Exclusionary Rule in US Constitution

This research paper entails the significance of the Exclusionary rule that has been developed to safeguard the protection guaranteed by the Fourth Amendment in the US Constitution. It discusses the rights guaranteed by the Fourth Amendment and are safeguarded by the Exclusionary rule. It also discusses the several exceptions that are applicable to the rule under circumstances where the otherwise excluded evidenced becomes admissible before the court.

Running head: CRIMINAL LAW
Criminal Law
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

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Abstract
This research paper entails the significance of the Exclusionary rule that has been developed to
safeguard the protection guaranteed by the Fourth Amendment in the US Constitution. The
Exclusionary doctrine excludes the evidences that are obtained by the Police officers and other
law enforcement officials through illegal means. The rule prohibits such evidences from being
admissible against the defendant during the trial process. However, this research paper discusses
about the rights that are guaranteed by the Fourth Amendment and are safeguarded by the
Exclusionary rule. It also discusses about the several exceptions that are applicable to the rule
under circumstances where the otherwise excluded evidenced becomes admissible before the
court. On one hand, the application of this rule deters the illegal means to obtain the evidence
against defendant on the other hand; it restricts its application to ensure administration of justice
is not hindered.

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Exclusionary Rule in US Constitution
Introduction
The exclusionary rule is considered as a legal rule that is used in the US Constitution,
which states that any evidence seized by the police illegally against the defendant, such evidence
shall not be submitted during the criminal trials. Evidence is permitted to be presented before the
court during trials of the criminals. The evidence that are relevant are only admissible in the
court, which implies that the evidence must be such that it establishes the existence of any
material fact related to the case. The exclusionary rule has been sanctioned to enforce the right of
the citizens to be secure in their homes against the any illegitimate governmental interference
(Kerr, 2016). However, the rule has been restricting the application of this rule only to evidences
that have been obtained illegally by the police. This rule has been considered a deterrent to
police misconduct.
The Exclusionary Rule
The exclusionary rule prevents the US government from submitting any evidence in trial
that has been obtained illegally in contravention of the Fourth Amendment. The Fourth
Amendment ensures protection against illegal seizure and search. The doctrine of exclusionary
rule used in the US courts has been sanctioned to deter police and other law enforcement agents
from obtaining evidence unreasonably and illegally (Cole, 2015). This rule has been sanctioned
in protection of the right of the people to be secured in their homes and to be protected against
illegal search and seizures. If an evidence is banned or forbidden from being submitted to the

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court, it implies that the evidence collected against the defendant cannot be used against him
during his trial, provided such evidence has been collected illegally.
Background of the Exclusionary Doctrine
At Common law, the legitimacy of the method to collect evidence had no relevance with
the admissibility of such evidence that is, the court was not concerned whether the evidence
submitted was obtained legally or illegally neither it formed any issue with respect to the
determination of the question. However, in 1886, the Supreme Court paved the way for the
establishment of the exclusionary rule in Boyd v United States [1886] 116 US 616. In this case,
the court held it is important to ensure that a liberal approach should be applied while
interpreting the constitutional provisions pertaining to security of person and property (Cole,
2015). The liberal construction principle led to the way establishment of the exclusionary rule
that was ultimately brought up in the landmark case of Weeks v United States [1914] 232 US
383.
In this landmark case, a US Marshall seized evidence from the home of the defendant
without any arrest or search warrant against Mr. Weeks. Moreover, such evidence was seized
without the consent of Mr. Weeks, the defendant. The court held that if evidence is seized in this
manner and used against the defendant, it should amount to a contravention of the protection
guaranteed in the Fourth Amendment; therefore, such evidence shall have no value. The court
further reasoned that the Fourth amendment subjects the Federal and US officials to restrictions
with respect to the exercise of their authority and power.
Hence, the Court established that the evidence obtained by the Federal agents in a manner
that contravenes the Fourth Amendment rights should not be included in the criminal

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prosecution against the defendant. Further, in Mapp v Ohio [1961] 367 US 643, the Supreme
Court held that the exclusionary rule is applicable to the states. Furthermore, the decision in
Miranda v Arizona [1966] 384 U.S. 436 established that the exclusionary rule is applicable to
self-incriminatory statements that have been obtained improperly, resulting in contravention of
the Fifth Amendment.
The Fourth Amendment and the Exclusion rule
The Fourth Amendment under the US Constitution was enforced with the objective of
ensuring security of every person in his or her respective homes. The underlying principle of this
amendment is that each man’s castle is his home and every man is safeguarded from arbitrary
and illegal police arrests (Kerr, 2016). The Fourth Amendment ensures that no person is
subjected to unreasonable seizures and searches of their respective properties by the US
government. This Constitutional amendment is based on the law regarding stop-and-frisk, search
warrants and any other forms of safety inspections, wiretaps etc. the Fourth Amendment is
fundamental to privacy law and other aspects of criminal law.
This legal provision stipulated under the Fourth Amendment aims at safeguarding the
privacy right of the people by deterring unnecessary and illegal intrusion from the US
Government. In other words, the Fourth Amendment does not ensure safety for search and
seizures that the governmental officials carry out legally and on a valid legal ground. Therefore,
in order to claim contravention of the Fourth Amendment, the court shall determine whether
such intrusion has violated any of the rights of the claimant, where the claimant expected privacy
and such intrusion has violated the privacy right.

