DAVIS
v.
MISSISSIPPI
394 U.S. 721 (1969)
CERTIORARI TO THE SUPREME COURT OF
MISSISSIPPI
No. 645.Argued February 26-27, 1969
Decided April 22, 1969.
In connection with a rape investigation the Meridian,
Mississippi, police, without warrants, brought numerous Negro youths to the
police station for questioning and fingerprinting. Petitioner was thus
questioned and fingerprinted, and released. Thereafter, concededly without a
warrant or probable cause for arrest, the police drove petitioner to Jackson
and confined him in jail overnight. After he was questioned and signed a
statement, he was returned to Meridian and jailed. While so confined he was
again fingerprinted and these prints were sent to the FBI for comparison with
latent prints found in the victim's home. The fingerprint evidence was admitted
at petitioner's trial for rape, over objection that it was the product of
unlawful detention, and he was convicted. The Mississippi Supreme Court upheld
the conviction. Held:
1. Fingerprint evidence is no exception to the rule
that all evidence obtained by searches and seizures in violation of the
Constitution is inadmissible in a state court. Pp. 723-724.
2. The Fourth Amendment applies to involuntary
detention occurring at the investigatory stage as well as at the accusatory
stage. Pp. 726-727.
3. Detentions for the sole purpose of obtaining
fingerprints are subject to the constraints of the Fourth Amendment. P. 727.
4. It is not determined here whether Fourth Amendment
requirements could be met by narrowly circumscribed procedures for obtaining,
during a criminal investigation, fingerprints of persons for whom there is no
probable cause to arrest, since no attempt was made in this case to employ
procedures which might comply with the Fourth Amendment. P. 728.204 So.2d 270, reversed.
Melvyn Zarr argued the cause for petitioner. With him
on the brief were Jack Greenberg, Michael
Meltsner,
Anthony G. Amsterdam, and Jack Young. [394 U.S. 721, 722]
G. Garland Lyell, Jr., Assistant Attorney General of
Mississippi, argued the cause for respondent. With him on the brief was Joe T.
Patterson, Attorney General.
MR. JUSTICE BRENNAN delivered the opinion of the Court.
Petitioner was convicted of rape and sentenced to life
imprisonment by a jury in the Circuit Court of Lauderdale County, Mississippi.
The only issue before us is whether fingerprints obtained from petitioner
should have been excluded from evidence as the product of a detention which was
illegal under the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments.
The rape occurred on the evening of December 2, 1965,
at the victim's home in Meridian, Mississippi. The victim could give no better
description of her assailant than that he was a Negro youth. Finger and palm
prints found on the sill and borders of the window through which the assailant
apparently entered the victim's home constituted the only other lead available
at the outset of the police investigation. Beginning on December 3, and for a
period of about 10 days, the Meridian police, without warrants, took at least
24 Negro youths to police headquarters where they were questioned briefly,
fingerprinted, and then released without charge. The police also interrogated 40
or 50 other Negro youths either at police headquarters, at school, or on the
street. Petitioner, a 14-year-old youth who had occasionally worked for the
victim as a yardboy, was brought in on December 3 and released after being
fingerprinted and routinely questioned. Between December 3 and December 7, he
was interrogated by the police on several occasions - sometimes in his home or
in a car, other times at police headquarters. This questioning apparently
related primarily to investigation of other potential suspects. Several times
during this same period petitioner was exhibited [394 U.S. 721, 723] to the
victim in her hospital room. A police officer testified that these
confrontations were for the purpose of sharpening the victim's description of
her assailant by providing "a gauge to go by on size and color." The
victim did not identify petitioner as her assailant at any of these
confrontations.
