NYS Public Health Legal Manual: A Guide for Judges, Attorneys ...

NEW YORK STATE PUBLIC HEALTH LEGAL MANUAL § 1.71
Court, 407 U.S. 297, 313 (1972) [“physical entry of the home is the chief
evil against which the wording of the Fourth Amendment is directed”].
By contrast, privacy expectations in commercial premises are “particularly
attenuated” in industries that are “closely regulated.” New York v.
Burger, 482 U.S. 691, 700 (1987). Nevertheless, administrative searches
of a home can fall within the “special needs exception” to the requirement
of obtaining a warrant pursuant to a showing of probable cause—”where
special needs, beyond the normal need for law enforcement, make the
warrant and probable cause requirement impracticable.” Board of Education
v. Earls, 536 U.S. 822, 829 (2002), citing Griffen v. Wisconsin, 483
U.S. 868, 873 (1987).
In applying the special needs exception, the courts perform the same
balancing test of expectations of privacy versus governmental interest.
Where the privacy interest is high, the governmental interest must be substantial.
A substantial government interest would include “exigent conditions”
where the government needs to discover “latent or hidden
conditions” or to “prevent the development of hazardous conditions,”
Board of Education v. Earls, supra, 536 U.S. at 828-29, or seeks to “protect
or preserve life.” Mincey v. Arizona, 437 U.S. 385, 392-93 (1978). In
the context of control of contagious diseases or other health hazards, facts
supporting the seriousness of the threat and the need for immediate government
action can justify a warrantless search. See Camara v. Municipal
Court, supra, 387 U.S. at 539 [“nothing we say today is intended to foreclose
prompt inspections, even without a warrant, that the law has traditionally
upheld in emergency situations”], citing North American Cold
Storage v. City of Chicago, 211 U.S. 306 (1908) [seizure of contaminated
food]; Jacobson v. Massachusetts, 197 U.S. 11 (1905) [mandatory smallpox
vaccination]; Compaignie Francaise v. Louisiana State Board of
Health, 186 U.S. 380 (1902) [health quarantine].
Seizures are subject to the same analysis. A seizure occurs where
“there is some meaningful interference with an individual’s possessory
interests in that property,” which would include the forced ejection of a
person from the property. Soldal v. Cook County, 506 U.S. 56, 60 (1992).
The same balancing test applicable to searches, including the special
needs exception, would apply.
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