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Jmari

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Arrest warrant + plain view doctrine

Post by Jmari » Mon Jul 24, 2017 11:23 am

I'm having trouble with this. So one of the requirements for the plain view is that police are legitimately on premises. does an arrest warrant constitute a legitimate purpose for an officer who plainly sees contraband in the home?

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Re: Arrest warrant + plain view doctrine

Post by Bass » Mon Jul 24, 2017 11:31 am

Jmari wrote:I'm having trouble with this. So one of the requirements for the plain view is that police are legitimately on premises. does an arrest warrant constitute a legitimate purpose for an officer who plainly sees contraband in the home?
There could be a scenario where an arrest warrant doesnt necessarily provide lawful purpose to be on the premises...when police enter a suspect's house under an arrest warrant after neighbours clearly informed them that the suspect is out of town, police don't have probable cause to believe the suspect is in his home and to break and enter.

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Re: Arrest warrant + plain view doctrine

Post by Jmari » Mon Jul 24, 2017 12:02 pm

Bass wrote:
Jmari wrote:I'm having trouble with this. So one of the requirements for the plain view is that police are legitimately on premises. does an arrest warrant constitute a legitimate purpose for an officer who plainly sees contraband in the home?
There could be a scenario where an arrest warrant doesnt necessarily provide lawful purpose to be on the premises...when police enter a suspect's house under an arrest warrant after neighbours clearly informed them that the suspect is out of town, police don't have probable cause to believe the suspect is in his home and to break and enter.

Ok, get this:

Man beats up gf. Fleds scene. Gf calls cops and tells them he is at his best friend's house. With a valid arrest warrant, they knock and ask best friend (he says he is not here) they break and enter, find contraband in plain view while searching for man.
Did they have probable cause?

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Re: Arrest warrant + plain view doctrine

Post by Toubro » Mon Jul 24, 2017 12:14 pm

Jmari wrote:
Bass wrote:
Jmari wrote:I'm having trouble with this. So one of the requirements for the plain view is that police are legitimately on premises. does an arrest warrant constitute a legitimate purpose for an officer who plainly sees contraband in the home?
There could be a scenario where an arrest warrant doesnt necessarily provide lawful purpose to be on the premises...when police enter a suspect's house under an arrest warrant after neighbours clearly informed them that the suspect is out of town, police don't have probable cause to believe the suspect is in his home and to break and enter.

Ok, get this:

Man beats up gf. Fleds scene. Gf calls cops and tells them he is at his best friend's house. With a valid arrest warrant, they knock and ask best friend (he says he is not here) they break and enter, find contraband in plain view while searching for man.
Did they have probable cause?
The relevant inquiry isn't "probable cause." If the police had "reason to believe" that the boyfriend was in his best friend's house, the arrest warrant supplied them with enough authority to enter the house. Once inside, anything in plain view that the officers have probable cause to believe is contraband is lawfully seized.

See OPE-4, question 14 for NCBE's analysis of this. There, a woman's house had been completely abandoned and shuttered up for months. They went out of their way in that question to describe how unoccupied and abandoned that house looked. In that case, they couldn't break in, because they didn't have "reason to believe" she was actually in there.

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Re: Arrest warrant + plain view doctrine

Post by Lavitz » Mon Jul 24, 2017 12:22 pm

Toubro wrote:
Jmari wrote:
Bass wrote:
Jmari wrote:I'm having trouble with this. So one of the requirements for the plain view is that police are legitimately on premises. does an arrest warrant constitute a legitimate purpose for an officer who plainly sees contraband in the home?
There could be a scenario where an arrest warrant doesnt necessarily provide lawful purpose to be on the premises...when police enter a suspect's house under an arrest warrant after neighbours clearly informed them that the suspect is out of town, police don't have probable cause to believe the suspect is in his home and to break and enter.

Ok, get this:

Man beats up gf. Fleds scene. Gf calls cops and tells them he is at his best friend's house. With a valid arrest warrant, they knock and ask best friend (he says he is not here) they break and enter, find contraband in plain view while searching for man.
Did they have probable cause?
The relevant inquiry isn't "probable cause." If the police had "reason to believe" that the boyfriend was in his best friend's house, the arrest warrant supplied them with enough authority to enter the house. Once inside, anything in plain view that the officers have probable cause to believe is contraband is lawfully seized.

