''Frank v. Maryland'', 359 U.S. 360 (1959), was a
United States 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 ...
case interpreting the
Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution.
Frank refused to allow the health inspectors into his home citing the Fourth Amendment. Inspectors were trying to perform an administrative search for code violations, specifically a rat infestation, not a criminal investigation, so they did not believe they were violating the Fourth Amendment. The Court, in an opinion written by
Felix Frankfurter
Felix Frankfurter (November 15, 1882 – February 22, 1965) was an Austrian-American jurist who served as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1939 until 1962, during which period he was a noted advocate of judic ...
, decided in favor of the inspectors claiming that the search would benefit the public more than Frank's interests in privacy.
The Supreme Court would reverse this decision eight years later in ''
Camara v. Municipal Court of City and County of San Francisco'', , ruling that the City of
San Francisco
San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17th ...
could not prosecute a person for refusing to consent to a search of their home by a city inspector, and the inspector may only search either by having consent, or must have a search warrant issued based on probable cause of a violation of law.
[''Camara v. Municipal Court of City and County of San Francisco'', .]
See also
*
*''
Wolf v. Colorado
''Wolf v. Colorado'', 338 U.S. 25 (1949), was a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court held 6—3 that, while the Fourth Amendment was applicable to the states, the exclusionary rule was not a necessary ingredient of the Fourth Amend ...
'',
References
*
*
External links
*
*
United States Fourth Amendment case law
United States Supreme Court cases
United States Supreme Court cases of the Warren Court
1959 in United States case law
{{SCOTUS-case-stub