Irvine v. California

347 U.S. 128 (1954)

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Irvine v. California

United States Supreme Court

347 U.S. 128 (1954)

Facts

Police suspected Irvine (defendant) of illegal bookmaking, but they had no proof, and they never obtained a search warrant. Instead, police had a key made, entered Irvine’s home, and installed a microphone by running its wire through a hole they bored into Irvine’s roof. For over a month, police listened to Irvine’s conversations from a nearby garage. Police entered Irvine’s house twice more to move the microphone into his bedroom and then a closet, and yet again to arrest him. At trial, police were allowed to testify to incriminating conversations they heard through the microphone. Irvine objected that the admission of these microphone conversations violated the Fourteenth Amendment. Irvine exhausted his state-court avenues to relief and then sought review of the federal issue in the United States Supreme Court.

Rule of Law

Issue

Holding and Reasoning (Jackson, J.)

Concurrence (Clark, J.)

Dissent (Douglas, J.)

Dissent (Frankfurter, J.)

Dissent (Black, J.)

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