Supreme Court Decisions Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Supreme Court Decisions - Research Paper Example As per the Fourth Amendment, a ‘reasonable search’ is one that is pursuant to a judicially sanctioned warrant and is supported by a probable cause (Dripps, 2007). That is as per the Fourth Amendment, if a search is not carried on, on the basis of a judicial warrant and its scope is not defined and delineated on the basis of the information furnished by an individual under oath and hence accountable to the court of law, it stands to be unreasonable. Thus, the Fourth Amendment’s definition of ‘search’ is very broad based that is open to varied interpretations in case of actual court cases and rulings. Olmstead v. United States, 277 U.S. 438 (1928) Before this judgment, the judicial institutions including the Supreme Court of the United States followed the spirit of the English Common Law, as per which, the permissibility of evidence in a court of law was in no way susceptible to the way in which that evidence was obtained (Bloom, 2003). In the judgment under consideration, the petitioner, Roy Olmstead appealed to the Supreme Court that the wiretapped private telephone communication presented as evidence against him by the law enforcement bodies were a direct violation of his Fourth Amendment Rights. The Supreme Court gave the ruling that the presented wiretapped telephonic conversation as evidence against the petitioner in no way violated the Fourth Amendment.