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Supreme Court Limits Police Searches

Supreme Court Limits Police Searches

Justices Clash Over Search Case
Split Vote Brings Roberts' 1st Dissent

WASHINGTON -- The Supreme Court's unity under new Chief Justice John Roberts was shattered Wednesday by a dispute over an adage: A man's home is his castle.

The justices ruled 5-3 that police without a warrant cannot search a house when one resident agrees but another says no.

Roberts wrote his first dissent, a harsh complaint that police may now be helpless to protect domestic abuse victims.

The decision ended a trend of one-sided rulings by the court. About two-thirds of the 30 decisions under Roberts' leadership have been unanimous, a high number on a court that has in the past been polarized along ideological lines.

Wednesday's ruling makes a significant change in the law nationwide, because lower courts had said that police could search with the consent of one of two adults living together.

The first major criminal law decision of this term, the case split the court along ideological lines, with Roberts speaking for the conservatives.

"Sharing space entails risk," Roberts said, including the risk of having your secrets and private items exposed to the police. In the case before the court, the wife's wish "to cooperate with the government" in a drug investigation should not be thwarted by giving her husband a "veto power," Roberts said. Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas agreed with him.

But a moderate-to-liberal majority led by Justice David H. Souter cited the "ancient adage that a man's home is his castle" and that even "the poorest man may in his cottage bid defiance to all the forces of the Crown." On a more everyday level, Souter said "no sensible person" would think he was free to enter a house if one of its two occupants stood in the doorway and said "stay out." That, in sum, is what happened in the case of Scott and Janet Randolph, an estranged couple from Americus, Ga.

After leaving to stay with her parents in Canada, Janet Randolph returned to their Georgia home in July 2001 and shortly afterward called police to report her husband was a cocaine user. When police arrived at their house, she invited them inside and said they would find evidence of his drug use in their bedroom.

Scott Randolph, a lawyer, refused to let the officers in. They entered anyway and upstairs found a straw with a white powder that proved to be cocaine.

The case of Georgia vs. Randolph asked whether this entry without a warrant was legal.

The Fourth Amendment forbids "unreasonable searches" by the government, and it generally requires police to have a search warrant before entering a home. But persons may freely consent to a search without a warrant.

So, what happens if one occupant of a home agrees to have the police come inside, while the other adamantly refuses? The Supreme Court had never answered that question until Wednesday.

In all, the eight members who participated in the case wrote six different opinions, swapping barbs. Conservative Justice Antonin Scalia and liberal Justice John Paul Stevens disputed whether the ruling helped women.

Stevens said: Neither husband nor wife "is a master possessing the power to override the other's constitutional right to deny entry to their castle."

Scalia said: "I must express grave doubt that today's decision deserves Justice Stevens' celebration as part of the forward march of women's equality."

It was surprising, considering that the court in recent months has been harmonious on emotional issues including abortion limits, religious freedom and a protest of the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy on gays.

"I'm thunderstruck this case would have generated this kind of response," said Kermit Hall, a historian and president of the State University of New York at Albany. "My sense is we are going to see more difference than we're going to see agreement."

Justice Samuel Alito did not participate in the case, because he was not on the court when it was argued.

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On the Net:

The case is Georgia v. Randolph
No. 04–1067. Argued November 8, 2005—Decided March 22, 2006
Cornell Law School / U.S. Supreme

Supreme Court: http://www.supremecourtus.gov/


http://www.courant.com/news/nationworld/hc-scotus0323.
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Posted by Editor at March 23, 2006 06:56 AM