The Fifth Amendment (Amendment V) to the
United States Constitution addresses
criminal procedure and other aspects of the Constitution. It was ratified, along with nine other articles, in 1791 as part of the
Bill of Rights
A bill of rights, sometimes called a declaration of rights or a charter of rights, is a list of the most important rights to the citizens of a country. The purpose is to protect those rights against infringement from public officials and pr ...
. The Fifth Amendment applies to every level of the government, including the federal, state, and local levels, in regard to a US citizen or resident of the US. The
Supreme Court furthered the protections of this amendment through the
Due Process Clause of the
Fourteenth Amendment.
One provision of the Fifth Amendment requires that
felonies
A felony is traditionally considered a crime of high seriousness, whereas a misdemeanor is regarded as less serious. The term "felony" originated from English common law (from the French medieval word "félonie") to describe an offense that resu ...
be tried only upon
indictment
An indictment ( ) is a formal accusation that a person has committed a crime. In jurisdictions that use the concept of felonies, the most serious criminal offence is a felony; jurisdictions that do not use the felonies concept often use that of a ...
by a
grand jury. Another provision, the
Double Jeopardy Clause, provides the right of defendants to be tried only once in federal court for the same offense. The
self-incrimination
In criminal law, self-incrimination is the act of exposing oneself generally, by making a statement, "to an accusation or charge of crime; to involve oneself or another ersonin a criminal prosecution or the danger thereof". (Self-incrimination ...
clause provides various protections against self-incrimination, including the right of an individual not to serve as a witness in a criminal case in which they are the defendant. "Pleading the Fifth" is a colloquial term often used to invoke the self-incrimination clause when witnesses decline to answer questions where the answers might incriminate them. In the 1966 case of ''
Miranda v. Arizona
''Miranda v. Arizona'', 384 U.S. 436 (1966), was a landmark decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in which the Court ruled that the Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution restricts prosecutors from using a person's statements made in response to ...
'', the Supreme Court held that the self-incrimination clause requires the police to issue a
''Miranda'' warning to criminal suspects interrogated while under police custody. The Fifth Amendment also contains the Takings Clause, which allows the federal government to
take private property for public use if the government provides "just compensation".
Like the Fourteenth Amendment, the Fifth Amendment includes a due process clause stating that no person shall "be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law". The Fifth Amendment's due process clause applies to the federal government, while the Fourteenth Amendment's due process clause applies to state governments. The Supreme Court has interpreted the Fifth Amendment's Due Process Clause as providing two main protections:
procedural due process
Procedural due process is a legal doctrine in the United States that requires government officials to follow fair procedures before depriving a person of life, liberty, or property. When the government seeks to deprive a person of one of those in ...
, which requires government officials to follow fair procedures before depriving a person of life, liberty, or property, and
substantive due process
Substantive due process is a principle in United States constitutional law that allows courts to establish and protect certain fundamental rights from government interference, even if only procedural protections are present or the rights are unen ...
, which protects certain
fundamental rights
Fundamental rights are a group of rights that have been recognized by a high degree of protection from encroachment. These rights are specifically identified in a constitution, or have been found under due process of law. The United Nations' Susta ...
from government interference. The Supreme Court has also held that the Due Process Clause contains a
prohibition against vague laws and an implied equal protection requirement similar to the Fourteenth Amendment's
Equal Protection Clause.
Text
The amendment as proposed by Congress in 1789:
Background before adoption
![James Madison(cropped)(c)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/20/James_Madison%28cropped%29%28c%29.jpg)
On June 8, 1789, Congressman
James Madison
James Madison Jr. (March 16, 1751June 28, 1836) was an American statesman, diplomat, and Founding Father. He served as the fourth president of the United States from 1809 to 1817. Madison is hailed as the "Father of the Constitution" for h ...
introduced several proposed constitutional amendments during a speech to the
House of Representatives
House of Representatives is the name of legislative bodies in many countries and sub-national entitles. In many countries, the House of Representatives is the lower house of a bicameral legislature, with the corresponding upper house often c ...
.
["James Madison's Proposed Amendments to the Constitution"]
'' Annals of Congress'' (June 8, 1789). His draft language that later became the Fifth Amendment was as follows:
[
]No person shall be subject, except in cases of impeachment, to more than one punishment or trial for the same offense; nor shall be compelled to be a witness against himself; nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor be obliged to relinquish his property, where it may be necessary for public use, without just compensation.... cept in cases of impeachments, and cases arising in the land or naval forces, or the militia when on actual service, in time of war or public danger... in all crimes punishable with loss of life or member, presentment or indictment by a grand jury shall be an essential preliminary...
This draft was edited by Congress; all the material before the first ellipsis was placed at the end, and some of the wording was modified. After approval by Congress, the amendment was ratified by the states on December 15, 1791 as part of the Bill of Rights
A bill of rights, sometimes called a declaration of rights or a charter of rights, is a list of the most important rights to the citizens of a country. The purpose is to protect those rights against infringement from public officials and pr ...
. Every one of the five clauses in the final amendment appeared in Madison's draft, and in their final order those clauses are the Grand Jury Clause (which Madison had placed last), the Double Jeopardy Clause, the Self Incrimination Clause, the Due Process Clause, and then the Takings Clause
The Fifth Amendment (Amendment V) to the United States Constitution addresses criminal procedure and other aspects of the Constitution. It was ratified, along with nine other articles, in 1791 as part of the Bill of Rights. The Fifth Amen ...
.
Grand jury
The grand jury is a pre-constitutional common law institution, and a constitutional fixture in its own right exclusively embracing common law. The process applies to the states to the extent that the states have incorporated grand juries and/or common law. Most states have an alternative civil process. "Although state systems of criminal procedure differ greatly among themselves, the grand jury is similarly guaranteed by many state constitutions and plays an important role in fair and effective law enforcement in the overwhelming 688
__NOTOC__
Year 688 ( DCLXXXVIII) was a leap year starting on Wednesday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. The denomination 688 for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar ...
majority of the States." Branzburg v. Hayes (No. 70-85) 1972. Grand juries
A grand jury is a jury—a group of citizens—empowered by law to conduct legal proceedings, investigate potential criminal conduct, and determine whether criminal charges should be brought. A grand jury may subpoena physical evidence or a pe ...
, which return indictment
An indictment ( ) is a formal accusation that a person has committed a crime. In jurisdictions that use the concept of felonies, the most serious criminal offence is a felony; jurisdictions that do not use the felonies concept often use that of a ...
s in many criminal cases, are composed of a jury of peers and operate in closed deliberation proceedings; they are given specific instructions regarding the law by the judge. Many constitutional restrictions that apply in court or in other situations do not apply during grand jury proceedings. For example, the exclusionary rule
In the United States, the exclusionary rule is a legal rule, based on constitutional law, that prevents evidence collected or analyzed in violation of the defendant's constitutional rights from being used in a court of law. This may be consider ...
does not apply to certain evidence presented to a grand jury; the exclusionary rule states that evidence obtained in violation of the Fourth, Fifth or Sixth amendments cannot be introduced in court. Also, an individual does not have the right to have an attorney present in the grand jury room during hearings. An individual would have such a right during questioning by the police while in custody, but an individual testifying before a grand jury is free to leave the grand jury room to consult with his attorney outside the room before returning to answer a question.