On December 12, the police drove petitioner 90 miles
to the city of Jackson and confined him overnight in the Jackson jail. The
State conceded on oral argument in this Court that there was neither a warrant
nor probable cause for this arrest. The next day, petitioner, who had not yet
been afforded counsel, took a lie detector test and signed a statement.1 He was
then returned to and confined in the Meridian jail. On December 14, while so
confined, petitioner was fingerprinted a second time. That same day, these
December 14 prints, together with the fingerprints of 23 other Negro youths
apparently still under suspicion, were sent to the Federal Bureau of
Investigation in Washington, D.C., for comparison with the latent prints taken
from the window of the victim's house. The FBI reported that petitioner's
prints matched those taken from the window. Petitioner was subsequently
indicted and tried for the rape, and the fingerprint evidence was admitted in
evidence at trial over petitioner's timely objections that the fingerprints
should be excluded as the product of an unlawful detention. The Mississippi
Supreme Court sustained the admission of the fingerprint evidence and affirmed
the conviction. 204 So.2d 270 (1967). We granted certiorari. 393 U.S. 821
(1968). We reverse.
At the outset, we find no merit in the suggestion in
the Mississippi Supreme Court's opinion that fingerprint evidence, because of
its trustworthiness, is not subject to the proscriptions of the Fourth and
Fourteenth [394 U.S. 721, 724] Amendments.2 Our decisions recognize no
exception to the rule that illegally seized evidence is inadmissible at trial,
however relevant and trustworthy the seized evidence may be as an item of
proof. The exclusionary rule was fashioned as a sanction to redress and deter
overreaching governmental conduct prohibited by the Fourth Amendment. To make
an exception for illegally seized evidence which is trustworthy would fatally
undermine these purposes. Thus, in Mapp v. Ohio, 367 U.S. 643, 655 (1961), we
held that "all evidence obtained by searches and seizures in violation of
the Constitution is, by that same authority, inadmissible in a state
court." (Italics supplied.) Fingerprint evidence is no exception to this
comprehensive rule. We agree with and adopt the conclusion of the Court of
Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in Bynum v. United States, 104
U.S. App. D.C. 368, 370, 262 F.2d 465, 467 (1958):
"True, fingerprints can be distinguished from
statements given during detention. They can also be distinguished from articles
taken from a prisoner's possession. Both similarities and differences of each
type of evidence to and from the others are apparent. But all three have the
decisive common characteristic of being something of evidentiary value which
the public authorities have caused an arrested person to yield to them during
illegal detention. If one such product of illegal detention is proscribed, by
the same token all should be proscribed."
We turn then to the question whether the detention of
petitioner during which the fingerprints used at trial were taken constituted
an unreasonable seizure of his [394 U.S. 721, 725] person in violation of the
Fourth Amendment. The opinion of the Mississippi Supreme Court proceeded on the
mistaken premise that petitioner's prints introduced at trial were taken during
his brief detention on December 3. In fact, as both parties before us agree,
the fingerprint evidence used at trial was obtained on December 14, while
petitioner was still in detention following his December 12 arrest. The
legality of his arrest was not determined by the Mississippi Supreme Court.
However, on oral argument here, the State conceded that the arrest on December
12 and the ensuing detention through December 14 were based on neither a
warrant nor probable cause and were therefore constitutionally invalid. The
State argues, nevertheless, that this invalidity should not prevent us from
affirming petitioner's conviction. The December 3 prints were validly obtained,
it is argued, and "it should make no difference in the practical or legal
sense which [fingerprint] card was sent to the F. B. I. for comparison."3
It may be that it does make a difference in light of the objectives of the
exclusionary rule, see Bynum v. United States, supra, at 371-372, 262 F.2d, at
468-469,4 but we need not decide the question since we have concluded that the
prints of December 3 were not validly obtained. [394 U.S. 721, 726]
The
State makes no claim that petitioner voluntarily accompanied the police
officers to headquarters on December 3 and willingly submitted to
fingerprinting. The State's brief also candidly admits that "[a]ll that
the Meridian Police could possibly have known about petitioner at the time . .
. would not amount to probable cause for his arrest . . . ."5 The State
argues, however, that the December 3 detention was of a type which does not
require probable cause. Two rationales for this position are suggested. First,
it is argued that the detention occurred during the investigatory rather than
accusatory stage and thus was not a seizure requiring probable cause. The
second and related argument is that, at the least, detention for the sole
purpose of obtaining fingerprints does not require probable cause.
