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Unreasonable Search

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Submitted By MrzBrooks1
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Unreasonable Search In the Fourth Amendment, they protected “the right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures.” However, they did not have telephones and had no way to anticipate future technological developments. As a result, they listed only persons, houses, papers, and effects as entitled to Fourth Amendment protection. It does not exactly define what an “unreasonable search” is but it does give an example that leaves some things open for interpretation. For instance, if there is imminent danger or something of that nature the circumstances change for what an “unreasonable search” classifies as. An officer would be allowed to search premises without a warrant in a situation like that. The Katz and Olmstead cases are two examples of how the Fourth Amendment is interpreted. In the case of Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347 (1967), the search aspect was based on fact that since there was "no physical entrance into the area occupied by" petitioner, there was no violation to the Fourth Amendment. The difference in the Olmstead v. United States, 277 U.S. 438 (1928), was that the Fourth Amendment protects people, not places. What a person knowingly exposes to the public, even in his own home or office, is not a subject of Fourth Amendment protection. But what he seeks to preserve as private, even in an area accessible to the public, may be constitutionally protected. So in this case the government relies on the language of the Amendment, and it claims that the protection given thereby cannot properly be held to include a telephone conversation. The Supreme Court held that the Fourth Amendment is implicated whenever the police use sense-enhancing technologies, not in general public use, to explore details inside a home that would previously have been unknowable without a physical

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