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CA5: SWAT team cannot conduct adminstrative search

By John Wesley Hall, Jr.

A private club corporation had standing to bring its own Fourth Amendment claim for a raid on the club. Defendants' violent SWAT team raid on the club was not within the consent given to patrons to enter. It also was not a reasonable administrative search. Even as an administrative search, it cannot be a pretext for a criminal search. Club Retro LLC v. Hilton, 2009 U.S. App. LEXIS 9864 (5th Cir. May 6, 2009): Taking plaintiffs' factual allegations as true, defendants did not enter Club Retro as would a typical patron; instead, they chose to project official authority by entering with weapons drawn in a S.W.A.T. team raid. They lacked any particularized suspicion or probable cause when they subsequently searched Club Retro, its attic, and the separate apartment and seized and searched all of its patrons and employees...continue to full post

Full post as published by Fourth Amendment on May 11, 2009 (boomark / email).