CourtCaseProject
Mapp vs Ohio
Case Analysis
Case Summary
On May 23 1957, Cleveland, Ohio police received a tip that Dollree Mapp was harbouring information related to a bombing case. After the tip was received police visited Mapp’s residence and demanded to be allowed entry. When Mapp refused because of the lack of a shown warrant police forced their way through Mapp’s home, showing her a piece of paper and arresting her for the possession of obscene and pornographic materials that they found during a search of her home. Mapp denied the material being hers, claiming she had lent the suitcase that the items were found in to a boarder and she did not have knowledge of their existence. Mapp was then prosecuted and found guilty of the possession of pornographic materials. When Mapp’s attorneys questioned the officers about the warrant, Ohio officials failed to reproduce or comment on the warrant. The case then went to the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court then ruled that the evidence found during the search was inadmissible because the seize without a warrant was against the fourth amendment. This case was the first of it’s kind. Although rulings like this had been made before on the Supreme Court level new laws were set into effect that evidence would be dismissed if obtained in violation of the fourth amendment on the state level. This case changed the way law enforcement on a state level conducted searches. Federal authorities were subject to these regulations since, Weeks v Illinois in 1914, however this was the first time it became mandatory for all states to require police to perform business in a certain way. Originally, states were allowed to make their own exclusionary rules. This new law affects each individual person and their right to be searched and seized legally.
Decision: 6 votes for Mapp 3 against
Mapp's argument was that she had wrongfully been searched and although the State court did not agree the case was then brought to the Supreme in which time they agreed and dropped all charges and found that all evidence against her was inadmissable in the court of law. Mapp was in fact in the right, in a personal opinion. Although illegal evidence was found it was not related to any previous assumptions about what Mapp was concealing. At first she was accused of harboring information about a bombing, which seemed important enough to dismiss proper search protocol, and when the hunt for the suspected information was unsuccessful police turned to prosecuting a petty crime. It sparks the question, "What happened in the search for the bomber?". The police were obviously in fear for the safety of others otherwise they would not have done what they did in the manner in which they did it. However, fear is not stated in the Fourth Amendment as a probable cause to conduct a search on someone's house and fail to present a warrant. For this reason I agree with the Majority Decision and their vote to not only excuse the charges and evidence but to also revisit the Fourth Amendment and what it means to have a warranted search of someone's person or property.
Majority Decision Summary
Dissenting Opinion Summary
"There is no war between the Constitution and common sense." - Justice Clark (Deliverer of the Majority Decision)
Justice Clark states in his deliverance of the court decision that the people's right to privacy as stated in the Fourth Amendment stands in Federal court. The Fourteenth Amendment's right to due process also stands in the eyes of the Federal Court. Based on these facts they should also apply in state courts. By allowing states, he says, to have exclusionary doctrines regarding the conduction of due process and searches is against the Constitution. Therefore, not only should Mapp's, and the entirety of people, right's be upheld in the Supreme Court but they should also be upheld in State Court.
"It seems to me that justice might well have been done in this case without overturning a decision on which the administration of criminal law in many of the States has long justifiably relied...I would not impose upon the States this federal exclusionary remedy." - Justice Harlan
Justice Harlan insisted, in his deliverance of the dissenting opinion, that the implication that state courts could not make the decision for themselves on whether or not a search was warranted was unnecessary, if not insulting. In Justice Harlan's Opinion he states that Wolf v Colorado is an example in which the State declared that the search of Wolf was warranted due to the information given by a reliable source.