If you are a legal resident in the United States, you are protected by the United States Constitution. This invaluable document has guarded over men and women in the United States since it was drafted, making sure that we receive the due respect we deserve as citizens of this country. The Fourth Amendment to the Bill of Rights states that Americans are protected from unlawful search and seizure. Every search warrant must be sanctioned by the court and supported by a probable cause.

The need for the Fourth Amendment came in response to the issues in colonial America. Back in its earliest years, America was a place of constant unlawful search and seizure. The governing authorities in towns would issue general warrants which allowed a persons' home to be searched without reason or cause. Eventually, the colony of Massachusetts fought against the searches, and curtailed the use of search and seizure. Later on, Virginia banned general search warrants in their declaration of rights, making it so that authorities had to have a probable cause to search private property. The Massachuesetts laws on this subject helped to provide the language that is now our Fourth Amendment.

Under the Fourth Amendment, a warrant must be judicially sanctioned for a search or an arrest. This means that the warrant must be reasonable and purported by a probable cause. Normally this "probable" evidence is supplied by a law officer who issued the information to the court and swore by it. How reasonable these searches and seizures can often be relative. A police officer probably won't always be certain that he has found the criminal that he is searching for at a certain address but he may have enough evidence to prove that the residence is a possible hideout.

It is important to note that the Fourth Amendment only covers searches that are done by the government. If an independent party does a search without a warrant and they are not acting on behalf of the government, then they don't have to abide by the Constitution. In fact, in the original writing, the Bill of Rights only restricted the federal government from searching without a warrant. In the case Mapp v. Ohio, the Supreme Court ruled that the law should apply to all states as well. This was because of the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.

The application of the search and seizure provisions in the Bill of Rights has come into question more often recently. This is because of the heightened issues with drugs in the past 50 years. Now, police often need to snoop into people's apartments or cars to find illegal stashes of narcotics. Because of this, the Court has sometimes approved warrantless seizures. Normally the court will approve these seizures or searches when there is probable cause that an offense was committed. This is often called the reasonableness requirement.

In some cases, lawyers may argue the search that took place. In the case Katz vs. United States the Supreme Court determined that a search only occurs when a person expected privacy in the thing searched and society believes that the expectation is reasonable. This new definition of search resulted in proving that Katz's rights were violated when the government wire-tapped a telephone booth so that they could listen to his conversation. The definition of seizure has to do with taking possession of a person's home or private property without a warrant. The seizure occurs because there is meaningful interference with the person's interest in that particular possession. For example, if a police officer takes away a person's property to use it as evidence in a case, this can be a seizure.

If the suspect gives permission for search or seizure, then no warrant is required. There are many intricate facets to the Fourth Amendment which have been dissected and discussed over the years. If you have more questions about search and seizure or believe that your Fourth Amendment rights were violated, talk to a criminal defense attorney about the situation. He or she may be able to add this into your case and help you to obtain the freedom you want.