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Case 11.1 Janet is a successful Colorado entrepreneur and ha…

Case 11.1 Janet is a successful Colorado entrepreneur and has recently decided to open a recreational marijuana sales business in Denver, “High and Mighty.” The state and county require operators of such businesses to acquire a license, hold a public meeting coordinated with the local and state license board, and other special procedures for this new and highly regulated enterprise.  One holiday weekend, Detective Jones stops in and informs Janet that he is conducting a surprise inspection of the business to determine if Janet is complying with state record-keeping laws and other rules ensuring that minors are not being permitted to purchase the recreational marijuana. Janet has never been the subject of such a search and is concerned the detective’s presence will scare away customers. There are 20 customers in line, waiting to purchase recreational marijuana. Detective Jones enters the store over Janet’s objection and despite her request that he produce a search warrant.  He enters her office and reviews her paperwork relevant to state record-keeping laws. He notes several irregularities and documents them. When Detective Jones returns to the sales area, he finds that Janet and her staff have continued to serve customers while he was in the office. Detective Jones checks the ID of several people who have made purchases and finds that two of them are under age under state law to purchase marijuana. While Detective Jones is checking IDs, one of the patrons (Bobby) waiting to buy marijuana says, “Man, I can’t believe this guy is giving us such a hard time. What a bummer!” Detective Jones directs this man to empty his pockets on a nearby table and finds he has cocaine.  Detective Jones arrests Bobby for possession of cocaine, cites Janet for violating state law for poor record-keeping and charges her with providing marijuana to underage patrons.Did the search of Janet’s business records meet the three requirements for authorizing inspections without search warrants of closely regulated businesses as established by the U.S. Supreme Court in New York v Burger?

Case 14.3 ​Officer Andretti pulls over a car that was drivin…

Case 14.3 ​Officer Andretti pulls over a car that was driving 20 miles over the speed limit. After asking for license and registration from the driver, he smells the distinct odor of alcohol in the car. There is one person in the passenger seat and one in the back seat. Both of these young people appear to be minors. When he looks into the back of the car, Officer Andretti sees beer cans littering the backseat.  The officer asks the passenger and the person in the back seat to exit the vehicle. They stumble and have a hard time standing up. Both of them smell of alcohol and their identification cards show they are under the legal age to consume alcohol in the state. The driver is also under age to possess or drink alcohol in the state, though does not appear to be impaired. Officer Andretti informs the driver he is being detained under state law under suspicion of providing alcohol to minors. One of the other passengers, Caitlin, becomes belligerent and shoves Officer Andretti. Officer Andretti arrests Caitlin, telling the other cooperative occupants of the car to take a seat on the curb. After placing handcuffs on Caitlin, Officer Andretti frisks the young woman and finds that she has illegal drugs in her pocket. Officer Smith arrives at this point to provide assistance, taking the driver and other passenger to the police station for processing for the alcohol offenses. The car is on a busy street and the police have it towed to the impound lot. At the lot, the on-duty officer finds a loaded 45 caliber pistol in the trunk in violation of state law.The illegal weapon found in the vehicle is:

Case 15.2 ​Officer McElroy suspects that Leon is selling dru…

Case 15.2 ​Officer McElroy suspects that Leon is selling drugs. One day he follows Leon to a park and notices that he meets with another man and passes him a newspaper. Unfortunately, Officer McElroy is unable to approach the young men without being seen because of the open area and both men quickly disappear into the trees. Since Officer McElroy does not think he was seen, he returns to the park, but hides behind some trees and uses his binoculars to observe another meeting between Leon and another young man. He is able to adjust his binoculars to see that Leon places a baggie of marijuana inside the newspaper immediately before the meeting. The other young man hands Leon paper money and receives the rolled up newspaper from Leon. Officer McElroy sneaks up on the two young men and overhears the buyer say, “I hope this weed is better than the last stuff you sold me.” Officer McElroy steps out from behind a tree and arrests both men.Leon is also offended that his private conversations were overheard by Officer McElroy and challenges the use of this information against him. Is he justified in doing so, and if so, why?

Case 15.1 ​The Sheriff’s Department has information to belie…

Case 15.1 ​The Sheriff’s Department has information to believe that illegal automatic weapons are being hidden in a garage on Mary Halberstam’s property. The information was obtained from a confidential informant who specified that the illegal weapons were assault rifles and that Mary has secured ammunition for the weapons in hopes of arming her friends against a looming government conspiracy. The Sheriff’s Department has a list of weapons that had been reported as stolen from a local gun store and the confidential informant confirmed those were the same weapons he had seen on Mary’s property. The informant made a sworn statement in the form of affidavit that was presented to a judge, who issued a search warrant for “any and all illegal items” in the home and garage of Mary, listing her proper address.  The Sheriff’s Department executed a search warrant at Mary’s home by forcing open her front door without knocking or announcing their presence and discovered the illegal weapons that matched the inventory from the Army Depot in her home and the garage.Mary challenges the search warrant as unconstitutional. She may succeed because: