Opinion ID: 901816
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Distinction Between Vehicle and Home Searches

Text: [¶ 83.] Constitutionally speaking, the difference between the search of a car and the search of a home is extremely important. Id. at 439, 93 S.Ct. at 2527. The United States Supreme Court in Cady outlined some of the reasons for the constitutional differences in treatment between vehicles and homes by stating: Because of the extensive regulation of motor vehicles and traffic, and also because of the frequency with which a vehicle can become disabled or involved in an accident on public highways, the extent of police-citizen contact involving automobiles will be substantially greater than police-citizen contact in a home or office. Some such contacts will occur because the officer may believe the operator has violated a criminal statute, but many more will not be of that nature. Id. at 441, 93 S.Ct. at 2528. After broadly laying the analytical framework for the community caretaker doctrine in the vehicular context, the majority applies that exception to the search of a house because homes cannot be arbitrarily isolated from the community caretaking equation. Supra ¶ 41. On the contrary, most jurisdictions have isolated homes from the community caretaker equation. This isolation is not arbitrary, but based on the constitutional differences between homes and automobiles. [¶ 84.] Constitutional jurisprudence in the United States has created rules distinguishing searches of cars and homes. See Rinehart, 2000 SD 135, ¶ 7, 617 N.W.2d at 843-44 (permitting the search of a vehicle under the community caretaker exception) (citing Cady, 413 U.S. 433, 93 S.Ct. 2523); Payton, 445 U.S. at 586, 100 S.Ct. at 1380 ([P]hysical entry of the home is the chief evil against which the wording of the Fourth Amendment is directed[.]); Katz, 389 U.S. at 357, 88 S.Ct. at 514 ([E]very law enforcement entry into a home for the purpose of search and seizure must be made with a warrant.). Thus, the analysis from Cady need not be extended to searches of a home. See supra ¶ 35.