Currently, federal law permits the trial of misdemeanors without indictments. Additionally, in trials of non-capital felonies, the prosecution may proceed without indictments if the defendants waive their Fifth Amendment right.
Grand jury indictments may be amended by the prosecution only in limited circumstances. In '' Ex Parte Bain'', , the Supreme Court held that the indictment could not be changed at all by the prosecution. ''United States v. Miller'', partly reversed ''Ex parte Bain''; now, an indictment's scope may be narrowed by the prosecution. Thus, lesser included charges may be dropped, but new charges may not be added.
The Grand Jury Clause of the Fifth Amendment does not protect those serving in the armed forces, whether during wartime or peacetime. Members of the state militia called up to serve with federal forces are not protected under the clause either. In '' O'Callahan v. Parker'', , the Supreme Court held that only charges relating to service may be brought against members of the militia without indictments. As a decision, O'Callahan, however, lived for a limited duration and was more a reflection of Justice William O. Douglas's distrust of presidential power and anger at the Vietnam Conflict. O'Callahan was overturned in 1987, when the Court held that members of the militia in actual service may be tried for any offense without indictments.
The grand jury indictment clause of the Fifth Amendment has not been incorporated under the Fourteenth Amendment. This means the grand jury requirement applies only to felony charges in the federal court system. While many states ''do'' employ grand juries, no defendant has a Fifth Amendment right to a grand jury for criminal charges in state court. States are free to abolish grand juries, and many (though not all) have replaced them with preliminary hearing.
Infamous crime
Whether a crime is "infamous", for purposes of the Grand Jury Clause, is determined by the nature of the punishment that may be imposed, not the punishment that is actually imposed; however, crimes punishable by death
Death is the irreversible cessation of all biological functions that sustain an organism. For organisms with a brain, death can also be defined as the irreversible cessation of functioning of the whole brain, including brainstem, and brain ...
must be tried upon indictment
An indictment ( ) is a formal accusation that a person has committed a crime. In jurisdictions that use the concept of felonies, the most serious criminal offence is a felony; jurisdictions that do not use the felonies concept often use that of a ...
s. The historical origin of "infamous crime" comes from the ''infamia
In ancient Roman culture, ''infamia'' (''in-'', "not," and ''fama'', "reputation") was a loss of legal or social standing. As a technical term of Roman law, ''infamia'' was an official exclusion from the legal protections enjoyed by a Roman citi ...
'', a punishment under Roman law by which a citizen was deprived of his citizenship. In ''United States v. Moreland
''United States v. Moreland'', 258 U.S. 433 (1922), was a case heard by the Supreme Court of the United States on March 9 and 10, 1922, and decided a month later on April 17. The case involved a Fifth Amendment rights issue centering on whether o ...
'', , the Supreme Court held that incarceration in a prison or penitentiary, as opposed to a correction or reformation house, attaches infamy to a crime. In '' Mackin v. United States'', , the Supreme Court judged that "'Infamous crimes' are thus, in the most explicit words, defined to be those 'punishable by imprisonment in the penitentiary'", while it later in ''Green v. United States
Green is the color between cyan and yellow on the visible spectrum. It is evoked by light which has a dominant wavelength of roughly 495570 nm. In subtractive color systems, used in painting and color printing, it is created by a combina ...
'' stated that "imprisonment in a penitentiary can be imposed only if a crime is subject to imprisonment exceeding one year." Therefore, an infamous crime is one that is punished by imprisonment for over one year. Susan Brown, a former defense attorney and Professor of Law at the University of Dayton School of Law
The University of Dayton School of Law (UDSL) is a private law school located in Dayton, Ohio. It is affiliated with the University of Dayton, which is a Catholic university of the Society of Mary. The school is accredited by the American Bar As ...
, concluded: "Since this is essentially the definition of a felony
A felony is traditionally considered a crime of high seriousness, whereas a misdemeanor is regarded as less serious. The term "felony" originated from English common law (from the French medieval word "félonie") to describe an offense that resu ...
, infamous crimes translate as felonies."
Double jeopardy
: ... nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb...
The Double Jeopardy Clause encompasses four distinct prohibitions: subsequent prosecution after acquittal, subsequent prosecution after conviction, subsequent prosecution after certain mistrials, and multiple punishment in the same indictment. Jeopardy applies when the jury is empaneled in a jury trial, when the first witness is sworn in during a bench trial, or when a plea is rendered.
Prosecution after acquittal
The government is not permitted to appeal or try again after the entry of an acquittal, whether a directed verdict
In law, a verdict is the formal finding of fact made by a jury on matters or questions submitted to the jury by a judge. In a bench trial, the judge's decision near the end of the trial is simply referred to as a finding. In England and Wales, ...
before the case is submitted to the jury, a directed verdict after a deadlocked jury, an appellate reversal for sufficiency (except by direct appeal to a higher appellate court), or an "implied acquittal" via conviction of a lesser included offense. In addition, the government is barred by collateral estoppel
Collateral estoppel (CE), known in modern terminology as issue preclusion, is a common law estoppel doctrine that prevents a person from relitigating an issue. One summary is that, "once a court has decided an issue of fact or law necessary to its ...
from re-litigating against the same defense, a fact necessarily found by the jury in a prior acquittal, even if the jury hung on other counts.
This principle does not prevent the government from appealing a pre-trial motion to dismiss or other non-merits dismissal, or a directed verdict after a jury conviction, nor does it prevent the trial judge from entertaining a motion for reconsideration of a directed verdict, if the jurisdiction has so provided by rule or statute. Nor does it prevent the government from retrying the defendant after an appellate reversal other than for sufficiency, including habeas, or "thirteenth juror" appellate reversals notwithstanding sufficiency on the principle that jeopardy has not "terminated". There is also an exception for judicial bribery in a bench trial.
Multiple punishment, including prosecution after conviction
In ''Blockburger v. United States
''Blockburger v. United States'', 284 U.S. 299 (1932), was a case in which the Supreme Court of the United States set an important standard to prevent double jeopardy.
Background
The defendant was charged with violations of the Harrison Narcotics ...
'' (1932), the Supreme Court announced the following test: the government may separately try to punish the defendant for two crimes if each crime contains an element that the other does not. ''Blockburger'' is the default rule, unless the legislature intends to depart; for example, Continuing Criminal Enterprise
The Continuing Criminal Enterprise Statute (commonly referred to as CCE Statute or Kingpin Statute) is a United States federal law that targets large-scale drug traffickers who are responsible for long-term and elaborate drug conspiracies. Unlike t ...