It is true that at the time of the December 3
detention the police had no intention of charging petitioner with the crime and
were far from making him the primary focus of their investigation. But to argue
that the Fourth Amendment does not apply to the investigatory stage is
fundamentally to misconceive the purposes of the Fourth Amendment.
Investigatory seizures would subject unlimited numbers of innocent persons to
the harassment and ignominy incident to involuntary detention. Nothing is more
clear than that the Fourth Amendment was meant to prevent wholesale intrusions
upon the personal security of our citizenry, whether these intrusions [394 U.S.
721, 727] be termed "arrests" or "investigatory
detentions."6 We made this explicit only last Term in Terry v. Ohio, 392
U.S. 1, 19 (1968), when we rejected "the notions that the Fourth Amendment
does not come into play at all as a limitation upon police conduct if the
officers stop short of something called a `technical arrest' or a `full-blown
search.'"
Detentions for the sole purpose of obtaining
fingerprints are no less subject to the constraints of the Fourth Amendment. It
is arguable, however, that, because of the unique nature of the
fingerprintingprocess, such detentions might, under narrowly defined
circumstances, be found to comply with the Fourth Amendment even though there
is no probable cause in the traditional sense. See Camara v. Municipal Court,
387 U.S. 523 (1967). Detention for fingerprinting may constitute a much less
serious intrusion upon personal security than other types of police searches
and detentions. Fingerprinting involves none of the probing into an
individual's private life and thoughts that marks an interrogation or search.
Nor can fingerprint detention be employed repeatedly to harass any individual,
since the police need only one set of each person's prints. Furthermore,
fingerprinting is an inherently more reliable and effective crime-solving tool
than eyewitness identifications or confessions and is not subject to such
abuses as the improper line-up and the "third degree." Finally,
because there is no danger of destruction of fingerprints, the limited
detention need not come unexpectedly or at an inconvenient time. [394 U.S. 721,
728] For this same reason, the general requirement that the authorization of a
judicial officer be obtained in advance of detention would seem not to admit of
any exception in the fingerprinting context.
We have no occasion in this case, however, to
determine whether the requirements of the Fourth Amendment could be met by
narrowly circumscribed procedures for obtaining, during the course of a
criminal investigation, the fingerprints of individuals for whom there is no
probable cause to arrest. For it is clear that no attempt was made here to
employ procedures which might comply with the requirements of the Fourth
Amendment: the detention at police headquarters of petitioner and the other
young Negroes was not authorized by a judicial officer; petitioner was
unnecessarily required to undergo two fingerprinting sessions; and petitioner
was not merely fingerprinted during the December 3 detention but also subjected
to interrogation. The judgment of the Mississippi Supreme Court is therefore
Reversed.
MR. JUSTICE FORTAS took no part in the consideration
or decision of this case.
Footnotes
[Footnote 1] The statement was not introduced at the
trial.
[Footnote 2] Fingerprint evidence would seem no more
"trustworthy" than other types of evidence - such as guns, narcotics,
gambling equipment - which are routinely excluded if illegally obtained.
[Footnote 3] Brief for Respondent 8.
[Footnote 4] The Government argued in Bynum that the
controversy over the introduction in evidence of a particular set of
fingerprints was "much ado over very little," because another set
properly taken was available and might have been used. The Court of Appeals
rejected this argument: "It bears repeating that the matter of primary
judicial concern in all cases of this type is the imposition of effective
sanctions implementing the Fourth Amendment guarantee against illegal arrest
and detention. Neither the fact that the evidence obtained through such
detention is itself trustworthy or the fact that equivalent evidence can
conveniently be obtained in a wholly proper way militates against this
overriding [394 U.S. 721, 726] consideration. It is entirely irrelevant that it
may be relatively easy for the government to prove guilt without using the product
of illegal detention. The important thing is that those administering the
criminal law understand that they must do it that way." 104 U.S. App.
D.C., at 371-372, 262 F.2d, at 468-469. On Bynum's retrial another set of
fingerprints in no way connected with his unlawful arrest was used, and he was
again convicted. The Court of Appeals affirmed this conviction. 107 U.S. App.
D.C. 109, 274 F.2d 767 (1960).
[Footnote 5] Brief for Respondent 3.
