concluding that Coolidge was distinguishable because, whereas seizure of Coolidge’s car required entry upon private property, “the automobile [in Cardwell] was seized from a public place where access was not meaningfully restricted”
How later courts described this case
- concluding that Coolidge was distinguishable because, whereas seizure of Coolidge’s car required entry upon private property, “the automobile [in Cardwell] was seized from a public place where access was not meaningfully restricted”
- explaining that “one has a lesser expectation of privacy in a motor vehicle because its function is transportation ... [and it] has little capacity for escaping public scrutiny [as] it travels public thoroughfares”
- holding that the warrantless seizure of a car from a public parking lot, and subsequent impoundment following the defendant’s arrest, was “not unreasonable” because there was probable cause that the car constituted evidence of a crime
- highlighting the “exigent circumstances that exist in connection with movable vehicles” because “the opportunity to search is fleeting since a car is readily movable,” which “is strikingly true when the automobile’s owner is alerted to police intentions and, as a consequence, the motivation to remove evidence from official grasp is heightened” (citing Chambers v. Maroney, 399 U.S. 42, 51 (1970))
Written by the judges who cited it.
Distinguished
Distinguished by State v. Childers, 18 Or. App. 564 (1974)
See also, Cardwell v. Lewis, 417 US 583, 94 S Ct 2464, 41 L Ed 2d 325 (1974), which is distinguishable on its facts from the instant case.
The opinion
Mr. Justice Powell,
concurring in the result.
I would reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeals for the reasons set forth in my concurring opinion in Schneckloth v. Bustamonte, 412 U. S. 218, 250 (1973). As stated therein, I would hold that “federal collateral review of a state prisoner’s Fourth Amendment claims— claims which rarely bear on innocence — should be confined solely to the question of whether the petitioner [for habeas corpus] was provided a fair opportunity to raise and have adjudicated the question in state courts.” Ibid. In this case there is no contention that respondent was denied a full and fair opportunity to litigate his claim in the state courts.