Essay On Search Incident To Arrest

Search Incident to Arrest One exception to the warrant requirement of the Fourth Amendment is a search incident to a lawful arrest. A search incident to lawful arrest requires a valid arrest as a foundation for conducting a search following an arrest (Ingram, 2009). In this particular type of arrest, a police officer will first begin the process by obtaining full control over an individual. Once the officer obtains full control over the individual he or she will then determine where, when, and how the person will either move from or stay in a particular area (Ingram, 2009). The next move is for the officer, after detaining the individual in question, is to then search the individual to find incriminating evidence. It is important to note that this type of search is actually permitted under the law.

The law also states that the officer can not only search the individual, but he or she can also search the area

The first being that law enforcement officials need to disarm their suspect before they take him or her into custody. The second rationale is to allow for the preservation of evidence in order to obtain evidence of criminality, and for said evidence to be used in a trial at a later date. One particular case in which this law was tested was in the case of Knowles v. Iowa (1998). In this particular case, a police officer searched a vehicle without first arresting the driver, but the officer did have probable cause. Even though the officer had probable cause to search the vehicle, the court concluded that such a search was a violation of the law. The court went on to say that the search was not permitted because no arrest had been made and therefore, the search of the vehicle could not be justified. The requirement of the law is that a search incident to arrest must first begin with an officer making an arrest prior to conducting a search incident to arrest (Ingram,