Court Cases

1 .Ferguson v . City of trip the light fantastic toe , 532 U .S . 67 (2001Sometime in 1988 to 1989 , the incidence of cocaine commit among the maternity patients , a practice that harmed the fetus and was a form of small pip-squeak yell , was at an alarming rate at the Charleston creation infirmary operated by the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC . The spoke members at MUSC volunteered to help the city of Charleston to prosecute women who act overconfident for cocaine while with child(predicate) . There afterwards Charleston solicitor Charles Codon organized a task force that include representatives of MUSC , the police , the County Substance Abuse Commission , and the Department of Social go , and which subsequently adopted a document entitled constitution M-7 that dealt with the Management of Drug Abuse During Pregnancy . The indemnity include the following provisions (1 ) procedures for identifying and scrutiny pregnant patients suspected of medicament use (2 ) a chain of custody to be followed when obtaining and interrogation patients urine samples (3 education and intercession referral for patients testing positive (4 patrol procedures and criteria for overhearing patients who tested positive , and (5 ) prosecutions for dose offenses or child failure . The policy neither provided for any changes in antenatal safeguard of mothers who tested positive , nor mandate any particular treatment for these mothers babies . Petitioners , 10 mothers who received obstetrical care at MUSC and who were harbored after testing positive for cocaine , challenged the validity of polity M-7 alleging among others that the warrantless and nonconsensual medicine tests for the purpose of criminal investigation constituted unconstitutional searches . Respondents , on the other hand all eged that petitioners holded and the medic! ine tests were for surplus non-law-enforcement purposes . The govern Court found in favor of the petitioners . On appeal , the Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit affirmed the debase coquet s decision , although ruled that the searches were reasonable under the redundant ineluctably doctrine .

Petitioners raised the case by writ of certiorari to the Supreme Court on the issue of the validity of the searchesThe coterminous goal of the government in conducting the drug tests is the eventual arrest and prosecution of those found positive for cocaine as potential in the roles and close participation of the police and prosecutors in the policy although the ultimate goal may have been to attract the mothers who tested positive into substance abuse treatmentThe Supreme Court held that the drug tests for law enforcement purposes conducted by MUSC are inordinate searches in the absence seizure of the patient s consent thereto . The general rule on the unconstitutionality of a nonconsensual warrantless search applies in this case . The alleged wear upon on of the city of using the threat of criminal sanctions to monish pregnant women from using cocaine can not beg off the use of such searches that violate the Fourth AmendmentThe searches were found to be unreasonable because firstly , the court assumed that the drug tests were do without the consent of the mothers . Secondly , the MUSC , being a state hospital , whose staff members are government actors under the purview...If you want to get a full essay, order it on our website: OrderEssay.net

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