Assume That an Applicable State Statute Makes It a Crime

question 60

Multiple Choice

Assume that an applicable state statute makes it a crime for a private citizen to possess a machine gun.For approximately three weeks,officer Roy Holt had had probable cause to believe that Alex Hood,a private citizen,possessed an arsenal of machine guns in his apartment.Acting on this probable cause but without a warrant,Holt knocked on the door of Hood's apartment and asked Hood if he could come in to talk to him.Hood let Holt in.Then,without Hood's consent,Holt began searching the entire apartment.Holt found several machine guns in the bedroom closet.He arrested Hood for an alleged violation of the statute mentioned above.In a pretrial motion,Hood's attorney has asked that the court apply the exclusionary rule and suppress the evidence yielded by Holt's search of Hood's apartment.Should the evidence be suppressed?

• A) No,because Holt had probable cause to believe that Hood had the machine guns in his apartment.
• B) Yes,because the unconsented search did not fall within the exceptions to the general rule that warrantless searches are unreasonable.
• C) No,because Hood voluntarily allowed Holt to enter the apartment and because the machine guns were in plain view in the closet.
• D) Yes,because the search,though warrantless,was conducted by an officer who was acting to further the public's safety.