Maryland v King - case brief PDF

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Kara Chrispen CJS 305-01

Maryland v. King 2013 Facts: Alonzo King was arrested after her threatened several people with a shot gun. During the booking the officers took a swab from the inside of his cheek for DNA. Several months later the DNA sample matched the DNA from an unsolved rape case. He was then arrested and indicted for the rape case. After King’s motion to suppress the evidence was denied, he was convicted and sentenced to life in prison. The Maryland Court of Appeals overturned the conviction on the grounds that the swab was a constitutionally unreasonable search under the Fourth Amendment. Question: What the DNA swab a violation to the Fourth Amendment? NO Kennedy (Majority): 1. DNA is advanced technology and helps to exonerate the wrongly convicted. DNA is reliable. 2. Using the buccal swab on an individual is a search. However it requires no surgical intrusion beneath the skin. 3. The Maryland DNA Collection Act states that all arrestees charged with serious crimes must give a buccal swab. The arrestee is already in the valid police custody for a serious offense supported by probable cause. 4. The swab is just part of the arresting process. 5. People use disguises all the time when committing crimes. There is false IDs, or lie about their identity. But DNA provides accuracy. 6. DNA provides untainted information to those charged with detaining suspects and detaining the property of any felon. 7. An arrestees past conduct is essential to an assessment of the danger he or she poses to the public. 8. DNA is more advanced that fingerprinting. An individual can alter their facial features and their fingerprints, but they cannot alter their DNA. 9. A swab is not an intrusion to an individual’s privacy. Scalia, Ginsburg, Sotomayor, Kagan (Dissent): 1. The Fourth Amendment forbids the search of a person for evidence for a crime where there is no belief that that person is guilty. 2. The DNA searches is more than simply discovering evidence of criminal wrongdoing. 3. The objects that are indicated for a search when an individual is arrested is weapons or evidence that can easily be destroyed and evidence relevant to the crime of arrest. 4. The DNA sample was associated with King. 5. The fingerprint database expanded from criminals to simple all Americans.

Kara Chrispen CJS 305-01

6. Today fingerprints are used to identify people, so we do not need the DNA samples to confirm the same information. 7. DNA just adds the ability to solve unsolved cases....