Search and Seizure in Schools

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Search and Seizure in Schools: From Lockers to Laptops School Search and Seizure Search and seizure protection is one of the fundamental rights that we as Americans were founded with. Under the Bill of Rights, the Fourth Amendment was enacted as a direct response to the policies and regulations that England had inflicted on the American Colonies. England’s general warrants and writs of assistance gave English authorities the right to blanket search Americans and their homes with a vague reference to what they were looking for and why. These dragnet searches were so offensive to the early Americans that they insisted their new government lacked that power under the Fourth Amendment (Kerr, 2005). This amendment was directly applied to schools by the Supreme Court in 1985. The Supreme Court case of New Jersey v. T.L.O. diminished the standard from “probable cause” to “reasonable suspicion” for schools in relation to searching students and their property (Sprung, 2011). In the New Jersey case a vice principal searched a student’s purse after a teacher reported that the student was observed smoking. The purse’s main area contained cigarettes and rolling paper. This prompted a further search of the rest of the purse which turned up drugs, money and a list of students who owed money to this individual for drug sales. The court recognized the school as a unique environment that needed special protection to ensure that it properly functions. This decision has been the “go to” standard for public schools ever since. Today some question the validity of the diminished standard as new technology has emerged that the Supreme Court of 1985 could not have foreseen (Sprung, 2011). The discussion on search and seizure in private and Catholic schools is normally a short one. Catholic and private school students have no Constitutional rights. There exists a contractual
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