New+Jersey+v.+TLO

N ew Jersey v. T.L.O.(1985)


 * Argued March 28, 1984 Re-argued October 2, 1984**
 * Decided January 15, 1985**

1. The case was brought about after, two girls where caught smoking in a Piscataway high school’s bathroom. After being caught by a teacher, and being turned over to Assistant Vice Principal Choplick, one student confessed to the action and the other, referred to as T.L.O., chose to deny the allegations. T.L.O.’s purse was then searched by the school claiming “reasons of suspicion". The school started to search the purse to find cigarettes. Upon finding the cigarettes, he continued to search the purse out of suspicion finding, a note card of names, wads of money, small bags, rolling papers, and marihuana. T.L.O. then claimed the search was a violation of her fourth amendment right and the evidence should be considered invalid. The case was then taken to court.

2. The argument made by the student, T.L.O., is that the court violated her fourth amendment right, claiming her rights against search and seizure. T.L.O. then claimed that anything found in her purse should be excluded from the case, because of the violation. The school made the argument that they had a reason to search under suspicion and search the purse.

3. This case actually went through four courts including the US Supreme Court. Because she was underage, a minor, it first was taken to a juvenile court where they claimed that the Fourth Amendment was not violated in this case. They then sentenced her to a year's probation. But that was not enough for T.L.O. because she appealed this ruling, taking the case to a higher appeals court. Once again, they did not find fault in the search. So of course T.L.O. was not satisfied. The case was present to the New Jersey Supreme Court, and they ruled that her privacy rights were violated when they searched the compartments of her purse. If it was up to T.L.O., she would have ended it there and taken the win, but it was the school this time who appealed it to be viewed by the highest court. Finally the US Supreme Court ruled in favor of the school, stating that the search was backed by “reasonable” suspicion. Therefore the contents did count as evidence against her.



4. The Supreme Court ruling for the New Jersey vs. T.L.O case was 6 to 3. The majority view was that the school acts as the representative as the state and not just as the replacement to the parents. If the school needed a warrant every time they had suspicions and did a search it would interfere with the urgency of school discipline systems. The dissenting view of the case was that T.L.O had a lack of criminal activity and whether or not the school had the same right and probable cause as the legal system.



5. The incident involving T.L.O and New Jersey occurred in 1980 and the case was decided on by the U.S Supreme Court in the school's favor that they had the right to search T.L.O's purse because of reasonable suspicion in 1985.

Links:

1, 2, 3, 4 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Jersey_v._T._L._O

4. @http://www.east-buc.k12.ia.us/05_06/AG1/al/al3.htm

5. @http://www.google.com/imgres?q=tlo+case&um=1&hl=en&tbm=isch&tbnid=l2kxRW-VWeuRUM:&imgrefurl=http://www2.maxwell.syr.edu/plegal/scales/tlovis.html&docid=0lYhyRCDaoyIkM&imgurl=http://www2.maxwell.syr.edu/plegal/scales/tlo.gif&w=811&h=1107&ei=eE-VT_tWw8foAcqWuf8D&zoom=1&iact=hc&vpx=180&vpy=123&dur=1297&hovh=262&hovw=192&tx=99&ty=145&sig=109870260530968684202&page=1&tbnh=150&tbnw=110&start=0&ndsp=18&ved=1t:429,r:0,s:0,i:69&biw=1280&bih=661