(CCE) may be punished separately from its predicates, as can conspiracy.
The ''Blockburger'' test, originally developed in the multiple punishments context, is also the test for prosecution after conviction. In ''Grady v. Corbin
''Grady v. Corbin'', 495 U.S. 508 (1990), was a United States Supreme Court decision holding that: "the Double Jeopardy Clause bars a subsequent prosecution if, to establish an essential element of an offense charged in that prosecution, the gover ...
'' (1990), the Court held that a double jeopardy violation could lie even where the ''Blockburger'' test was satisfied, but ''Grady'' was overruled in ''United States v. Dixon
''United States v. Dixon'', 509 U.S. 688 (1993), was a decision of the Supreme Court of the United States, United States Supreme Court concerning double jeopardy. The case overruled ''Grady v. Corbin'' (1990) and revived the traditional Blockburger ...
'' (1993).
Prosecution after mistrial
The rule for mistrial
In law, a trial is a coming together of parties to a dispute, to present information (in the form of evidence) in a tribunal, a formal setting with the authority to adjudicate claims or disputes. One form of tribunal is a court. The tribunal, ...
s depends upon who sought the mistrial. If the defendant moves for a mistrial, there is no bar to retrial, unless the prosecutor acted in "bad faith", i.e., goaded the defendant into moving for a mistrial because the government specifically wanted a mistrial. If the prosecutor moves for a mistrial, there is no bar to retrial if the trial judge finds "manifest necessity" for granting the mistrial. The same standard governs mistrials granted ''sua sponte
In law, ''sua sponte'' (Latin: "of his, her, its or their own accord") or ''suo motu'' ("on its own motion") describes an act of authority taken without formal prompting from another party. The term is usually applied to actions by a judge taken wi ...
''.
Prosecution in different states
In Heath v. Alabama
''Heath v. Alabama'', 474 U.S. 82 (1985), is a case in which the Supreme Court of the United States, United States Supreme Court ruled that, because of the doctrine of "dual sovereignty" (the concept that the United States and each U.S. state, stat ...
(1985), the Supreme Court held, that the Fifth Amendment rule against double jeopardy does not prohibit two different states from separately prosecuting and convicting the same individual for the same illegal act.
Self-incrimination
The Fifth Amendment protects individuals from being forced to incriminate themselves. Incriminating oneself is defined as exposing oneself (or another person) to "an accusation or charge of crime", or as involving oneself (or another person) "in a criminal prosecution or the danger thereof". The ''privilege'' against compelled self-incrimination is defined as "the constitutional right of a person to refuse to answer questions or otherwise give testimony against himself". To "plead the Fifth" is to refuse to answer any question because "the implications of the question, in the setting in which it is asked" lead a claimant to possess a "reasonable cause to apprehend danger from a direct answer", believing that "a responsive answer to the question or an explanation of why it cannot be answered might be dangerous because injurious disclosure could result."
Historically, the legal protection against compelled self-incrimination was directly related to the question of torture for extracting information and confessions.
The legal shift away from widespread use of torture and forced confession
A forced confession is a confession obtained from a suspect or a prisoner by means of torture (including enhanced interrogation techniques) or other forms of duress. Depending on the level of coercion used, a forced confession is not valid in rev ...
dates to the turmoil of the late 16th and early 17th century in England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...
.[ex-officio-mero">]
The Supreme Court of the United States has held that "a witness may have a reasonable fear of prosecution and yet be innocent of any wrongdoing. The privilege serves to protect the innocent who otherwise might be ensnared by ambiguous circumstances."
However, Professor James Duane
James Duane (February 6, 1733 – February 1, 1797) was an American Founding Father, attorney, jurist, and American Revolutionary leader from New York. He served as a delegate to the First Continental Congress, Second Continental Congress an ...
of the Regent University School of Law argues that the Supreme Court, in a 5–4 decision in ''Salinas v. Texas
''Berghuis v. Thompkins'', 560 U.S. 370 (2010), is a landmark decision by the Supreme Court of the United States in which the Court considered the position of a suspect who understands their right to remain silent under ''Miranda v. Arizona'' an ...
'', significantly weakened the privilege, saying "our choice to use the Fifth Amendment privilege can be used against you at trial depending exactly how and where you do it."
In the ''Salinas'' case, justices Alito, Roberts, and Kennedy held that "the Fifth Amendment's privilege against self-incrimination does not extend to defendants who simply decide to remain mute during questioning. Long-standing judicial precedent has held that any witness who desires protection against self-incrimination must explicitly claim that protection."
Justice Thomas, siding with Alito, Roberts and Kennedy, in a separate opinion, held that, "Salinas' Fifth Amendment privilege would not have been applicable even if invoked because the prosecutor's testimony regarding his silence did not compel Salinas to give self-incriminating testimony." Justice Antonin Scalia joined Thomas' opinion.
Legal proceedings and congressional hearings
The Fifth Amendment privilege against compulsory self-incrimination applies when an individual is called to testify in a legal proceeding. The Supreme Court ruled that the privilege applies whether the witness is in a federal court or, under the incorporation doctrine
In United States constitutional law, incorporation is the doctrine by which portions of the Bill of Rights have been made applicable to the states. When the Bill of Rights was ratified, the courts held that its protections extended only to the ...
of the Fourteenth Amendment, in a state court, and whether the proceeding itself is criminal or civil.
The right to remain silent was asserted at grand jury or congressional hearings in the 1950s, when witnesses testifying before the House Committee on Un-American Activities
The House Committee on Un-American Activities (HCUA), popularly dubbed the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), was an investigative committee of the United States House of Representatives, created in 1938 to investigate alleged disloy ...
or the Senate Internal Security Subcommittee
The United States Senate's Special Subcommittee to Investigate the Administration of the Internal Security Act and Other Internal Security Laws, 1951–77, known more commonly as the Senate Internal Security Subcommittee (SISS) and sometimes the M ...
claimed the right in response to questions concerning their alleged membership in the Communist Party
A communist party is a political party that seeks to realize the socio-economic goals of communism. The term ''communist party'' was popularized by the title of ''The Manifesto of the Communist Party'' (1848) by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. ...
. Under the Red Scare hysteria at the time of McCarthyism, witnesses who refused to answer the questions were accused as "fifth amendment communists". They lost jobs or positions in unions and other political organizations, and suffered other repercussions after "taking the Fifth".