See OPE-4, question 14 for NCBE's analysis of this. There, a woman's house had been completely abandoned and shuttered up for months. They went out of their way in that question to describe how unoccupied and abandoned that house looked. In that case, they couldn't break in, because they didn't have "reason to believe" she was actually in there.
That's not right. If the suspect is just a guest of the third party, police need a search warrant to use any evidence found in the third party's home against the third party, period. This is a hard and fast rule, and plain view is irrelevant. If a suspect is a co-resident, that's different, and the arrest warrant alone would be enough to justify using the evidence against them. The question you cited is just about whether police could lawfully enter a residence to look for someone, not about using evidence against a third party owner of the home.

Maybe they can "seize" it, but it's pretty irrelevant since the question will almost certainly be whether the police can introduce it against the owner.

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Re: Arrest warrant + plain view doctrine

Post by Jmari » Mon Jul 24, 2017 12:25 pm

[quote="Toubro"][quote="Jmari"][quote="Bass"][quote="Jmari"]I'm having trouble with this. So one of the requirements for the plain view is that police are legitimately on premises. does an arrest warrant constitute a legitimate purpose for an officer who plainly sees contraband in the home?[/quote]

There could be a scenario where an arrest warrant doesnt necessarily provide lawful purpose to be on the premises...when police enter a suspect's house under an arrest warrant after neighbours clearly informed them that the suspect is out of town, police don't have probable cause to believe the suspect is in his home and to break and enter.[/quote]


Ok, get this:

Man beats up gf. Fleds scene. Gf calls cops and tells them he is at his best friend's house. With a valid arrest warrant, they knock and ask best friend (he says he is not here) they break and enter, find contraband in plain view while searching for man.
Did they have probable cause?[/quote]

The relevant inquiry isn't "probable cause." If the police had "reason to believe" that the boyfriend was in his best friend's house, the arrest warrant supplied them with enough authority to enter the house. Once inside, anything in plain view that the officers have probable cause to believe is contraband is lawfully seized.

See OPE-4, question 14 for NCBE's analysis of this. There, a woman's house had been completely abandoned and shuttered up for months. They went out of their way in that question to describe how unoccupied and abandoned that house looked. In that case, they couldn't break in, because they didn't have "reason to believe" she was actually in there.[/quote]




That was my understanding, as well. This fact pattern I provided is similar to an MBE question from Barbri. The right answer states that the evidence should be suppressed because the police obtained evidence without a search warrant. It makes no sense.

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Re: Arrest warrant + plain view doctrine

Post by Jmari » Mon Jul 24, 2017 12:31 pm

Lavitz wrote:
Toubro wrote:
Jmari wrote:
Bass wrote:
Jmari wrote:I'm having trouble with this. So one of the requirements for the plain view is that police are legitimately on premises. does an arrest warrant constitute a legitimate purpose for an officer who plainly sees contraband in the home?
There could be a scenario where an arrest warrant doesnt necessarily provide lawful purpose to be on the premises...when police enter a suspect's house under an arrest warrant after neighbours clearly informed them that the suspect is out of town, police don't have probable cause to believe the suspect is in his home and to break and enter.

Ok, get this:

Man beats up gf. Fleds scene. Gf calls cops and tells them he is at his best friend's house. With a valid arrest warrant, they knock and ask best friend (he says he is not here) they break and enter, find contraband in plain view while searching for man.
Did they have probable cause?
The relevant inquiry isn't "probable cause." If the police had "reason to believe" that the boyfriend was in his best friend's house, the arrest warrant supplied them with enough authority to enter the house. Once inside, anything in plain view that the officers have probable cause to believe is contraband is lawfully seized.

See OPE-4, question 14 for NCBE's analysis of this. There, a woman's house had been completely abandoned and shuttered up for months. They went out of their way in that question to describe how unoccupied and abandoned that house looked. In that case, they couldn't break in, because they didn't have "reason to believe" she was actually in there.
That's not right. If the suspect is just a guest of the third party, police need a search warrant to use any evidence found in the third party's home against the third party, period. This is a hard and fast rule, and plain view is irrelevant. If a suspect is a co-resident, that's different, and the arrest warrant alone would be enough to justify using the evidence against them. The question you cited is just about whether police could lawfully enter a residence to look for someone, not about using evidence against a third party owner of the home.

