Welsh v. Wisconsin
Encyclopedia
Facts: Evening of April 24, 1978, the petitioner was seen driving a car erratically, and the car eventually swerved off the road and came to a stop in an open field. A passerby called the police, and before the police arrived the driver walked away. The officer identified the petitioner-driver from the registration of the abandoned car. Without a warrant the officer went to the petitioner's home. The petitioner's stepdaughter answered the door, but the issue of whether she gave consent to the officers' entry was unresolved (and for the purposes of this case, the court assumed that consent was not given). The officer found the petitioner upstairs and arrested him for driving while under the influence of an intoxicant
. Under the relevant Wisconsin DUI statute, a first offense was a noncriminal violation subject to a civil forfeiture proceeding for a maximum fine of $200.
Issue: Whether the warrantless arrest violates the Fourth Amendment protection against unlawful search and seizure.
Holding: The warrantless, nighttime entry of petitioner's home to arrest him for a civil, nonjailable traffic offense, was prohibited by the special protection afforded the individual in his home by the Fourth Amendment
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Analysis:
DUI
DUI is a three letter acronym that may stand for:* Driving under the influence * Democratic Union for Integration — the largest ethnic Albanian party in the Republic of Macedonia* Data Use Identifier...
. Under the relevant Wisconsin DUI statute, a first offense was a noncriminal violation subject to a civil forfeiture proceeding for a maximum fine of $200.
Issue: Whether the warrantless arrest violates the Fourth Amendment protection against unlawful search and seizure.
Holding: The warrantless, nighttime entry of petitioner's home to arrest him for a civil, nonjailable traffic offense, was prohibited by the special protection afforded the individual in his home by the Fourth Amendment
Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution
The Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution is the part of the Bill of Rights which guards against unreasonable searches and seizures, along with requiring any warrant to be judicially sanctioned and supported by probable cause...
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Analysis:
- When the government’s interest is only to arrest for a minor offense, that presumption of unreasonableness is difficult to rebut, and the government usually should be allowed to make such arrests only with a warrant issued upon probable cause by a neutral and detached magistrate.
- An important factor to be considered when determining whether any exigency exists is the gravity of the underlying offense for which the arrest is being made. Exception to a home entry should rarely be sanctioned.
- Evidence of petitioner’s blood-alcohol level may dissipate is not sufficient here since the minor offense is insufficiently substantial to justify warrantless in-home arrests under exigent circumstances (where dissent disagrees).