Senator Joseph McCarthy (R-WI) asked, "Are you now, or have you ever been, a member of the Communist Party?" while he was chairman of the Senate Government Operations Committee Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. Admitting to a previous Communist Party membership was not sufficient. Witnesses were also required to "name names", i.e. implicate others they knew to be Communists or who had been Communists in the past. Academy Award
The Academy Awards, better known as the Oscars, are awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international film industry. The awards are regarded by many as the most prestigious, significant awards in the entertainment ind ...
winning director Elia Kazan testified before the House Committee on Un-American Activities
The House Committee on Un-American Activities (HCUA), popularly dubbed the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), was an investigative committee of the United States House of Representatives, created in 1938 to investigate alleged disloy ...
that he had belonged to the Communist Party briefly in his youth. He also "named names", which incurred enmity of many in Hollywood. Other entertainers such as Zero Mostel found themselves on a Hollywood blacklist
The Hollywood blacklist was an entertainment industry blacklist, broader than just Hollywood, put in effect in the mid-20th century in the United States during the early years of the Cold War. The blacklist involved the practice of denying empl ...
after taking the Fifth, and were unable to find work for a while in show business. Pleading the Fifth in response to such questions was held inapplicable, since being a Communist itself was not a crime.
The amendment has also been used by defendants and witnesses in criminal cases involving the American Mafia.
Statements made to non-governmental entities
The privilege against self-incrimination does not protect an individual from being suspended from membership in a non-governmental, self-regulatory organization
A self-regulatory organization (SRO) is an organization that exercises some degree of regulatory authority over an industry or profession. The regulatory authority could exist in place of government regulation, or applied in addition to governmen ...
(SRO), such as the New York Stock Exchange
The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE, nicknamed "The Big Board") is an American stock exchange in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan in New York City. It is by far the world's largest stock exchange by market capitalization of its listed ...
(NYSE), where the individual refuses to answer questions posed by the SRO. An SRO itself is not a court of law, and cannot send a person to jail. SROs, such as the NYSE and the National Association of Securities Dealers
The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) is a private American corporation that acts as a self-regulatory organization (SRO) that regulates member brokerage firms and exchange markets. FINRA is the successor to the National Associat ...
(NASD), are generally not considered to be state actors. See ''United States v. Solomon'', ''D. L. Cromwell Invs., Inc. v. NASD Regulation, Inc.'', and ''Marchiano v. NASD''. SROs also lack subpoena powers. They rely heavily on requiring testimony from individuals by wielding the threat of loss of membership or a bar from the industry (permanent, if decided by the NASD) when the individual asserts his Fifth Amendment privilege against compelled self-incrimination. If a person chooses to provide statements in testimony to the SRO, the SRO may provide information about those statements to law enforcement agencies, who may then use the statements in a prosecution of the individual.
Custodial interrogation
The Fifth Amendment limits the use of evidence obtained illegally by law enforcement officers. Originally, at common law
In law, common law (also known as judicial precedent, judge-made law, or case law) is the body of law created by judges and similar quasi-judicial tribunals by virtue of being stated in written opinions."The common law is not a brooding omnipres ...
, even a confession obtained by torture
Torture is the deliberate infliction of severe pain or suffering on a person for reasons such as punishment, extracting a confession, interrogational torture, interrogation for information, or intimidating third parties. definitions of tortur ...
was admissible. However, by the eighteenth century, common law in England provided that coerced confessions were inadmissible. The common law rule was incorporated into American law by the courts. The Supreme Court has repeatedly overruled convictions based on such confessions, in cases such as ''Brown v. Mississippi
''Brown v. Mississippi'', 297 U.S. 278 (1936), was a Supreme Court of the United States, United States Supreme Court case that ruled that a defendant's involuntary confession (legal), confession that is extracted by the police brutality, use of for ...
'', .
Law enforcement responded by switching to more subtle techniques, but the courts held that such techniques, even if they do not involve physical torture, may render a confession involuntary and inadmissible. In '' Chambers v. Florida'' (1940) the Court held a confession obtained after five days of prolonged questioning, during which time the defendant was held incommunicado, to be coerced. In '' Ashcraft v. Tennessee'' (1944), the suspect had been interrogated continuously for thirty-six hours under electric lights. In ''Haynes v. Washington'', the Court held that an "unfair and inherently coercive context" including a prolonged interrogation rendered a confession inadmissible.
''Miranda v. Arizona
''Miranda v. Arizona'', 384 U.S. 436 (1966), was a landmark decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in which the Court ruled that the Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution restricts prosecutors from using a person's statements made in response to ...
'' (1966) was a landmark case involving confessions. Ernesto Miranda
Ernesto Arturo Miranda (March 9, 1941 – January 31, 1976) was an American criminal and laborer whose conviction on kidnapping, rape, and armed robbery charges based on his confession under police interrogation was set aside in the landmark U.S ...
had signed a statement confessing to the crime, but the Supreme Court held that the confession was inadmissible because the defendant had not been advised of his rights. The Court held "the prosecution may not use statements ... stemming from custodial interrogation of the defendant unless it demonstrates the use of procedural safeguards effective to secure the privilege against self-incrimination." Custodial interrogation is initiated by law enforcement after a person has been taken into custody or otherwise deprived of his freedom of movement before being questioned as to the specifics of the crime. As for the procedural safeguards to be employed, unless other fully effective means are devised to inform accused persons of their right of silence and to assure a continuous opportunity to exercise it, the following measures are required. Before any questioning, the person must be warned that he has a right to remain silent, that any statement he does make may be used as evidence against him, and that he has a right to the presence of an attorney, either retained or appointed.
The warning Chief Justice Earl Warren referred to is now called the Miranda warning
In the United States, the ''Miranda'' warning is a type of notification customarily given by police to criminal suspects in police custody (or in a custodial interrogation) advising them of their right to silence and, in effect, protection f ...
, and it is customarily delivered by the police to an individual before questioning. ''Miranda'' has been clarified by several further Supreme Court rulings. For the warning to be necessary, the questioning must be conducted under "custodial" circumstances. A person detained in jail or under arrest is, of course, deemed to be in police custody. Alternatively, a person who is under the ''reasonable belief'' that he may not freely leave from the restraint of law enforcement is also deemed to be in "custody". That determination of "reasonableness" is based on a totality of the objective circumstances. A mere presence at a police station may not be sufficient, but neither is such a presence required. Traffic stops are not deemed custodial. The Court has ruled that age can be an objective factor. In ''Yarborough v. Alvarado
''Yarborough v. Alvarado'', 541 U.S. 652 (2004), is a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court declined to overturn a state court's conclusion that a minor was not in custody for ''Miranda'' purposes during his police interview. Micha ...
'' (2004), the Court held that "a state-court decision that failed to mention a 17-year-old's age as part of the Miranda custody analysis was not objectively unreasonable".[''J.D.B. v. North Carolina'']
"United States Supreme Court", June 16, 2011, accessed June 20th, 2011. In her concurring opinion Justice O'Connor wrote that a suspect's age may indeed "be relevant to the 'custody' inquiry";[''Yarborough v. Alvarado'']
"United States Supreme Court", June 1, 2004, accessed June 20th, 2011. the Court did not find it relevant in the specific case of ''Alvarado''. The Court affirmed that age could be a relevant and objective factor in '' J.D.B. v. North Carolina'' where they ruled that "so long as the child's age was known to the officer at the time of police questioning, or would have been objectively apparent to a reasonable officer, its inclusion in the custody analysis is consistent with the objective nature of that test".
