Court Opinion

ID: 9424013
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:09:54.129081+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:22:47.540776
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Stewart,
dissenting.
I do not disagree with the Court’s conclusion that the petitioner was arrested and detained without probable cause. But it does not follow that his fingerprints were inadmissible at the trial.
Fingerprints are not “evidence” in the conventional sense that weapons or stolen goods might be. Like the color of a man’s eyes, his height, or his very physiognomy, the tips of his fingers are an inherent and unchanging characteristic of the man. And physical impressions of his fingertips can be exactly and endlessly reproduced.
We do not deal here with a confession wrongfully obtained or with property wrongfully seized — so tainted as to be forever inadmissible as evidence against a defendant. We deal, instead, with “evidence” that can be identically reproduced and lawfully used at any subsequent trial.*
I cannot believe that the doctrine of Mapp v. Ohio, 367 U. S. 643, requires so useless a gesture as the reversal of this conviction.

At the original trial the victim of the rape, under oath, positively identified the petitioner as her assailant. There now exists, therefore, ample probable cause to detain him and take his fingerprints.