Exclusionary Rule

• Author: Jeffrey Lehman, Shirelle Phelps

Page 264

The principle based on federal CONSTITUTIONAL LAW that evidence illegally seized by law enforcement officers in violation of a suspect's right to be free from unreasonable SEARCHES AND SEIZURES cannot be used against the suspect in a criminal prosecution.

The exclusionary rule is designed to exclude evidence obtained in violation of a criminal defendant's FOURTH AMENDMENT rights. The Fourth Amendment protects against unreasonable searches and seizures by law enforcement personnel. If the search of a criminal suspect is unreasonable, the evidence obtained in the search will be excluded from trial.

The exclusionary rule is a court-made rule. This means that it was created not in statutes passed by legislative bodies but rather by the U.S. Supreme Court. The exclusionary rule applies in federal courts by virtue of the Fourth Amendment. The Court has ruled that it applies in state courts although the DUE PROCESS CLAUSE of the FOURTEENTH AMENDMENT.(The Bill of Rights?the first ten amendments? applies to actions by the federal government. The Fourteenth Amendment, the Court has held, makes most of the protections in the BILL OF RIGHTS applicable to actions by the states.)

The exclusionary rule has been in existence since the early 1900s. Before the rule was fashioned, any evidence was admissible in a criminal trial if the judge found the evidence to be relevant. The manner in which the evidence had been seized was not an issue. This began to change in 1914, when the U.S. Supreme Court devised a way to enforce the Fourth Amendment. In Weeks v. United States, 232 U.S. 383, 34 S. Ct. 341, 58 L. Ed. 652 (1914), a federal agent had conducted a warrantless search for evidence of gambling at the home of Fremont Weeks. The evidence seized in the search was used at trial, and Weeks was convicted. On appeal, the Court held that the Fourth Amendment barred the use of evidence secured through a warrantless search. Weeks's conviction was reversed, and thus was born the exclusionary rule.

The exclusionary rule established in Weeks was constitutionally required only in federal court until MAPP V. OHIO, 367 U.S. 643, 81 S. Ct. 1684, 6 L. Ed. 2d 1081 (1961). In Mapp, Cleveland police officers had gone to the home of Dollree Mapp to ask her questions regarding a recent bombing. The officers demanded entrance into her home. Mapp called her attorney and then refused to allow the officers in without a warrant. The officers became rough with Mapp, handcuffed her, and searched her home. They found allegedly obscene books, pictures, and photographs.

Mapp was charged with violations of OBSCENITY laws, prosecuted, convicted, and sentenced to seven years in prison. The Ohio Supreme Court affirmed the conviction, but the U.S. Supreme Court overturned it.

In Mapp, the Court held that the exclusionary rule applied to state criminal proceedings through the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Before the Mapp ruling, not all states excluded evidence obtained in violation of the Fourth Amendment. Since Mapp, a defendant's claim of unreasonable SEARCH AND SEIZURE has become a matter of course in most criminal prosecutions.

A criminal defendant's claim of unreasonable search and seizure is usually heard in a suppression hearing before the presiding judge. This hearing is conducted before trial to determine what evidence will be suppressed, or excluded from trial.

The exclusionary rule is still regularly invoked by criminal defendants, but its golden age may have passed. Since the...