Maybe they can "seize" it, but it's pretty irrelevant since the question will almost certainly be whether the police can introduce it against the owner.
My question was about the legitimate purpose as standing for the plain view doctrine. The victim told the police that he was there, but when they got there, friend told them he wasn't. So the question is whether the people officer's conduct is lawful when they entered. If it is, that makes proper standing for plain view. If not, then there is no standing.

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Re: Arrest warrant + plain view doctrine

Post by MelaPela » Mon Jul 24, 2017 12:35 pm

Jmari wrote:
Toubro wrote:
Jmari wrote:
Bass wrote:
Jmari wrote:I'm having trouble with this. So one of the requirements for the plain view is that police are legitimately on premises. does an arrest warrant constitute a legitimate purpose for an officer who plainly sees contraband in the home?
There could be a scenario where an arrest warrant doesnt necessarily provide lawful purpose to be on the premises...when police enter a suspect's house under an arrest warrant after neighbours clearly informed them that the suspect is out of town, police don't have probable cause to believe the suspect is in his home and to break and enter.

Ok, get this:

Man beats up gf. Fleds scene. Gf calls cops and tells them he is at his best friend's house. With a valid arrest warrant, they knock and ask best friend (he says he is not here) they break and enter, find contraband in plain view while searching for man.
Did they have probable cause?
The relevant inquiry isn't "probable cause." If the police had "reason to believe" that the boyfriend was in his best friend's house, the arrest warrant supplied them with enough authority to enter the house. Once inside, anything in plain view that the officers have probable cause to believe is contraband is lawfully seized.

See OPE-4, question 14 for NCBE's analysis of this. There, a woman's house had been completely abandoned and shuttered up for months. They went out of their way in that question to describe how unoccupied and abandoned that house looked. In that case, they couldn't break in, because they didn't have "reason to believe" she was actually in there.



That was my understanding, as well. This fact pattern I provided is similar to an MBE question from Barbri. The right answer states that the evidence should be suppressed because the police obtained evidence without a search warrant. It makes no sense.
I think the issue here is that they didn't have a warrant that covered the best friend's house. So any evidence (even if found in plain view) they seized while at the best friend's house would be suppressed because they didn't have the right to be in the best friend's house. My Themis outline says that "a police officer may not arrest a person in another person's home without a search warrant, absent exigent circumstances or valid consent" and "a police officer may seize an item in plain view, even if it was not named in the search warrant so long as (i) the officer is on the premises for a lawful purpose, and (ii) the incriminating character of the item is immediately apparent. If the officer is not legitimately on the premises, the plain view doctrine does not apply."

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Re: Arrest warrant + plain view doctrine

Post by Toubro » Mon Jul 24, 2017 12:41 pm

Lavitz wrote:
Toubro wrote:
Jmari wrote:
Bass wrote:
Jmari wrote:I'm having trouble with this. So one of the requirements for the plain view is that police are legitimately on premises. does an arrest warrant constitute a legitimate purpose for an officer who plainly sees contraband in the home?
There could be a scenario where an arrest warrant doesnt necessarily provide lawful purpose to be on the premises...when police enter a suspect's house under an arrest warrant after neighbours clearly informed them that the suspect is out of town, police don't have probable cause to believe the suspect is in his home and to break and enter.

Ok, get this:

Man beats up gf. Fleds scene. Gf calls cops and tells them he is at his best friend's house. With a valid arrest warrant, they knock and ask best friend (he says he is not here) they break and enter, find contraband in plain view while searching for man.
Did they have probable cause?
The relevant inquiry isn't "probable cause." If the police had "reason to believe" that the boyfriend was in his best friend's house, the arrest warrant supplied them with enough authority to enter the house. Once inside, anything in plain view that the officers have probable cause to believe is contraband is lawfully seized.