[Footnote 6] The State relies on various statements in
our cases which approve general questioning of citizens in the course of
investigating a crime. See Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 477-478 (1966);
Culombe v. Connecticut, 367 U.S. 568, 635 (concurring opinion) (1961). But
these statements merely reiterated the settled principle that while the police
have the right to request citizens to answer voluntarily questions concerning
unsolved crimes they have no right to compel them to answer.
MR. JUSTICE HARLAN, concurring.
I join the opinion of the Court, with one reservation.
The Court states in dictum that, because fingerprinting may be scheduled for a
time convenient to the citizen, "the general requirement that the
authorization of a judicial officer be obtained in advance of detention would
seem not to admit of any exception in the fingerprinting context." Ante,
this page. I cannot concur in so sweeping a proposition. There may be
circumstances, falling short of the "dragnet" procedures employed in
this case, where compelled submission to fingerprinting would not amount to a
violation of the Fourth Amendment even in the [394 U.S. 721, 729] absence of a
warrant, and I would leave that question open.
MR. JUSTICE BLACK, dissenting.
The petitioner here was convicted of a brutal rape of
a woman, committed in her own home. Fingerprints of the petitioner, left on the
window sill of her home, were the clinching evidence bringing about
petitioner's conviction. The Court, by once more expanding the reach of the
judicially declared exclusionary rule, ostensibly resting on the Fourth
Amendment, holds the fingerprint evidence constitutionally inadmissible and
thereby reverses petitioner's conviction. The rape occurred on December 2,
1965, and, as was their duty, the police authorities began to make a searching
investigation the morning of December 3. The raped woman was originally able to
describe the rapist only as a young Negro male. With this evidence the police
proceeded to interrogate a number of young Negroes on the streets, at their
homes, or at the police station, and then permitted them to go on their way.
The petitioner was among those so interrogated on December 3, at which time his
fingerprints were made. The fingerprints were again taken on December 14. The
record does not show that petitioner or any other young man who was questioned
and fingerprinted ever made the slightest objection. Apparently all of them
cooperated with the police in efforts to find out who had committed the rape.
This case is but one more in an ever-expanding list of cases in which this
Court has been so widely blowing up the Fourth Amendment's scope that its
original authors would be hard put to recognize their creation.* For this most
[394 U.S. 721, 730] unnecessary expansion of the Amendment, the Court is
compelled to put its chief reliance on a Court of Appeals decision, Bynum v.
United States, 104 U.S. App. D.C. 368, 262 F.2d 465. I think it is high time
this Court, in the interest of the administration of criminal justice, made a
new appraisal of the language and history of the Fourth Amendment and cut it
down to its intended size. Such a judicial action would, I believe, make our
cities a safer place for men, women, and children to live.
I dissent from this reversal.
[Footnote *] See, e. g., Bumper v. North Carolina, 391
U.S. 543 - another rape case; Spinelli v. United States, 393 U.S. 410; Aguilar
v. Texas, 378 U.S. 108; Recznik v. City of Lorain, 393 U.S. 166; and Griswold
v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479.
MR. JUSTICE STEWART, dissenting.
I do not disagree with the Court's conclusion that the
petitioner was arrested and detained without probable cause. But it does not
follow that his fingerprints were inadmissible at the trial.
Fingerprints are not "evidence" in the
conventional sense that weapons or stolen goods might be. Like the color of a
man's eyes, his height, or his very physiognomy, the tips of his fingers are an
inherent and unchanging characteristic of the man. And physical impressions of
his fingertips can be exactly and endlessly reproduced.
We do not deal here with a confession wrongfully
obtained or with property wrongfully seized - so tainted as to be forever
inadmissible as evidence against a defendant. We deal, instead, with
"evidence" that can be identically reproduced and lawfully used at
any subsequent trial.*
I cannot believe that the doctrine of Mapp v. Ohio,
367 U.S. 643, requires so useless a gesture as the reversal of this conviction.
[Footnote *] At the original trial the victim of the
rape, under oath, positively identified the petitioner as her assailant. There
now exists, therefore, ample probable cause to detain him and take his
fingerprints. [394 U.S. 721, 731]