The Independent Source Exception to the Exclusionary Rule under the United States Constitution

I discussed the inevitable discovery exception in my last post. This post will discuss the independent source exception, particularly the United States Supreme Court cases of Segura v. United States, 468 U.S. 796 (1984), and Murray v. United States, 487 U.S. 533 (1988), and related North Carolina cases. It should be noted that the independent source exception was initially adopted in Silverthorne Lumber Co. v. United States, 251 U.S. 385 (1920), and can apply to investigations involving Fourth, Fifth, or Sixth Amendment violations. The Court has justified the independent source exception as follows: Society’s interest in deterring unlawful law enforcement conduct and the public interest in having juries receive all probative evidence of a crime are properly balanced by putting law enforcement in the same, not a worse, position that they would have been if no law enforcement error or misconduct had occurred. When the challenged evidence has been legally obtained through a source independent of unlawful law enforcement activity, exclusion of such evidence would put law enforcement in a worse position than they would have been in absent any error or violation. Nix v. Williams, 467 U.S. 431 (1984). Segura v. United States. Drug agents entered an apartment without a warrant and secured it pending the issuance of a search warrant. The search warrant was issued the next day, and drugs and other evidence was seized. The Court said that it was important to focus on the narrow and precise question before it. The lower courts in this case had [...]