See OPE-4, question 14 for NCBE's analysis of this. There, a woman's house had been completely abandoned and shuttered up for months. They went out of their way in that question to describe how unoccupied and abandoned that house looked. In that case, they couldn't break in, because they didn't have "reason to believe" she was actually in there.
That's not right. If the suspect is just a guest of the third party, police need a search warrant to use any evidence found in the third party's home against the third party, period. This is a hard and fast rule, and plain view is irrelevant. If a suspect is a co-resident, that's different, and the arrest warrant alone would be enough to justify using the evidence against them. The question you cited is just about whether police could lawfully enter a residence to look for someone, not about using evidence against a third party owner of the home.

Maybe they can "seize" it, but it's pretty irrelevant since the question will almost certainly be whether the police can introduce it against the owner.
Right the contraband can't be admitted against the third party, sure. I assumed they were the boyfriend's contraband, used against him. I thought OP's question was about when an arrest warrant allows the police to lawfully enter a house, because a gateway question for whether plain view would work is if the police were lawfully present in the area.

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Re: Arrest warrant + plain view doctrine

Post by Lavitz » Mon Jul 24, 2017 12:42 pm

Jmari wrote: My question was about the legitimate purpose as standing for the plain view doctrine. The victim told the police that he was there, but when they got there, friend told them he wasn't. So the question is whether the people officer's conduct is lawful when they entered. If it is, that makes proper standing for plain view. If not, then there is no standing.
I mean, the BarBri answer is clearly right that the evidence should be suppressed, and that's all they're going to ask about, so I'm not sure what your confusion is.

After thinking about it, I don't think they can even "seize" it and not use it, because I don't think they were in there lawfully in the first place. The "reason to believe" test should only apply to places where the suspect lives. This was a third party's home. Need consent or exigent circumstances to enter. Steagald was pretty clear about this.

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Re: Arrest warrant + plain view doctrine

Post by Lavitz » Mon Jul 24, 2017 12:43 pm

Toubro wrote:Right the contraband can't be admitted against the third party, sure. I assumed they were the boyfriend's contraband, used against him. I thought OP's question was about when an arrest warrant allows the police to lawfully enter a house, because a gateway question for whether plain view would work is if the police were lawfully present in the area.
I interpreted the OP's question differently, but I guess now I also disagree that they were there lawfully., depending on whether you consider the suspect a guest or a co-resident.
Last edited by Lavitz on Mon Jul 24, 2017 12:46 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Arrest warrant + plain view doctrine

Post by Toubro » Mon Jul 24, 2017 12:45 pm

Lavitz wrote:
Jmari wrote: My question was about the legitimate purpose as standing for the plain view doctrine. The victim told the police that he was there, but when they got there, friend told them he wasn't. So the question is whether the people officer's conduct is lawful when they entered. If it is, that makes proper standing for plain view. If not, then there is no standing.
I mean, the BarBri answer is clearly right that the evidence should be suppressed, and that's all they're going to ask about, so I'm not sure what your confusion is.

After thinking about it, I don't think they can even "seize" it and not use it, because I don't think they were in there lawfully in the first place. The "reason to believe" test should only apply to places where the suspect lives. This was a third party's home. Need consent or exigent circumstances to enter. Steagald was pretty clear about this.
Oh cool. Don't remember covering the bolded anywhere. Thanks!

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Re: Arrest warrant + plain view doctrine

Post by Lavitz » Mon Jul 24, 2017 12:49 pm

Toubro wrote:
Lavitz wrote:
Jmari wrote: My question was about the legitimate purpose as standing for the plain view doctrine. The victim told the police that he was there, but when they got there, friend told them he wasn't. So the question is whether the people officer's conduct is lawful when they entered. If it is, that makes proper standing for plain view. If not, then there is no standing.
I mean, the BarBri answer is clearly right that the evidence should be suppressed, and that's all they're going to ask about, so I'm not sure what your confusion is.

After thinking about it, I don't think they can even "seize" it and not use it, because I don't think they were in there lawfully in the first place. The "reason to believe" test should only apply to places where the suspect lives. This was a third party's home. Need consent or exigent circumstances to enter. Steagald was pretty clear about this.
Oh cool. Don't remember covering the bolded anywhere. Thanks!
Well, it's more like you need to have a reasonable belief that (1) the suspect resides there and (2) is present there at the time you're going to look. So you need to believe suspect is a resident, which means living there, as far as I can remember. Which is why I think the answer to any question like this will just be that the evidence needs to be suppressed. But if they make it obvious that police think the suspect lives there regularly, then they can enter lawfully.

