Facts
- Silverthorne Lumber Co., Inc. and its officers were investigated for suspected federal tax and revenue violations.
- After an indictment and early-morning arrests of Frederick W. Silverthorne and his father, federal officials searched the company’s office while the men were in custody.
- The officials, acting without lawful authority and under color of a void writ, seized the company’s books, papers, and documents and took them to the U.S. Attorney’s office.
- The company promptly moved for return of the seized materials; the district court ordered the originals returned but allowed the government to keep photographs and copies it had made.
- The government used what it learned from the unlawful seizure to pursue a new indictment and to issue subpoenas duces tecum compelling production of the original corporate records before the grand jury.
- The company and Frederick W. Silverthorne refused to comply, asserting Fourth Amendment protection.
- The district court held the company in contempt (fine) and held Frederick W. Silverthorne in contempt (imprisonment until compliance).
Issues
- Whether the government may compel production of corporate books and papers by subpoena when the subpoenas were framed using information obtained through a prior unconstitutional search and seizure.
- Whether the Fourth Amendment protects a corporation and its officers against such compelled production despite the corporation’s lack of a Fifth Amendment privilege against compelled production of corporate records.
- Whether the Fourth Amendment permits the government to use otherwise valid legal process to obtain evidence after first learning of it through unlawful government conduct.
Decision
- The Supreme Court reversed the contempt judgments.
- The Court held that the government may not use knowledge gained from an unconstitutional search and seizure to compel production of the same materials by subpoena.
- The Court rejected the view that the government could keep and rely on copies or derived information while returning the originals, because that would allow circumvention of the Fourth Amendment.
- The Court held that Fourth Amendment protection against unreasonable searches and seizures applies to corporations and their officers in this setting, independent of any Fifth Amendment limitation.
- The Court noted that the constitutional objection was timely because the parties promptly sought return of the materials and consistently objected to their later use.
Legal Principles
- The Fourth Amendment forbids not only the use of evidence obtained by unconstitutional search and seizure, but also the government’s use of information derived from that illegality to obtain evidence through later compulsion.
- Permitting subpoenas based on information learned from an unlawful seizure would give the government a practical benefit from unconstitutional conduct and would render the Fourth Amendment ineffective.
- Corporate entities have Fourth Amendment protection against unlawful searches and seizures of their premises and records, even though corporations generally lack a Fifth Amendment privilege against compelled production of corporate documents.
- A party must assert Fourth Amendment rights in a timely manner; prompt motions for return of unlawfully seized property can preserve the objection to later derivative use.
Conclusion
The Court invalidated contempt sanctions imposed for refusing to comply with subpoenas that were the product of an earlier illegal seizure, holding that the Fourth Amendment bars both direct and derivative governmental use of unlawfully obtained evidence, including subpoenas framed from tainted information, and that corporations receive Fourth Amendment protection for their records and premises.