United States v. Santana
United States Supreme Court
427 U.S. 38 (1976)

- Written by Carolyn Strutton, JD
Facts
An undercover police officer arranged to buy heroin from Patricia McCafferty. McCafferty told the officer that they would pick up the heroin at the house of “Mom” Santana (defendant). The police officer obtained marked bills for the drug buy and drove with McCafferty to Santana’s house. McCafferty took the money from the officer, went into the house, and then returned to the officer’s car with small envelopes containing a brownish-white powder. After driving a short distance away from the house, the officer stopped the car, displayed his badge to McCafferty, and arrested her. McCafferty told the officer that Santana had the money. When other police officers approached Santana’s house, they saw Santana standing in the doorway of the house, with the door open, holding a brown paper bag. As the officers shouted “police,” Santana attempted to retreat into the house. The police caught Santana in the vestibule and arrested her. During the arrest, two bundles of packets of heroin fell out of the bag Santana was holding, and she had some of the marked money from the drug buy in her pockets. At trial, the district court granted Santana’s motion to suppress the heroin evidence, and the court of appeals affirmed that ruling. The prosecution (plaintiff) appealed.
Rule of Law
Issue
Holding and Reasoning (Rehnquist, J.)
Concurrence (Stevens, J.)
Dissent (Marshall, J.)
What to do next…
Here's why 816,000 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.