Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/529bv.pdf
Page Number: 412

529US2

Unit: $U44

[09-26-01 10:00:50] PAGES PGT: OPIN

Cite as: 529 U. S. 334 (2000)

337

Opinion of the Court

Place, 462 U. S. 696, 707 (1983).
Indeed, it is undisputed
here that petitioner possessed a privacy interest in his
bag.

But the Government asserts that by exposing his bag to
the public, petitioner lost a reasonable expectation that his
bag would not be physically manipulated. The Government
relies on our decisions in California v. Ciraolo, supra, and
Florida v. Riley, 488 U. S. 445 (1989), for the proposition that
matters open to public observation are not protected by the
Fourth Amendment.
In Ciraolo, we held that police obser-
vation of a backyard from a plane ﬂying at an altitude of
1,000 feet did not violate a reasonable expectation of privacy.
Similarly, in Riley, we relied on Ciraolo to hold that police
observation of a greenhouse in a home’s curtilage from a heli-
copter passing at an altitude of 400 feet did not violate the
Fourth Amendment. We reasoned that the property was
“not necessarily protected from inspection that involves no
physical invasion,” and determined that because any member
of the public could have lawfully observed the defendants’
property by ﬂying overhead, the defendants’ expectation of
privacy was “not reasonable and not one ‘that society is pre-
pared to honor.’ ” See Riley, supra, at 449 (explaining and
relying on Ciraolo’s reasoning).

But Ciraolo and Riley are different from this case because
they involved only visual, as opposed to tactile, observation.
Physically invasive inspection is simply more intrusive than
purely visual inspection. For example, in Terry v. Ohio, 392
U. S. 1, 16–17 (1968), we stated that a “careful [tactile] explo-
ration of the outer surfaces of a person’s clothing all over his
or her body” is a “serious intrusion upon the sanctity of the
person, which may inﬂict great indignity and arouse strong
resentment, and it is not to be undertaken lightly.” Al-
though Agent Cantu did not “frisk” petitioner’s person, he
did conduct a probing tactile examination of petitioner’s
carry-on luggage. Obviously, petitioner’s bag was not part
of his person. But travelers are particularly concerned