Fourth Amendment Rights – Search and Seizure in Schools

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Reasonable Suspicion

Most student searches in schools begin as a result from some reasonable suspicion by a school district employee that the student has violated a law or school policy. In order to have reasonable suspicion a school employee must have facts that support the suspicions are true. A justifiable search is one in which a school employee:

The information or knowledge possessed by the school employee must come from a valid and reliable source to be considered reasonable. These sources can include the employees personal observations and knowledge, reliable reports of other school officials, reports of eyewitnesses and victims, and/or informant tips. The suspicion must be based on facts and weighted so that the probability is sufficient enough that the suspicion may be true.

A justifiable student search must include each of the following components:

In general, school officials cannot search a large group of students just because they suspect that a policy has been violated, but have been unable to connect the violation to a particular student.

However, there are court cases that have allowed such large group searches particularly concerning the suspicion of someone possessing a dangerous weapon, which jeopardizes the safety of the student body.

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Fourth Amendment Rights - Search and Seizure in Schools