The questioning does not have to be explicit to trigger Miranda rights. For example, two police officers engaging in a conversation designed to elicit an incriminating statement from a suspect would constitute questioning. A person may choose to waive his Miranda rights, but the prosecution has the burden of showing that such a waiver was actually made.
A confession not preceded by a Miranda warning where one was necessary cannot be admitted as evidence against the confessing party in a judicial proceeding. The Supreme Court, however, has held that if a defendant voluntarily testifies at the trial that he did not commit the crime, his confession may be introduced to challenge his credibility, to "impeach" the witness, even if it had been obtained without the warning.
In ''Hiibel v. Sixth Judicial District Court of Nevada
''Hiibel v. Sixth Judicial District Court of Nevada'', 542 U.S. 177 (2004), is a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court held that a statute requiring suspects to disclose their names during a valid Terry stop does not violate the Four ...
'' (2004), the Supreme Court ruled 5–4 that being required to identify oneself to police under states' stop and identify statutes
"Stop and identify" statutes are laws in several U.S. states that authorize police to lawfully order people whom they reasonably suspect of a crime to state their name. If there is not reasonable suspicion that a crime has been committed, is bei ...
is not an unreasonable search or seizure, and is not necessarily self-incrimination.
Explicit invocation
In June 2010, the Supreme Court ruled in '' Berghuis v. Thompkins'' that a criminal suspect must now invoke the right to remain silent unambiguously. Unless and until the suspect actually states that he is relying on that right, police may continue to interact with (or question) him, and any voluntary statement he makes can be used in court. The mere act of remaining silent is, on its own, insufficient to imply the suspect has invoked those rights. Furthermore, a voluntary reply, even after lengthy silence, can be construed as implying a waiver. The new rule will defer to police in cases where the suspect fails to assert the right to remain silent. This standard was extended in ''Salinas v. Texas
''Berghuis v. Thompkins'', 560 U.S. 370 (2010), is a landmark decision by the Supreme Court of the United States in which the Court considered the position of a suspect who understands their right to remain silent under ''Miranda v. Arizona'' an ...
'' in 2013 to cases where individuals not in custody who volunteer to answer officers' questions and who are not told their Miranda rights. The Court stated that there was no "ritualistic formula" necessary to assert this right, but that a person could not do so "by simply standing mute".
Production of documents
Under the Act of Production Doctrine, the act of an individual in producing documents or materials (e.g., in response to a subpoena) may have a "testimonial aspect" for purposes of the individual's right to assert the Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination to the extent that the individual's act of production provides information not already in the hands of law enforcement personnel about the (1) existence; (2) custody; or (3) authenticity, of the documents or materials produced. See '' United States v. Hubbell''. In ''Boyd v. United States
''Boyd v. United States'', 116 U.S. 616 (1886) was a decision by the United States Supreme Court in which the Court held that "a search and seizure asequivalent oa compulsory production of a man's private papers" and that the search was "an 'un ...
'', the U.S. Supreme Court stated that "It is equivalent to a compulsory production of papers to make the nonproduction of them a confession of the allegations which it is pretended they will prove".
By corporations
Corporations may also be compelled to maintain and turn over records; the Supreme Court has held that the Fifth Amendment protections against self-incrimination extend only to "natural persons". The Court has also held that a corporation's custodian of records can be forced to produce corporate documents ''even'' if the act of production would incriminate him personally. The only limitation on this rule is that the jury cannot be told that the custodian personally produced those documents in any subsequent prosecution of him, but the jury is still allowed to draw adverse inferences from the content of the documents combined with the position of the custodian in the corporation.
Refusal to testify in a criminal case
In '' Griffin v. California'' (1965), the Supreme Court ruled that a prosecutor may not ask the jury to draw an inference of guilt from a defendant's refusal to testify in his own defense. The Court overturned as unconstitutional under the federal constitution a provision of the California state constitution that explicitly granted such power to prosecutors.
Refusal to testify in a civil case
While defendants are entitled to assert the right against compelled self-incrimination in a civil court case, there are consequences to the assertion of the right in such an action.
The Supreme Court has held that "the Fifth Amendment does not forbid adverse inferences against parties to civil actions when they refuse to testify in response to probative evidence offered against them." ''Baxter v. Palmigiano'', " Mr. Justice Brandeis declared, speaking for a unanimous court in the ''Tod'' case, 'Silence is often evidence of the most persuasive character.'" "'Failure to contest an assertion ... is considered evidence of acquiescence ... if it would have been natural under the circumstances to object to the assertion in question.'"
In ''Baxter'', the state was entitled to an adverse inference against Palmigiano because of the evidence against him and his assertion of the Fifth Amendment right.
Some civil cases are considered "criminal cases" for the purposes of the Fifth Amendment. In ''Boyd v. United States
''Boyd v. United States'', 116 U.S. 616 (1886) was a decision by the United States Supreme Court in which the Court held that "a search and seizure asequivalent oa compulsory production of a man's private papers" and that the search was "an 'un ...
'', the U.S. Supreme Court stated that "A proceeding to forfeit a person's goods for an offence against the laws, though civil in form, and whether in rem or in personam, is a "criminal case" within the meaning of that part of the Fifth Amendment which declares that no person "shall be compelled, in any criminal case, to be a witness against himself."
In '' United States v. Lileikis'', the court ruled that Aleksandras Lileikis was not entitled to Fifth Amendment protections in a civil denaturalization
Denaturalization is the loss of citizenship against the will of the person concerned. Denaturalization is often applied to ethnic minorities and political dissidents. Denaturalization can be a penalty for actions considered criminal by the stat ...
case even though he faced criminal prosecution in Lithuania, the country that he would be deported to if denaturalized.
Federal income tax
In some cases, individuals may be legally required to file reports that call for information that may be used against them in criminal cases. In ''United States v. Sullivan'', the United States Supreme Court ruled that a taxpayer could not invoke the Fifth Amendment's protections as the basis for refusing to file a required federal income tax return. The Court stated: "If the form of return provided called for answers that the defendant was protected from making he could have raised the objection in the return, but could not on that account refuse to make any return at all. We are not called on to decide what, if anything, he might have withheld."
In ''Garner v. United States'', the defendant was convicted of crimes involving a conspiracy to "fix" sporting contests and to transmit illegal bets. During the trial the prosecutor introduced, as evidence, the taxpayer's federal income tax returns for various years. In one return the taxpayer had showed his occupation to be "professional gambler". In various returns the taxpayer had reported income from "gambling" or "wagering". The prosecution used this to help contradict the taxpayer's argument that his involvement was innocent. The taxpayer tried unsuccessfully to keep the prosecutor from introducing the tax returns as evidence, arguing that since the taxpayer was legally required to report the illegal income on the returns, he was being compelled to be a witness against himself. The Supreme Court agreed that he was legally required to report the illegal income on the returns, but ruled that the right against self-incrimination still did not apply. The Court stated that "if a witness under compulsion to testify makes disclosures instead of claiming the right, the Government has not 'compelled' him to incriminate himself."
