Can Police Search My Home for a Sex Crime Investigation? Combs Waterkotte attorneys Christopher Combs and Joshua Boardman discuss everything you need to know about Illinois sex crime charges, including sexual assault, sexual abuse, rape, and more.
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Interview Transcript
Scott Michael Dunn: Can police search my home for a sex crime investigation in Illinois?
Joshua Boardman: Yes, they can. The two ways in which they’d be able to is one, they knock on your door. Somebody that has the ability to let them in legally speaking, I mean has some sort of connection with that home as far as residency, lets them in. So then they do a search via consent. That would be one avenue. The second avenue is if they’ve been able to obtain a search warrant based on a previous probable cause finding in order to come in and locate whatever they’re claiming is within that home as potential evidence.
Christopher Combs: I’m asking you as the head of our Illinois department, does search incident to arrest does that apply? Meaning once they’re arrested, can they go ahead and search the home?
Boardman: Yes, they can. They can then utilize that arrest and the allegations or the findings or the probable cause within the context of that arrest to then go search for other evidence that would be related to those allegations for which you’re placed under arrest for.
Combs: And then again, this is more a question to Josh, but in computer sex crimes, I know that least in Missouri, they will ping to law enforcement if there’s some type of computer sex crime. Oftentimes they have a warrant, but sometimes they’ll just come in and seize electronics. Is that correct?
Boardman: Yes. And then …
Dunn: Based on the allegations.
Boardman: Based on the allegations, then try to create the probable cause afterwards. And so it’s kind of, to use the phrase, putting the cart before the horse to some extent.
Combs: But it happens. I mean we see it.
Boardman: It’s essentially a fishing expedition because they’re claiming well we think there was a ping so we think there’s something here. Don’t know quite what it is but we need that device to try to narrow it down, when in other criminal contexts warrants are not obtained that way. I mean, if you’re coming in specific for a drug search or something, you have to list what you suspect to be in that location or listed on the warrant. Oftentimes with these electronic devices or storage on the cloud or whatever, it tends to be a more broad scope and then they try to justify narrowing.
