U.S. Constitution Amendments Quiz

U.S. Constitutional Amendments Related to Policing

• 1st Amendment: Protects freedom of speech, religion, press, assembly, and petition. Limits on speech include obscenity, fighting words, threats, and incendiary speech. Citizens may record police actions (verbally, written, symbolically (signs)) and videotape with consent, or even secretly.

• 2nd Amendment: Establishes the right to keep and bear arms.

• 4th Amendment: Prohibits unreasonable searches and seizures by the government. Crucial for policing, as officers must understand what constitutes a search and seizure. The more intrusive the action, the stronger the need for police justification. Important legal standards for searches include warrants, exceptions to warrants, probable cause, specific and articulable facts, consensual encounters, plain view, exigent circumstances.

• 5th Amendment: Protects against self-incrimination and double jeopardy. Similar to Article 12 of the Massachusetts Declaration of Rights.

• 6th Amendment: Enshrines the rights of accused persons to an attorney, speedy trial, and an impartial jury.

• 8th Amendment: Protects against excessive bail, fines, and cruel and unusual punishments.

• 14th Amendment: Guarantees due process and equal protection under the law to all citizens. Applies Bill of Rights protections to the states.

Massachusetts Declaration of Rights

• Article 12: Similar protections as the 5th Amendment.

• Article 14: Similar protections as the 4th Amendment.

• Massachusetts Constitution: All laws must comply with the state constitution, sometimes offering greater protections than the U.S. Constitution. The constitution is divided into parts, chapters, sections, and articles of amendments.

Sources of Law

• Statutory Law: Written laws enacted by legislative branches (state or federal).

• Case Law: Court interpretations of law, often reviewed through fact patterns.

Legal Standards for Police Actions

• Objective vs. Subjective Tests: Objective reasonableness focuses on what a reasonable person would do, while subjective focuses on an individual's specific beliefs and actions.

• Seizures and Searches:

  • Search: Intrusion into a person's privacy (home, body, property) by police.
  • Seizure: Police taking possession of property, arresting someone, or restricting movement.
  • Reasonable Expectation of Privacy (Katz Test): A person must have subjective expectation of privacy, and that expectation must be one that society recognizes as reasonable. Courts consider a search's reasonableness based on various factors.

• Probable Cause: Trustworthy facts and circumstances showing it's more likely than not that a crime has been committed or evidence exists. Critical for arrests and searches.

• Reasonable Suspicion: Less than probable cause, but more than a hunch. Used for temporary investigative stops and frisks, requiring specific and articulable facts.

  • Aguilar-Spinelli Rule: Evaluates non-police sources of information, requiring basis of knowledge and veracity.
  • Factors that can support reasonable suspicion/probable cause include encounter location, reason for encounter, officer training and experience, suspect's behavior (nervousness, evasiveness), high-crime areas, the suspect's race (considered alongside other evidence).

Exclusionary Rule

• Purpose: Deter police misconduct, remedy for violated constitutional rights.
  • Requirements for invoking: Government action (police), standing (violation of the individual's rights), reasonable expectation of privacy (Katz test), lack of probable cause (warrant or valid exception).
  • Exceptions: Attenuation/purging the taint, independent source, inevitable discovery, defective warrant, invalid arrest.

Voluntary Encounters

• Definition: Police can approach and question citizens in public places without justification if the person is willing to listen and answer.

Arrest Warrants

• Execution: Officers announce presence & purpose before forcibly entering, unless a no-knock warrant has been granted.
  • Restriction: Non-compliance with knock-and-announce can lead to evidence suppression.
• Jurisdiction: An arrest warrant allows any Massachusetts officer to serve it outside their usual jurisdiction.
• Requirements: The officer must provide the warrant to the arrestee as soon as possible. Physical possession is not required, but they must identify the person they are arresting. Double-check warrant information in the WMS (Warrant Management System).
• Probable Cause: Not required for executing arrest warrants; probable cause for issuance sufficed.

Search Warrants

• Issuance: Issued by judicial officials, for specific locations/items for evidence.
  • Types: Premises (address, description), motor vehicles (description, photo).
  • Execution: Execution must happen within 7 days, officers must have a copy, a copy must be provided to the premises occupant.
  • Knock and Announce: Officers must knock and announce their presence for forcible entries, unless a no-knock warrant is issued. An exception is needed if there is a credible risk of imminent harm.
  • Judge vs. Clerk: A judge is needed for no-knock warrants or body cavity searches (strong showing of particularized need, high degree of probable cause).
  • Return: Search warrants must be returned to the issuing authority within 7 days.

Arrest Without a Warrant

• Authority: Police have authority to arrest for felonies committed in their presence, or with probable cause to believe a felony occurred, and for misdemeanors committed in their presence that amount to a breach of the peace, and certain other misdemeanors by statute (e.g. drug offenses, MV offenses).

• Probable Cause Requirements: Officers must have facts establishing probable cause. These can include officer's knowledge, observations, victim/witness/anonymous tip statements, suspect's prior record, confessions, etc.

  • If not brought to court for arraignment within 24 hours of a warrantless arrest (due to weekends, holidays), officers need a judicial evaluation to confirm probable cause.

Citizen's Arrest and Merchant Detainments

• Citizen's Arrest: Limited to felonies witnessed and committed; not for misdemeanors.

• Merchant Detainments: A merchant can detain a suspected shoplifter for a reasonable time/manner; shoplifting accusations are probable cause for police arrest.

Jurisdiction and Civil Liability

• Jurisdiction: Related to municipality-employed police officers.

• Civil Liability: Police conduct has potential for civil liability; unreasonable conduct can be a cause of action.

Search Incident to Arrest

• Scope: Searches limited to the arrested person and the area within immediate control for weapons or evidence destruction. Search must happen concurrently with the arrest.

• Grabbing Area: Scope depends on arrest circumstances (multiple officers/suspects, positioning, restraint). The area searched is also subject to change if the suspect changes position voluntarily.

• Strip Searches: Probable cause needed; not physically invasive or humiliating; specific written policies must be followed.

• Body Cavity Searches: Visual searches - no touching, require probable cause. Manual searches (touching/probing) require a judge-issued warrant.

Motor Vehicle Searches

• Carroll Doctrine/Automobile Exception: Probable cause to believe evidence is in the vehicle is sufficient to search, due to mobility. This exception usually does not apply if the vehicle is parked on the property of a house.

Protective Sweeps

• Definition: Warrantless cursory checks of premises for people, not evidence, based on reasonable belief of danger or evidence destruction.

Exigent Circumstances

• Definition: Immediate action required, for evidence preservation or protection of people/officers.

• Requirement: Police action necessary, and the exigency is not created or foreseeable by police; there's no delay.

Consent Searches

• Valid Consent: Must be voluntary, clearly communicated, by someone with actual or apparent authority.
• Revocation: Consent can be revoked at any time, searches must stop.
• Who can consent: Occupants with actual or apparent authority or control over the area.

Curtilage

• Definition: Protected area immediately surrounding a dwelling and considered part of the house. Includes gardens, driveways, garages, etc. but does not include motel rooms, hotels, or business premises.
• Open Fields: Land not part of the curtilage (no expectation of privacy) can be searched without a warrant.
• Reason for distinction of curtilage and open fields: It is considered a protected area around the house due to the reasonable expectation of privacy by occupants.

Other concepts including reasonable expectation of privacy for cell phones, rental cars, and abandoned property, open fields, and stop searches (terry stops), vehicle exit order.