''Sullivan'' and ''Garner'' are viewed as standing, in tandem, for the proposition that on a required federal income tax return a taxpayer would probably have to report the amount of the illegal income, but might validly claim the right by labeling the item "Fifth Amendment" (instead of "illegal gambling income", "illegal drug sales", etc.) The United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit has stated: "Although the source of income might be privileged, the amount must be reported." The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit has stated: "...the ''amount'' of a taxpayer's income is not privileged even though the ''source'' of income may be, and Fifth Amendment rights can be exercised in compliance with the tax laws 'by simply listing his alleged ill-gotten gains in the space provided for "miscellaneous" income on his tax form'." In another case, the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit stated: "While the ''source'' of some of he defendant
He or HE may refer to:
Language
* He (pronoun), an English pronoun
* He (kana), the romanization of the Japanese kana へ
* He (letter), the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets
* He (Cyrillic), a letter of the Cyrillic script called ''He'' ...
Johnson's income may have been privileged, assuming that the jury believed his uncorroborated testimony that he had illegal dealings in gold in 1970 and 1971, the ''amount'' of his income was not privileged and he was required to pay taxes on it." In 1979, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit stated: "A careful reading of ''Sullivan'' and ''Garner'', therefore, is that the self-incrimination privilege can be employed to protect the taxpayer from revealing the information as to an illegal source of income, but does not protect him from disclosing the amount of his income."
Grants of immunity
If the government gives an individual immunity, then that individual may be compelled to testify. Immunity may be "transactional immunity" or "use immunity"; in the former, the witness is immune from prosecution for offenses related to the testimony; in the latter, the witness may be prosecuted, but his testimony may not be used against him. In '' Kastigar v. United States'', the Supreme Court held that the government need only grant use immunity to compel testimony. The use immunity, however, must extend not only to the testimony made by the witness, but also to all evidence derived therefrom. This scenario most commonly arises in cases related to organized crime
Organized crime (or organised crime) is a category of transnational, national, or local groupings of highly centralized enterprises run by criminals to engage in illegal activity, most commonly for profit. While organized crime is generally th ...
.
Record keeping
A statutorily required record-keeping system may go too far such that it implicates a record-keeper's right against self-incrimination. A three part test laid out by '' Albertson v. Subversive Activities Control Board'', is used to determine this: 1. the law targets a highly selective group inherently suspect of criminal activities; 2. the activities sought to be regulated are already permeated with criminal statutes as opposed to essentially being non-criminal and largely regulatory; and 3. the disclosure compelled creates a likelihood of prosecution and is used against the record-keeper. In this case, the Supreme Court struck down an order by the Subversive Activities Control Board requiring members of the Communist Party
A communist party is a political party that seeks to realize the socio-economic goals of communism. The term ''communist party'' was popularized by the title of ''The Manifesto of the Communist Party'' (1848) by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. ...
to register with the government and upheld an assertion of the privilege against self-incrimination, on the grounds that statute under which the order had been issued was "directed at a highly selective group inherently suspect of criminal activities."
In '' Leary v. United States'', the court struck down the Marijuana Tax Act
The Marihuana Tax Act of 1937, , was a United States Act that placed a tax on the sale of cannabis. The H.R. 6385 act was drafted by Harry Anslinger and introduced by Rep. Robert L. Doughton of North Carolina, on April 14, 1937. The Seventy-fift ...
because its record keeping statute required self-incrimination
In criminal law, self-incrimination is the act of exposing oneself generally, by making a statement, "to an accusation or charge of crime; to involve oneself or another ersonin a criminal prosecution or the danger thereof". (Self-incrimination ...
.
In ''Haynes v. United States
''Haynes v. United States'', 390 U.S. 85 (1968), was a United States Supreme Court decision interpreting the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution's self-incrimination clause. ''Haynes'' extended the Fifth Amendment protections elucida ...
'', the Supreme Court ruled that, because convicted felons are prohibited from owning firearms, requiring felons to register any firearms they owned constituted a form of self-incrimination
In criminal law, self-incrimination is the act of exposing oneself generally, by making a statement, "to an accusation or charge of crime; to involve oneself or another ersonin a criminal prosecution or the danger thereof". (Self-incrimination ...
and was therefore unconstitutional.
Combinations & passwords
While no such case has yet arisen, the Supreme Court has indicated that a respondent cannot be compelled to turn over "the contents of his own mind", e.g. the password to a bank account (doing so would prove his control of it).
Lower courts have given conflicting decisions on whether forced disclosure of computer passwords is a violation of the Fifth Amendment.
In ''In re Boucher
''In re Boucher'' (case citation: No. 2:06-mJ-91, 2009 WL 424718), is a federal criminal case in Vermont, which was the first to directly address the question of whether investigators can compel a suspect to reveal their encryption passphrase o ...
'' (2009), the US District Court of Vermont ruled that the Fifth Amendment might protect a defendant from having to reveal an encryption password, or even the existence of one, if the production of that password could be deemed a self-incriminating "act" under the Fifth Amendment. In ''Boucher'', production of the unencrypted drive was deemed not to be a self-incriminating act, as the government already had sufficient evidence to tie the encrypted data to the defendant.
In January 2012 a federal judge in Denver ruled that a bank-fraud suspect was required to give an unencrypted copy of a laptop hard drive to prosecutors. However, in February 2012 the Eleventh Circuit
The United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit (in case citations, 11th Cir.) is a federal court with appellate jurisdiction over the following U.S. district courts:
* Middle District of Alabama
* Northern District of Alabama
* ...
ruled otherwise—finding that requiring a defendant to produce an encrypted drive's password would violate the Constitution, becoming the first federal circuit court to rule on the issue. In April 2013, a District Court magistrate judge
The term magistrate is used in a variety of systems of governments and laws to refer to a civilian officer who administers the law. In ancient Rome, a '' magistratus'' was one of the highest ranking government officers, and possessed both judici ...
in Wisconsin refused to compel a suspect to provide the encryption password to his hard drive after FBI agents had unsuccessfully spent months trying to decrypt the data. The Oregon Supreme Court
The Oregon Supreme Court (OSC) is the highest state court in the U.S. state of Oregon. The only court that may reverse or modify a decision of the Oregon Supreme Court is the Supreme Court of the United States.[Garrity rule
In Law of the United States, United States law, the ''Garrity'' warning is an advisement of rights usually administered by federal, state, or local investigators to their employees who may be the subject of an internal investigation. The ''Garri ...]