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Significance of the Exclusionary rule
The introduction of the exclusionary rule in the Fourth Amendment has been made to
deter police misconduct and enables the courts to exclude admissibility of any incriminating
evidence during trial provided the defendant establishes that the evidence was obtained in
violation of a constitutional provision (Kerr, 2016). This doctrine permits the defendants to
challenge the evidence obtained illegally by initiating a pre-trial motion in order to suppress the
evidence.
However, if the court permits the evidence to be submitted during trial and the jury votes
in favor of conviction, the defendant is entitled to prefer an appeal to challenge the correctness of
the decision taken by the court regarding denial of the motion to suppress. Although the Supreme
Court had established in Lockhart v Nelson [1988] 488 USS 33 that the defendant is not barred
from the retrial, however, if the defendant is convicted in the second trial and the evidence
suppressed by the applying the exclusionary rule is crucial to the prosecution.
The doctrine of “Fruit of the Poisonous Tree”
This legal doctrine ‘Fruit of the Poisonous tree’ states that an evidence obtained through
illegal search, seizure, interrogation or arrest is not admissible before the court as the evidence is
tainted due to the illegal method in which it has been obtained. In other words, this doctrine is
considered as a companion to the exclusionary rule, as this doctrine not only excludes evidence
from trial that has been obtained in contravention of the Constitution but it also excludes any
other evidence that has been obtained through the illegal search or seizure (Kerr, 2016).
For instance, police put a wiretap on a drug-dealer’s phone without obtaining any warrant
for the same. Now, the suspect discloses that he has drugs hidden under a dumpster and the

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buyer picks it from the dumpster. The police finds the place and seize the drugs and such illegal
phone calls shall not be admissible to the court which is signified as the ‘poisonous tree’ and the
drugs seized as the outcome of the illegal phone call shall not be admissible either as it is
signified as ‘the fruit of the poisonous tree’.
Exceptions to the Exclusionary Rule
Although the rationale behind the establishment of the exclusionary rule is to deter the
law enforcement officers from conducting illegal searches and seizures contravention of the
Fourth amendment, thus, providing remedies to the defendants whose rights have been infringed.
However, since this doctrine is a court made rule unlike an independent constitutional right,
hence, courts have provided with exceptions to the application of this rule. The exceptions are
enumerated as below:
a) Good faith- if a police officer relies on search warrant and collect evidence but such
search warrant turns out to be invalid, under such circumstances, the evidence shall not
be excluded from being admissible (Kerr, 2016). This exception as established in the
landmark case United States v Leon [1983] 104 S Ct. 3405 and in Arizona v Evans
[1995] 514 US1. Further, in the case Illinois v Krull [1987], the court held that evidence
is admissible if the officers rely on nay statute that has been later repealed. Furthermore,
in Herring v US [2009], the Court found that the good faith exception should be
applicable against the exclusionary rule when the police employees mistakenly failed to
maintain warrant database records.
b) Doctrine of Independent source- any evidence that has been excluded initially for being
obtained illegally may be later admissible provided the same evidence has been obtained

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after lawful seizure or search. This exception was established in the case of Nix v
Williams [1984] for the first time and then this rule has been interpreted in Murray v US
[1988].
c) Doctrine of Attenuation – under circumstances where the challenged evidence and the
unconstitutional conduct is not directly related and attenuated, the evidence shall become
admissible as was established in Utah v Strieff [2016] and Brown v Illinois [1975]. The
court shall determine three essential factors to apply this exception: presence of
interference, temporal proximity and purpose of official misconduct.
d) Doctrine of Inevitable Discovery – in Nix v Williams it was established that any evidence
discovered illegally shall be admissible if it is clear that such evidence would otherwise
have been discovered even if the investigations were carried out lawfully.
e) Evidence admissible for Impeachment- In Harris v New York [1971], the Supreme Court
established that this exception shall be used as truth-detecting factor to avert perjury but
such evidence shall be admissible only for impeachment and not to establish guilt.
Conclusion
From the above discussion, it can be inferred that the exclusionary rule that has been
developed to allow the defendant to suppress certain evidences that are admitted against them on
the ground that such evidence has been collected through illegal means and violates their rights
guaranteed under the Fourth Amendment. A ‘motion to suppress evidence’ is a request that is
made by the defendant before the court to exclude such evidences from the trial proceedings for
the illegal manner it has been obtained by the law enforcement officials (Kerr, 2016).

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The exclusionary rule has been subjected to limited applications as this rule merely deters
the police officers from using illegal means to collect evidence and use it against the defendant,
violating the legal provision of the Fourth Amendment and the rights of such defendants. If any
police officers or law enforcement officers do not have a search or seizure warrant against any
person, the rule prohibits such officers to search or seize any property of such person rendering
such search or seizure as well as the evidence obtained through such illegal procedures as invalid
and unlawful. The rule though safeguards the rights guaranteed to the people by the Fourth
amendment but not the extent that justice cannot be administered.

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Reference list
Arizona v Evans [1995] 514 US1
Boyd v United States [1886] 116 US 616
Brown v Illinois. [1975] 422 U.S. 590
Cole, S. C. (2015). De-Clawing Katz: Emerging Technology and the Exclusionary Rule. SMU
Sci. & Tech. L. Rev., 18, 47.
Harris v New York [1971]. 401 U.S. 222
Herring v US (2009) 555 U.S. 135
Illinois v Krull (1987) 480 U.S. 340,
Kerr, O. S. (2016). The Effect of Legislation on Fourth Amendment Protection. Mich. L.
Rev., 115, 1117.
Lockhart v Nelson [1988] 488 USS 33
Mapp v Ohio 367 US 643
Miranda v Arizona [1966] 384 U.S. 436
Murray v US (1988) 487 U.S. 533
Nix v Williams (1984),467 U.S. 431
United States v Leon [1983] 104 S Ct. 3405
Utah v Strieff (2016) 579 U.S. ___, 136 S. Ct. 2056

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Weeks v United States [1914] 232 US 383