Rochin v. California

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Rochin v. California

Supreme Court of the United States

Argued October 16, 1951
Decided January 2, 1952


Full case name:	Richard Antonio Rochin v. People of the State of California

Citations:	342 U.S. 165; 72 S. Ct. 205; 96 L. Ed. 183; 1952 U.S. LEXIS 2576; 25 A.L.R.2d 1396

Prior history:	Defendant convicted, motion for new trial denied, Superior Court of Los Angeles County; affirmed, 225 P. 2d 1 (Cal. Ct. App. 1950); rehearing denied, Cal. Ct. App., Dec. 22, 1951; review denied, Cal., Jan. 11, 1951; cert. granted, 341 U.S. 939 (1951)

Subsequent history:	None

Holding

The use at trial of evidence obtained by conduct that "shocks the conscience" violates due process. Second District Court of Appeal for the Second Appellate District of California reversed.

Court membership

Case opinions

Majority by: Frankfurter
Joined by: Reed, Jackson, Burton, Vinson, Clark
Concurrence by: Black
Concurrence by: Douglas
Minton took no part in the consideration or decision of the case.

Laws applied

U.S. Const. amends. V, XIV

Rochin v. California, 342 U.S. 165 (1953) was a case decided by the Supreme Court of the United States that added behavior that "shocks the conscience" into tests of what violates substantive due process. This balancing test is often criticized as having subsequently been used in a particularly subjective manner.

1 Background
2 The Case
3 Notes
4 External links

[edit] Background

On July 1, 1949, three Los Angeles County deputy sheriffs entered the Rochin's residence without a search warrant and forcibly entered Rochin's room on the second floor.

Upon entering the room, the officers noticed two capsules on the night stand. Rochin immediately swallowed the capsules after officer Jack Jones asked him, "Whose stuff is this?" Jones then grabbed and squeezed Rochin by the neck, as well as shoving his fingers in Rochin's mouth as he attempted to eject the capsules.^[1] The officers, unable to obtain the capsules, handcuffed and took Rochin to Angelus Emergency Hospital where he was strapped to an operating table and had a tube forcibly placed in his mouth and into his stomach and given an emetic solution, whereupon he vomited the capsules into a bucket. The officers then retrieved the capsules and tested them to be morphine^[2].

Subsequently, this was submitted as evidence, and Rochin was found guilty of violating California Health and Safety Code § 11500 as having an unlawful preparation of morphine.

Rochin appealed his case on the basis that his rights, guaranteed to him by Amendments IV and XIV of the United States Constitution and by Article I(1)(13)(19) of the California Constitution rendered the evidence inadmissible, and that the forced stomach pumping was self-incrimination. The appeals court denied his defense arguing that the evidence was admissible, despite the egregious behavior of the officers and doctor, as it was "competent evidence," and the courts are not allowed to question the means in which it was obtained. As the court wrote, "illegally obtained evidence is admissible on a criminal charge in this state."^[3]

[edit] The Case

The court voted in an 8-0 decision (Minton abstained), to overturn the decision. Justice Frankfurter wrote the majority opinion which struck down the conviction arguing that the brutality of the means used to extract the evidence from Rochin, "shocks the conscience," and clearly violates the due process of law as guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendments. Frankfurter also admitted the term "due process" was nebulous; he asserted that it existed in order to preserve the fairness and integrity of the system and that society expects judges to act impartially and to take into account precedence and social context.^[4]

Justice Douglas and Black both wrote concurring opinions in which they argued that the lower court's decision should have been overturned based on the Fifth Amendment liberty from self incrimination. Both justices believed that the 14th Amendment's guarantee of "due process" incorporated that right. The justices' opinions also offered much criticism of Frankfurter's opinion for the court.

Douglas rebuked the court for suddenly declaring that the exclusion of illegally obtained evidence, which had not been an issue up until then, suddenly violated the "decencies of civilized conduct."^[5] Black disagreed with the logic in the majority as being contradictory. He argued the opinion enabled the court to nullify the California state law of using illegal evidence based on due process because its application, "shocks the conscience," but then admonishes judges to be impartial and use the society's standards in judgment.