Open-fields doctrine: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 17:53, 12 May 2023

Revision as of 01:08, 8 June 2023

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While open fields are not protected by the Fourth Amendment, the [[curtilage]], or outdoor area immediately surrounding the home, may be protected. Courts have treated this area as an extension of the house and as such subject to all the privacy protections afforded a person's home (unlike a person's open fields) under the Fourth Amendment.

An area is curtilage if it "harbors the intimate activity associated with the sanctity of a man's home and the privacies of life."<ref>''[[United States v. Dunn]]'', {{Ussc|480|294|1987|pin=300}}.</ref> Courts make this determination by examining "the proximity of the area claimed to be curtilage to the home, whether the area is included within an enclosure surrounding the home, the nature of the uses to which the area is put, and the steps taken by the resident to protect the area from observation by people passing by."<ref>''Dunn'', 480 U.S. at 301.</ref> Theoretically, many structures might extend the curtilage protection to the areas immediately surrounding them. The courts have gone so far as to treat a tent as a home for Fourth Amendment purposes in the past.<ref>''[[https://casetext.com/case/us-v-gooch-7 United States v. Gooch]]'', 6 F.3d 673 (9th Cir. 1993).</ref><ref>''[[https://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=17867362683417409777&hl=en&as_sdt=6&as_vis=1&oi=scholarr LaDuke v. Nelson]]'', 762 F.2d 1318 (9th Cir. 1985)'</ref><ref>''[[https://casetext.com/case/laduke-v-castillo LaDuke v. Castillo]]'', 455 F.Supp. (E.D. Wash. 1978).</ref>

Despite this rather broad interpretation of curtilage, the courts seem willing to find areas to be outside of the curtilage if they are in any way separate from the home (by a fence, great distance, other structures, even certain plants).<ref>''[[https://casetext.com/case/us-v-hatch-13 U.S. v. Hatch]]'', 931 F.2d 1478 (11th Cir.), cert. denied, 502 U.S. 883 (1991).</ref>

==Rejections of doctrine by state courts==

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Since ''Oliver'', the highest courts of [[Montana]], [[New York (state)|New York]], [[Oregon]] and [[Vermont]], as well as a [[Washington (state)|Washington]] state appeals court, have held that the open-fields doctrine does not apply in those states due to their state constitutions granting greater protections to citizens (under [[dual sovereignty]] a state may grant its citizens more rights than those guaranteed in the federal constitution). Since ''Katz'' grounded privacy in persons rather than places, they argue, landowners who have taken affirmative steps to exclude the public such as fencing or posting the [[boundary (real estate)|bounds]] assert a privacy interest sufficient to prevail over any warrantless search of the property where common exceptions such as [[hot pursuit]] and plain view do not apply. Some of those opinions have been critical of not only ''Oliver'' but ''Hester''.

In a 2017 [[concurring opinion]] where the doctrine did not come into play in overturning a [[Wisconsin]] farmer's convictions for threatening two state game wardens he believed had been illegal hunters trespassing on his land, Justice [[Rebecca Bradley (judge)|Rebecca Bradley]] of [[Wisconsin Supreme Court|that state's Supreme Court]] was highly critical of it.<ref name="State v. Stietz">{{cite court |litigants=State v. Stietz|vol=895|reporter=[[North Western Reporter|N.W. 2d]]|opinion=796|pinpoint=812–815|court=[[Wisconsin Supreme Court|Wisc.]]|date=2017|url=https://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=15612653012475974548|access-date=September 17, 2019}}</ref>

===''State v. Dixson''===

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{{cquote|... [I]mportant practical considerations suggest that the police should not be empowered to invade land closed to the public. In many parts of the country, landowners feel entitled to [[Second Amendment to the United States Constitution|use self-help]] in expelling trespassers from their posted property. There is thus a serious risk that police officers, making unannounced, warrantless searches of 'open fields,' will become involved in violent confrontations with irate landowners ...<ref name="Marshall Oliver dissent note 19">''[[Oliver v. United States]]'', {{ussc|466|170|195n19|1984}} [[Thurgood Marshall|Marshall]], J., dissenting</ref>}}

The scenario Justice [[Thurgood Marshall|Marshall]] feared in his ''Oliver'' dissent came to pass in [[Lafayette County, Wisconsin]], in 2012. Near sunset on the last Sunday of November, the last day of the state's firearm [[Deer hunting#State government regulation|deer season]], Robert Stietz, a cattle and mushroom farmer, went to patrol a detached {{convert|25|acre|ha|adj=on}} parcel of his land off [[Wisconsin Highway 81|state Highway 81]] for illegal hunters and vandals, both of which he had had problems with in the past. He carried both his rifle and a pistol, and drove to the property in his wife's sedan since he did not expect to be bringing a deer carcass home. For the same reason, he wore camouflage and no [[blaze orange]].<ref name="Stietz 803–804">{{cite court|litigants=State v. Stietz|vol=895|reporter=[[North Western Reporter|N.W.2d]]|opinion=796|pin=803–804|court=[[Wisconsin Supreme Court|Wisc.]]|date=2017|url=https://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=15612653012475974548|access-date=September 27, 2019}}</ref>

At the same time, unbeknownst to Stietz, two game wardens with the state's [[Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources|Department of Natural Resources]] were patrolling the area in their vehicle, looking for hunters who might be trying to take a deer after the official end of the season, [[civil twilight|20 minutes after sunset]], which that day was 4:45&nbsp;p.m. Just before 5, they found the sedan parked alongside the highway. In it they observed an open and empty gun case, a bottle of scent-killing spray and a camouflage [[Tree stand|tree seat]], all of which led them to deduce that the occupant of the car was probably hunting. The car's registration came back to Stietz when they checked it on their vehicle's computer.<ref name="Stietz 803–804" />