Open-fields doctrine: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 06:42, 3 October 2019

Revision as of 06:44, 3 October 2019

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===''State v. Kirchoff''===

A case that had begun before ''Oliver'' provided the [[Vermont Supreme Court]] with its opportunity to consider the open-fields doctrine almost a decade later. In 1982 Robert Kirchoff bought a {{convert|39|acre|ha|adj=on}} parcel in the town of [[Lincoln, Vermont]], posted it and filed a notice to that effect with the town clerk. He allowed some of his neighbors to ride their bicycles on trails that crossed the property, but otherwise did not allow any access.<ref name="People v. Kirchoff">{{cite court case|litigants=People v. Kirchoff|vol=587|reporter=[[Atlantic Reporter|A.2d]]|opinion=988|court=[[Vermont Supreme Court|Vt.]]|date=1988|url=https://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=9401759424447139849|accessdate=October 1, 2019}}</ref>

Kirchoff had been living there for four years when the [[Addison County, Vermont|Addison County]] sheriff received a tip that he was growing marijuana on his land. The sheriff and another law enforcement officer went to a neighboring house, crossed a fence, and followed an old logging road past some old "no trespassing" signs. They left the road and found the growing cannabis plants in the woods roughly 100 yards (91 m) from his house, invisible from the road.<ref name="Kirchoff at 990">''Kirchoff'', at 990</ref>

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Peck also called the majority's holding that the search was unconstitutional "a grossly unfair example of police-bashing", that he himself took personally.

{{quote|The police are not psychic. At the time they entered the open fields portion of defendant's property, they had no way of knowing or of anticipating that this Court would follow, sheep-like, the decision of one of the most activist-oriented among the state courts,{{efn|''Dixson''}} or that we would reject a contrary decision by the high court of a state which borders us and is far more similar to us in size and other characteristics than the former{{efn|Peck was referring to ''State v. Linder'', in which the [[New Hampshire Supreme Court|Supreme Court of neighboring New Hampshire]] had five years previously held the open-fields doctrine applied in that state.<ref name="State v. Linder">{{cite court|litigants=State v. Linder|vol=128|reporter=N.H.|opinion=66|court=[[New Hampshire Supreme Court|N.H.]]|date=1986|url=https://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=2487942038615680423|accessdate=October 3, 2019}}</ref>}} ... I would remind the majority, as it sheds its tears for the defendant, that the entry was not arbitrary. It was not an afternoon of sport for the police, on the off-chance they might just happen to stumble on marijuana or some other contraband, in much the same spirit that we hunt deer and other game. The entry was undertaken in reliance on a "tip"; with every reason to believe the search was legitimate, and it was done in good faith.</ref>}} Peck feared that the majority's decision would unnecessarily handicap the state's police in preventing crime. He accused it of "cho[osing]] the possible prestige with which it may be honored by law reviews and other constitutional activists among the courts, and legal writers, to a recognition of the rights of the individual inhabitants of the State of Vermont."<ref name="Kirchoff 999–1008" />

===''People v. Scott''===