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Re: Arrest warrant + plain view doctrine

Post by Jmari » Mon Jul 24, 2017 12:53 pm

So my question boils down to this:
Does an arrest warrant provide basis for legitimate purpose under the plain view doctrine, when officers didn't have consent to be on TP's premise?

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Re: Arrest warrant + plain view doctrine

Post by Lavitz » Mon Jul 24, 2017 1:03 pm

Jmari wrote:So my question boils down to this:
Does an arrest warrant provide basis for legitimate purpose under the plain view doctrine, when officers didn't have consent to be on TP's premise?
And I'd say no, unless there's some fact about the suspect living there.

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Re: Arrest warrant + plain view doctrine

Post by RaceJudicata » Mon Jul 24, 2017 1:15 pm

Lavitz wrote:
Toubro wrote:
Jmari wrote:
Bass wrote:
Jmari wrote:I'm having trouble with this. So one of the requirements for the plain view is that police are legitimately on premises. does an arrest warrant constitute a legitimate purpose for an officer who plainly sees contraband in the home?
There could be a scenario where an arrest warrant doesnt necessarily provide lawful purpose to be on the premises...when police enter a suspect's house under an arrest warrant after neighbours clearly informed them that the suspect is out of town, police don't have probable cause to believe the suspect is in his home and to break and enter.

Ok, get this:

Man beats up gf. Fleds scene. Gf calls cops and tells them he is at his best friend's house. With a valid arrest warrant, they knock and ask best friend (he says he is not here) they break and enter, find contraband in plain view while searching for man.
Did they have probable cause?
The relevant inquiry isn't "probable cause." If the police had "reason to believe" that the boyfriend was in his best friend's house, the arrest warrant supplied them with enough authority to enter the house. Once inside, anything in plain view that the officers have probable cause to believe is contraband is lawfully seized.

See OPE-4, question 14 for NCBE's analysis of this. There, a woman's house had been completely abandoned and shuttered up for months. They went out of their way in that question to describe how unoccupied and abandoned that house looked. In that case, they couldn't break in, because they didn't have "reason to believe" she was actually in there.
That's not right. If the suspect is just a guest of the third party, police need a search warrant to use any evidence found in the third party's home against the third party, period. This is a hard and fast rule, and plain view is irrelevant. If a suspect is a co-resident, that's different, and the arrest warrant alone would be enough to justify using the evidence against them. The question you cited is just about whether police could lawfully enter a residence to look for someone, not about using evidence against a third party owner of the home.

Maybe they can "seize" it, but it's pretty irrelevant since the question will almost certainly be whether the police can introduce it against the owner.
Not sure that is entirely true. (Could be wrong, and happy to be proven wrong). But my understanding - and I think an example I was given during lecture - that if, say, the police are in hot pursuit of a suspect, suspect goes into a third party's home. Police are able to enter the home because they are in hot pursuit. THerefore, are lawfully in the premises. If they happen to see drugs on the table, they have right to seize cause plain view.

ETA: "I find this reasoning applies equally when a suspect for whom the police have an arrest warrant retreats into the house of a third party. Although the rights sought to be protected by requiring officers to obtain a search warrant before arresting an individual in the home of a third party are the rights of the third party rather than the rights of the suspect, the doctrine of “hot pursuit” nonetheless justifies this entry. Indeed, when holding that law enforcement officials must secure a search warrant prior to making an arrest entry into third party premises, the Supreme Court specifically stated that “a warrantless entry of a home would be justified if the police were in ‘hot pursuit’ of a fugitive” and cited Santana. Steagald, 451 U.S. at 222. Because the officers' entry into the Prince Street Apartment after the individual whom they reasonably believed to be Rossi Graham retreated into the house was justified under the doctrine of hot pursuit,2 the evidence seized from the Prince Street Apartment that was in plain view, will not be suppressed."

United States v. Williams, 2004 WL 1637021, at *3 (S.D.N.Y. July 20, 2004)

Here, they arrested the third parties, even though the original suspect wasn't in the house. Search justified because plain view + lawful presence in house.

