UNIVERSITY OF THE DISTRICT OF - UDC Law Review

131 United States v. Llanes, 398 F.2d 880 (2d Cir.1968).
132 State v. Person, 34 Ohio Misc. 97, 298 N.E.2d 922 (1973) (concluding that even though the landlord’s son could admit the police
to the hallway of the rooming house, the police officer’s actions in “surreptitiously peering through a keyhole” constituted a Fourth
Amendment search). Cf. State v. Morrow, 95 Wis.2d 595, 291 N.W.2d 298 (App.1980) (where officer assumed prone position on
floor of hotel hallway and looked under door into room, this a search, but one made on probable cause and in exigent
circumstances on facts of this case).
133 Cf. State v. Adams, 378 So.2d 72 (Fla.App.1979) (where police looked in defendant’s room in a rooming house by going onto the
porch and then standing on a chair to peer through a window above eye level, this was a search because defendant had a reasonable
expectation of privacy against such surveillance).
134 State v. Carter, note 127 supra (also emphasizing officer “peered through a small gap between the blinds”).
Compare United States v. Fields, 113 F.3d 313 (2d Cir.1997) (distinguishing case in which court held it a search to look through a
very small opening in a sheet of plywood covering a broken window, court concludes looking from common area of apartment
complex into bedroom no search, given “the five-to six-inch opening beneath the blinds in this case” which was “sufficiently large
to be clearly visible from the interior of the room to anyone who cared enough about his privacy to close the blinds”).
135 United States v. Potts, 297 F.2d 68 (6th Cir.1961). The Supreme Court stated in Oliver v. United States, 466 U.S. 170, 104 S.Ct.
1735, 80 L.Ed.2d 214 (1984), that “the curtilage is the area to which extends the intimate activity associated with the ‘sanctity of a
man’s home and the privacies of life, … and therefore has been considered part of home itself for Fourth Amendment purposes.
Thus, courts have extended Fourth Amendment protection to the curtilage; and they have defined the curtilage, as did the common
law, by reference to the factors that determine whether an individual reasonably may expect that an area immediately adjacent to
the home will remain private.” The Court added that “for most homes, the boundaries of the curtilage will be clearly marked; and
the conception defining the curtilage-as the area around the home to which the activity of home life extends-is a familiar one easily
understood from our daily experience.”
The extent of the curtilage depends upon the nature of the premises. As stated in Commonwealth v. Thomas, 358 Mass. 771, 267
N.E.2d 489 (1971): “In a modern urban multifamily apartment house, the area within the ‘curtilage’ is necessarily much more
limited than in the case of a rural dwelling subject to one owner’s control. … In such an apartment house, a tenant’s ‘dwelling’
cannot reasonably be said to extend beyond his own apartment and perhaps any separate areas subject to his exclusive control.”
136 Taylor v. United States, 286 U.S. 1, 52 S.Ct. 466, 76 L.Ed. 951 (1932); Martin v. United States, 183 F.2d 436 (4th Cir.1950); State
v. Brochu, 237 A.2d 418 (Me.1967); State v. Winkler, 552 N.W.2d 347 (N.D.1996).
Distinguishable from those decisions is City of Whitefish v. Large, 318 Mont. 310, 80 P.3d 427 (2003) (where defendant’s carport
was attached to but beneath her condominium unit, police could enter the carport because “it would be comparable to the front
porch” in other cases, as “casual visitors might easily walk through her carport to reach the stairs to her front door”).
State v. Jenkins, 143 Idaho 918, 155 P.3d 1157 (2007).
137 Rosencranz v. United States, 356 F.2d 310 (1st Cir.1966); Walker v. United States, 225 F.2d 447 (5th Cir.1955).
138 Roberson v. United States, 165 F.2d 752 (6th Cir.1948).
139 Wakkuri v. United States, 67 F.2d 844 (6th Cir.1933).
140 People v. Lind, 370 Ill. 131, 18 N.E.2d 189 (1938); Cantu v. State, 557 S.W.2d 107 (Tex.Crim.App.1977).
141 Carney v. United States, 163 F.2d 784 (9th Cir.1947); Guaresimo v. United States, 13 F.2d 848 (6th Cir.1926); People v. Lees, 257
Cal.App.2d 363, 64 Cal.Rptr. 888 (1967); People v. Swanberg, 22 A.D.2d 902, 255 N.Y.S.2d 267 (1964).
142 Schnorenberg v. United States, 23 F.2d 38 (7th Cir.1927); Guaresimo v. United States, 13 F.2d 848 (6th Cir.1926).
143 Hodges v. United States, 243 F.2d 281 (5th Cir.1957); Schnorenberg v. United States, 23 F.2d 38 (7th Cir.1927).
144 United States v. McBride, 287 F. 214 (S.D.Ala.1922).
145 United States v. Mitchell, 12 F.2d 88 (S.D.Tex.1926).
146 Brock v. United States, 256 F.2d 55 (5th Cir.1958) (was 150 to 180 feet from residence).
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