Arrest, Search, Seizure, Warrant illegal search and seizure

[flowerpower57]

There was a search warrant for my friends house. The address on the paper wasn't technically his address. They found evidence in the house, but can they use that evidence since the address was wrong or if his lawyer argues it can they dismiss the evidence?

 

[jharris352]

No, your friend will not be able to excape the search warrant contents because the address was "technically" wrong. There is what is called a "good faith exception" to the search warrant. If I was his defense attorney I would try to suppress the evidence but I would not be very hopeful. Then again, I never would take a child molestation case because I know my heart would not be in it.

I just noticed you are in Georgia. What county? Is your friend's case in the news?

 

[flowerpower57]

no, my friends case is not in the news. and For the address, he has a lot in which he built two houses, the house closer to the road was the address on the paper and its in his name. He's renting that house out right now. His address does not fall under the same address as that house and the house he's living in is in his mom's name. Does that make a difference?

 

[BayState]

no, my friends case is not in the news. and For the address, he has a lot in which he built two houses, the house closer to the road was the address on the paper and its in his name. He's renting that house out right now. His address does not fall under the same address as that house and the house he's living in is in his mom's name. Does that make a difference?

After reading all of your posts...Why do you care about your "friend"?

 

[jharris352]

No, it won't matter.

 

[CdwJava]

This is also why there should be a description of the property to be searched included in the warrant application. If the number and the description are clearly another house, then a suppression motion would stand a good chance of success. If the description clearly describes the property searched, and the erroneous numbers were reasonably believed to be the address, then that should not result in a suppression.

I live in a rural county and it is often very difficult to identify the exact numbers on a host of properties. Sometimes, if there is time for research, we go with parcel numbers.

 

[mightymoose]

Ya... the application for the warrant would have had a very specific description of any buildings or vehicles they wanted to search. The number may have been wrong, but according to the description there is likely no doubt of what they intended to search.

Get new friends.