(sometimes called the Garrity Warning
In United States law, the ''Garrity'' warning is an advisement of rights usually administered by federal, state, or local investigators to their employees who may be the subject of an internal investigation. The ''Garrity'' warning advises subje ...
or Garrity Rights) before answering the questions, then the answers cannot be used in criminal prosecution of the employee. This principle was developed in ''Garrity v. New Jersey
''Garrity v. New Jersey'', 385 U.S. 493 (1967), was a case in which the Supreme Court of the United States held that law enforcement officers and other public employees have the right to be free from compulsory self-incrimination.. It gave birth t ...
'', 385 U.S. 493 (1967). The rule is most commonly applied to public employees such as police officers.
Due process
The Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution each contain a due process clause. Due process deals with the administration of justice
The administration of justice is the process by which the legal system of a government is executed. The presumed goal of such an administration is to provide justice for all those accessing the legal system. The phrase is also commonly used to d ...
and thus the due process clause acts as a safeguard from arbitrary denial of life, liberty, or property by the government outside the sanction of law. The Supreme Court has interpreted the due process clauses to provide four protections: procedural due process
Procedural due process is a legal doctrine in the United States that requires government officials to follow fair procedures before depriving a person of life, liberty, or property. When the government seeks to deprive a person of one of those in ...
(in civil and criminal proceedings), substantive due process
Substantive due process is a principle in United States constitutional law that allows courts to establish and protect certain fundamental rights from government interference, even if only procedural protections are present or the rights are unen ...
, a prohibition against vague
In linguistics and philosophy, a vague predicate is one which gives rise to borderline cases. For example, the English adjective "tall" is vague since it is not clearly true or false for someone of middling height. By contrast, the word "prime" is ...
laws, and as the vehicle for the incorporation of the Bill of Rights
In United States constitutional law, incorporation is the doctrine by which portions of the Bill of Rights have been made applicable to the states. When the Bill of Rights was ratified, the courts held that its protections extended only to the ...
.
Takings Clause
Eminent domain
The "Takings Clause", the last clause of the Fifth Amendment, limits the power of eminent domain
Eminent domain (United States, Philippines), land acquisition (India, Malaysia, Singapore), compulsory purchase/acquisition (Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, United Kingdom), resumption (Hong Kong, Uganda), resumption/compulsory acquisition (Austr ...
by requiring "just compensation" be paid if private property is taken for public use. This provision of the Fifth Amendment originally applied only to the federal government, but the U.S. Supreme Court
The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point o ...
ruled in the 1897 case '' Chicago, B. & Q. Railroad Co. v. Chicago'' that the Fourteenth Amendment incidentally extended the effects of that provision to the states. The federal courts, however, have shown much deference to the determinations of Congress, and even more so to the determinations of the state legislatures, of what constitutes "public use". The property need not actually be used by the public; rather, it must be used or disposed of in such a manner as to benefit the public welfare or public interest. One exception that restrains the federal government is that the property must be used in exercise of a government's enumerated powers.
The owner of the property that is taken by the government must be justly compensated. When determining the amount that must be paid, the government does not need to take into account any speculative schemes in which the owner claims the property was intended to be used. Normally, the fair market value
The fair market value of property is the price at which it would change hands between a willing and informed buyer and seller. The term is used throughout the Internal Revenue Code, as well as in bankruptcy laws, in many state laws, and by sever ...
of the property determines "just compensation". If the property is taken before the payment is made, interest accrues (though the courts have refrained from using the term "interest").
Property under the Fifth Amendment includes contractual rights
A contract is a legally enforceable agreement between two or more parties that creates, defines, and governs mutual rights and obligations between them. A contract typically involves the transfer of goods, services, money, or a promise to t ...
stemming from contracts between the United States, a U.S. state
In the United States, a state is a constituent political entity, of which there are 50. Bound together in a political union, each state holds governmental jurisdiction over a separate and defined geographic territory where it shares its sove ...
or any of its subdivisions and the other contract partner(s), because contractual rights are property rights for purposes of the Fifth Amendment. The United States Supreme Court held in ''Lynch v. United States'', 292 U.S. 571 (1934) that valid contracts of the United States are property, and the rights of private individuals arising out of them are protected by the Fifth Amendment. The court said: "The Fifth Amendment commands that property be not taken without making just compensation. Valid contracts are property, whether the obligor be a private individual, a municipality, a state, or the United States. Rights against the United States arising out of a contract with it are protected by the Fifth Amendment. ''United States v. Central Pacific R. Co.'', 118 U. S. 235, 238; ''United States v. Northern Pacific Ry. Co.'', 256 U. S. 51, 64, 67. When the United States enters into contract relations, its rights and duties therein are governed generally by the law applicable to contracts between private individuals''.''"
The federal courts have not restrained state and local governments from seizing privately owned land for private commercial development on behalf of private developers. This was upheld on June 23, 2005, when the Supreme Court issued its opinion in ''Kelo v. City of New London
''Kelo v. City of New London'', 545 U.S. 469 (2005), was a landmark decision by the Supreme Court of the United States in which the Court held, 5–4, that the use of eminent domain to transfer land from one private owner to another private own ...
''. This 5–4 decision remains controversial. The majority opinion, by Justice Stevens
John Paul Stevens (April 20, 1920 – July 16, 2019) was an American lawyer and jurist who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1975 to 2010. At the time of his retirement, he was the second-olde ...
, found that it was appropriate to defer to the city's decision that the development plan had a public purpose, saying that "the city has carefully formulated a development plan that it believes will provide appreciable benefits to the community, including, but not limited to, new jobs and increased tax revenue." Justice Kennedy's concurring opinion observed that in this particular case the development plan was not "of primary benefit to ... the developer" and that if that was the case the plan might have been impermissible. In the dissent, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor argued that this decision would allow the rich to benefit at the expense of the poor, asserting that "Any property may now be taken for the benefit of another private party, but the fallout from this decision will not be random. The beneficiaries are likely to be those citizens with disproportionate influence and power in the political process, including large corporations and development firms." She argued that the decision eliminates "any distinction between private and public use
Public use is a legal requirement under the Takings Clause ("nor shall private property be taken for public use without just compensation") of the Fifth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, that owners of property seized by eminent domain for "pub ...
of property—and thereby effectively delete the words 'for public use' from the Takings Clause of the Fifth Amendment". A number of states, in response to ''Kelo'', have passed laws and/or state constitutional amendments which make it more difficult for state governments to seize private land. Takings that are not "for public use" are not directly covered by the doctrine, however such a taking might violate due process rights under the Fourteenth amendment, or other applicable law.
The exercise of the police power of the state resulting in a taking of private property was long held to be an exception to the requirement of government paying just compensation. However the growing trend under the various state constitution's taking clauses is to compensate innocent third parties whose property was destroyed or "taken" as a result of police action.
Just compensation
The last two words of the amendment promise "just compensation" for takings by the government. In '' United States v. 50 Acres of Land'' (1984), the Supreme Court wrote that "The Court has repeatedly held that just compensation normally is to be measured by "the market value of the property at the time of the taking contemporaneously paid in money." '' Olson v. United States'', 292 U.S. 246 (1934) ... Deviation from this measure of just compensation has been required only "when market value has been too difficult to find, or when its application would result in manifest injustice to owner or public". ''United States v. Commodities Trading Corp.
