6 (2013).
- At the Amendment's very core stands the right of a man to retreat into his own home and there be free from unreasonable governmental intrusion. Silverman v. United States, 365 U.S. 505, 511 (1961).
- To give full practical effect to that right, the court considers curtilage – "the area 'immediately surrounding and associated with the home -- to be part of the home itself for Fourth Amendment purposes. Oliver v. United States, 466 U.S. 170, 180 (1984).
- The protection afforded the curtilage is essentially a protection of families and personal privacy in an area intimately linked to the home, both physically and psychologically, where privacy expectations are most heightened. California v. Ciraolo, 476 U.S. 207, 212-13 (1986).
Justice Alito will likely go his entire tenure on the Supreme Court without ever voting for a criminal defendant; for some umpires with some batters it is a strike every time. According to him, government agents should be able to walk right onto your property and rummage around in your belongings. Wake up, Sam!
Robert L. Abell
www.RobertAbellLaw.com
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