Is Our Home Really Our Castle?
At the Law Offices of Andrew Mishlove, we have taken our fight for the right of privacy in our homes to the United States Supreme Court.
Our client was reported by a neighbor for some minor erratic driving. He parked in his driveway and went inside his home. About fifteen minutes later, a group of police came to his home.
They had no warrant, no suspicion of a serious crime and no knowledge of any threat to public safety. So, they had no legal basis to enter the home and they knew it. They decided, instead, to force our client out of the house.
Banging on windows and doors, shining flashlights into the house and yelling, the police refused to take no for an answer. Even after our client emphatically told them to leave, they continued their siege of his home. Eventually, our client left his home and was arrested.
The Wisconsin courts held that since he was arrested outside of his home, there was no violation of the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution, which guarantees the sanctity of a person’s home.
Amazingly, in more than two hundred years since the Fourth Amendment was written, the United States Supreme Court has never decided a case such as this. We believe that laying siege to a citizen’s home is just as much of a violation of the home as an illegal entry into the living room.
We have filed a Petition for a Writ of Certiorari, asking the United States Supreme Court to hear the case. They will decide whether or not they will hear the case when they convene for the October 2011 session.