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Re: Arrest warrant + plain view doctrine

Post by Lavitz » Mon Jul 24, 2017 1:28 pm

RaceJudicata wrote:
Lavitz wrote:
Toubro wrote:
Jmari wrote:
Bass wrote:
Jmari wrote:I'm having trouble with this. So one of the requirements for the plain view is that police are legitimately on premises. does an arrest warrant constitute a legitimate purpose for an officer who plainly sees contraband in the home?
There could be a scenario where an arrest warrant doesnt necessarily provide lawful purpose to be on the premises...when police enter a suspect's house under an arrest warrant after neighbours clearly informed them that the suspect is out of town, police don't have probable cause to believe the suspect is in his home and to break and enter.

Ok, get this:

Man beats up gf. Fleds scene. Gf calls cops and tells them he is at his best friend's house. With a valid arrest warrant, they knock and ask best friend (he says he is not here) they break and enter, find contraband in plain view while searching for man.
Did they have probable cause?
The relevant inquiry isn't "probable cause." If the police had "reason to believe" that the boyfriend was in his best friend's house, the arrest warrant supplied them with enough authority to enter the house. Once inside, anything in plain view that the officers have probable cause to believe is contraband is lawfully seized.

See OPE-4, question 14 for NCBE's analysis of this. There, a woman's house had been completely abandoned and shuttered up for months. They went out of their way in that question to describe how unoccupied and abandoned that house looked. In that case, they couldn't break in, because they didn't have "reason to believe" she was actually in there.
That's not right. If the suspect is just a guest of the third party, police need a search warrant to use any evidence found in the third party's home against the third party, period. This is a hard and fast rule, and plain view is irrelevant. If a suspect is a co-resident, that's different, and the arrest warrant alone would be enough to justify using the evidence against them. The question you cited is just about whether police could lawfully enter a residence to look for someone, not about using evidence against a third party owner of the home.

Maybe they can "seize" it, but it's pretty irrelevant since the question will almost certainly be whether the police can introduce it against the owner.
Not sure that is entirely true. (Could be wrong, and happy to be proven wrong). But my understanding - and I think an example I was given during lecture - that if, say, the police are in hot pursuit of a suspect, suspect goes into a third party's home. Police are able to enter the home because they are in hot pursuit. THerefore, are lawfully in the premises. If they happen to see drugs on the table, they have right to seize cause plain view.

ETA: "I find this reasoning applies equally when a suspect for whom the police have an arrest warrant retreats into the house of a third party. Although the rights sought to be protected by requiring officers to obtain a search warrant before arresting an individual in the home of a third party are the rights of the third party rather than the rights of the suspect, the doctrine of “hot pursuit” nonetheless justifies this entry. Indeed, when holding that law enforcement officials must secure a search warrant prior to making an arrest entry into third party premises, the Supreme Court specifically stated that “a warrantless entry of a home would be justified if the police were in ‘hot pursuit’ of a fugitive” and cited Santana. Steagald, 451 U.S. at 222. Because the officers' entry into the Prince Street Apartment after the individual whom they reasonably believed to be Rossi Graham retreated into the house was justified under the doctrine of hot pursuit,2 the evidence seized from the Prince Street Apartment that was in plain view, will not be suppressed."

United States v. Williams, 2004 WL 1637021, at *3 (S.D.N.Y. July 20, 2004)

Here, they arrested the third parties, even though the original suspect wasn't in the house. Search justified because plain view + lawful presence in house.
Hot pursuit constitutes exigent circumstances which, as I clarified in a later post, would allow the police to lawfully enter the third party's home. There were no exigent corcumstances in OP's hypo.

My bad if "hard and fast rule" was overbroad.

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Re: Arrest warrant + plain view doctrine

Post by Jmari » Mon Jul 24, 2017 2:05 pm

If you guys have the Barbri stimulated test, it is question 81. In case I left something out.

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Re: Arrest warrant + plain view doctrine

Post by pancakes3 » Mon Jul 24, 2017 2:26 pm

Lavitz answered it pretty thoroughly and correctly. I don't know think there's anything else to it.

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Re: Arrest warrant + plain view doctrine

Post by Jmari » Mon Jul 24, 2017 10:38 pm

Thanks, guys! Good luck tomorrow!

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