United may refer to:
Places
* United, Pennsylvania, an unincorporated community
* United, West Virginia, an unincorporated community
Arts and entertainment Films
* ''United'' (2003 film), a Norwegian film
* ''United'' (2011 film), a BBC Two fi ...
'', 339 U.S. 121, 123 (1950).
Civil asset forfeiture
Civil asset forfeiture
Civil may refer to:
*Civic virtue, or civility
*Civil action, or lawsuit
* Civil affairs
*Civil and political rights
*Civil disobedience
*Civil engineering
*Civil (journalism), a platform for independent journalism
*Civilian, someone not a membe ...
or occasionally civil seizure, is a controversial
Controversy is a state of prolonged public dispute or debate, usually concerning a matter of conflicting opinion or point of view. The word was coined from the Latin ''controversia'', as a composite of ''controversus'' – "turned in an opposite d ...
legal process
Legal process (sometimes simply process) is any formal notice or writ by a court obtaining jurisdiction over a person or property. Common forms of process include a summons, subpoena, mandate, and warrant. Process normally takes effect by s ...
in which law enforcement officer
A law enforcement officer (LEO), or peace officer in North American English, is a public-sector employee whose duties primarily involve the enforcement of laws. The phrase can include campaign disclosure specialists, local police officers, ...
s take asset
In financial accounting, an asset is any resource owned or controlled by a business or an economic entity. It is anything (tangible or intangible) that can be used to produce positive economic value. Assets represent value of ownership that can ...
s from persons suspected of involvement with crime or illegal activity without necessarily charging the owners with wrongdoing. While civil procedure
Civil procedure is the body of law that sets out the rules and standards that courts follow when adjudicating civil lawsuits (as opposed to procedures in criminal law matters). These rules govern how a lawsuit or case may be commenced; what kin ...
, as opposed to criminal procedure, generally involves a dispute between two private citizens, civil forfeiture involves a dispute between law enforcement
Law enforcement is the activity of some members of government who act in an organized manner to enforce the law by discovering, deterring, rehabilitating, or punishing people who violate the rules
Rule or ruling may refer to:
Education ...
and ''property'' such as a pile of cash or a house or a boat, such that the thing is suspected of being involved in a crime. To get back the seized property, owners must prove it was not involved in criminal activity. Sometimes it can mean a threat to seize property as well as the act of seizure itself.
In civil forfeiture, assets are seized by police based on a suspicion of wrongdoing, and without having to charge a person with specific wrongdoing, with the case being between police and the ''thing itself'', sometimes referred to by the Latin term ''in rem
''In rem'' jurisdiction ("power about or against 'the thing) is a legal term describing the power a court may exercise over property (either real or personal) or a "status" against a person over whom the court does not have ''in personam'' jurisd ...
'', meaning "against the property"; the property itself is the defendant and no criminal charge against the owner is needed. If property is seized in a civil forfeiture, it is "up to the owner to prove that his cash is clean" and the court can weigh a defendant's use of their 5th amendment right to remain silent in their decision. In civil forfeiture, the test in most cases[Note: the legal tests used to justify civil forfeiture vary according to state law, but in most cases the tests are looser than in criminal trials where the "beyond a reasonable doubt" test is predominant] is whether police feel there is a preponderance of the evidence
In a legal dispute, one party has the burden of proof to show that they are correct, while the other party had no such burden and is presumed to be correct. The burden of proof requires a party to produce evidence to establish the truth of facts ...
suggesting wrongdoing; in criminal forfeiture, the test is whether police feel the evidence is beyond a reasonable doubt
Beyond a reasonable doubt is a legal standard of proof required to validate a criminal conviction in most adversarial legal systems. It is a higher standard of proof than the balance of probabilities standard commonly used in civil cases, beca ...
, which is a tougher test to meet. In contrast, criminal forfeiture is a legal action brought as "part of the criminal prosecution of a defendant", described by the Latin term ''in personam
''In personam'' is a Latin phrase meaning "against a particular person". In a lawsuit in which the case is against a specific individual, that person must be served with a summons and complaint (E&W known as Particulars of Claim (CPR 1999) to give ...
'', meaning "against the person", and happens when government indicts or charges the property which is either used in connection with a crime, or derived from a crime, that is suspected of being committed by the defendant; the seized assets are temporarily held and become government property officially ''after'' an accused person has been convicted by a court of law; if the person is found to be not guilty, the seized property must be returned.
Normally both civil and criminal forfeitures require involvement by the judiciary; however, there is a variant of civil forfeiture called ''administrative forfeiture'' which is essentially a civil forfeiture which does not require involvement by the judiciary, which derives its powers from the Tariff Act of 1930
A tariff is a tax imposed by the government of a country or by a supranational union on imports or exports of goods. Besides being a source of revenue for the government, import duties can also be a form of regulation of foreign trade and polic ...
, and empowers police to seize banned imported merchandise, as well as things used to import or transport or store a controlled substance, money, or other property which is less than $500,000 value.
See also
* United States constitutional criminal procedure
The United States Constitution contains several provisions regarding the law of criminal procedure.
Petit jury and venue provisions—both traceable to enumerated complaints in the Declaration of Independence—are included in Article Th ...
References
Further reading
*
*
* Fifth Amendment with Annotations
* "Fifth Amendment Rights of a Resident Alien After Balsys". Lloyd, Sean K. In: ''Tulsa Journal of Comparative & International Law'', Vol. 6, Issue 2 (Spring 1999), pp. 163–194.
* "An analysis of American Fifth Amendment jurisprudence and its relevance to the South African right to silence". Theophilopoulos C. In: ''South African Law Journal'', Mar 2006, Vol. 123, Issue 3, pp. 516–538. Juta Law Publishing, 2006.
* "Fifth Amendment: Rights of Detainees". ''The Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology''. 70(4):482–489; Williams & Wilkins Company, 1979.
* "FBAR Reporting and the Required Records Doctrine: Continued Erosion of Fifth Amendment Rights". COMISKY, IAN M.; LEE, MATTHEW D. ''Journal of Taxation & Regulation of Financial Institutions''. Mar/Apr 2012, Vol. 25 Issue 4, pp. 17–22.
* "Fifth Amendment Rights of a Client regarding Documents Held by His Attorney: United States v. White". In: ''Duke Law Journal''. 1973(5):1080–1097; Duke University School of Law, 1973.
* Matthew J. Weber. "Warning—Weak Password: The Courts' Indecipherable Approach to Encryption and the Fifth Amendment", ''U. Ill. J.L Tech & Pol'y'' (2016).
External links
Cornell Law Information
Don't Talk to the Police Video
{{DEFAULTSORT:Fifth Amendment To The United States Constitution
1791 in American law
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05
1791 in American politics
Eminent domain