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Due Process Institute defends core protections against unreasonable searches and seizures in physical spaces like homes, vehicles, and personal property. This work focuses on strengthening warrant requirements and limiting exceptions that erode privacy rights.
Discover Due Process Institute’s efforts to uphold core Fourth Amendment safeguards against unlawful searches and seizures.
Explore Due Process Institute’s work in the courts to uphold Fourth Amendment safeguards.
Interested in learning about the many modern erosions of our traditional 4th Amendment rights?
In Lange v. California, we highlighted warrantless home entries committed in the pursuit of alleged misdemeanor crimes. So-called “hot pursuit” searches are a categorical exemption to our constitutional right to be free from unreasonable search and seizure under the 4th Amendment. Not only do these warrantless invasions infringe on these rights, they enabled racialized policing and eroded public trust in law enforcement.
Filed with the DKT Liberty Project, Law Enforcement Action Partnership, and Reason Foundation.
The Supreme Court agreed with Due Process Institute that the Constitution puts limits on when police pursuing a fleeing suspect can enter a home without a warrant. You can read the 9-0 decision here.
Due Process Institute also thanks Jessica Amunson, Caroline Cease, and Philip Sailer of Jenner & Block for their amicus support on this case.
In Florida v. Kraft, DPI explained how the use of the police’s covert video surveillance took advantage of the lack of privacy safeguards in the law and failed to utilize adequate minimization techniques to pass Constitutional muster– therefore the evidence obtained from that surveillance must be excluded.
The Florida Court of Appeals agreed with the Due Process Institute and found that police had violated the Fourth Amendment. You can read the full opinion here.
Due Process Institute thanks Donnie Murrell for his amicus support on this matter.
The question in Torres v. Madrid, et. al. was if a “seizure” has occurred, in violation of the Fourth Amendment, when police attempt to stop a suspect by force but do not immediately succeed in doing so. The amicus brief argued that there are good public policy reasons for determining that such action is a “seizure” including accountability for police and improving public trust in law enforcement and their actions.
Filed with the American Association For Justice, Cato Institute, Law Enforcement Action Partnership, Reason Foundation, and R Street Institute.
The United States Supreme Court ruled 5-3 that the application of physical force to the body of a person with intent to restrain is a seizure even if the person does not submit and is not subdued. You can read the opinion here.
We thank Anton Metlitsky, Dimitri Portnoi, Daniel Tully, and Noah Ickowitz of O’Melveny & Myers LLP for their pro bono work on this issue.