Adams v. Williams
United States Supreme Court
407 U.S. 143 (1972)
- Written by Salina Kennedy, JD
Facts
A police officer was on patrol late at night in a high-crime area when an informant approached him and told him that a man in a nearby car was in possession of drugs and had a gun in his waistband. The officer went to the car, in which Robert Williams (defendant) was sitting with the motor off. The officer tapped on the window and asked Williams to open the door. Williams instead lowered the window, and the officer immediately reached through the window and removed the gun from Williams’s waistband. The officer arrested Williams for unlawful possession of the pistol and, incident to the arrest, searched Williams and the car, finding heroin and more weapons. Williams’s pretrial motion to suppress the gun and the heroin from evidence was denied. At trial, the police officer testified that, prior to the tip concerning Williams, the officer had received one other tip from the informant which had not led to an arrest because it could not be verified. Williams was convicted. The state supreme court affirmed the conviction. The district court denied Williams’s petition for habeas corpus relief, which the court of appeals reversed, granting relief. The United States Supreme Court granted certiorari.
Rule of Law
Issue
Holding and Reasoning (Rehnquist, J.)
Dissent (Marshall, J.)
Dissent (Brennan, J.)
Dissent (Douglas, J.)
What to do next…
Here's why 812,000 law students have relied on our case briefs:
- Written by law professors and practitioners, not other law students. 46,300 briefs, keyed to 988 casebooks. Top-notch customer support.
- The right amount of information, includes the facts, issues, rule of law, holding and reasoning, and any concurrences and dissents.
- Access in your classes, works on your mobile and tablet. Massive library of related video lessons and high quality multiple-choice questions.
- Easy to use, uniform format for every case brief. Written in plain English, not in legalese. Our briefs summarize and simplify; they don’t just repeat the court’s language.
