NCJ Number
80195
Date Published
Unknown
Length
0 pages
Annotation
Charles E. Moylan, Associate Judge of the Maryland Court of Special Appeals, discusses the fourth amendment exception that permits warrantless search incident to lawful arrest.
Abstract
The conditions of a lawful arrest solve the problem of exigency for entry. Difficulty arises however, with a question of scope -- how extensive and intensive can such a warrantless search be? The Supreme Court has given answers to this question six times over the 42 years between 1927 and 1969. The court reversed itself five times, vacillating between broad and narrow interpretations of the rule. This record of indecision began with the Supreme Court's initial failure to distinguish the holding from the dicta; it cited from the commentaries to a 1914 decision which merely alluded to the warrantless search of a victim after arrest. The broadest interpretation of search incident law was handed down in 1947, when the breaking of private seals was ruled permissible in the Harris case. The case of Chimel v. California brought about the final resolution in 1969. The narrow, well-reasoned decision is based on two purposes of the search incident to arrest: disarming the arrestee to prevent his escape, which requires searching his body, and preventing the destruction of readily destroyable evidence within the arrestee's extended reach, which permits the search of the arrestee's surroundings within about 8 feet. Thus, this exception must be evaluated on an ad hoc, case-by-case basis, because the measure of scope may expand or contract with the external circumstances of the so-called Chimel perimeter.