The officer's subjective intent is irrelevant so long as there is some legal basis for the stop. The appellate court held that Whren has not been extended to justifying a warrantless search under these circumstances. A search warrant should have been obtained. The narcotics was properly suppressed. But, until a higher court decides the issue, this court felt bound by prior case law to the contrary.
Random weapons searches on school campuses, under tightly controlled conditions, are constitutional.
Students were required to show the contents of their pockets only if the metal detector was triggered. Defendant student was caught with an illegal knife following one such search. The Juvenile Court denied her motion to suppress the knife and she appealed. The Fourth Amendment is not violated by such searches where the government need is great, the intrusion on the individual is limited, and a more rigorous standard of individualized suspicion is unworkable. The student searches at issue here met these requirements.