Plain View Doctrine

Today’s computer storage capacity has brought about new controversy surrounding the plain view doctrine in context to a legally executed search warrant of a suspects hard drive in order to find evidence of a particular crime being investigated. When an officer searches a physical location while executing a search warrant and discovers evidence of another crime other than the one being investigated, that evidence is said to be in “plain view,” which can be seized and used to support a criminal prosecution. Many courts have simply applied the plain view doctrine to computer searches. For example, if an officer is searching a suspects’ computer with a legal warrant for evidence linked to a particular crime, but discovers files containing child
The reason for this is due to the ease in which files that would be considered evidence could be camouflaged or disguised using deceptive file names or extensions. However, some courts have ruled to the fact since computer storage has increased significantly and the amount of information stored on a computer can be monumental that some restrictions to the plain view doctrine need apply. “Other courts have concluded that because computer searches bring so much information to officers’ attention, the plain view doctrine must be limited. These cases generally have arisen in the context of searches pursuant to search warrants, and courts have expressed a concern that computer search warrants may amount to general warrants that allow officers to rummage through a suspect’s computer for evidence of any wrongdoing” (Welty, 2013). When an officer is searching through a suspects’ computer in accordance with a valid search warrant other evidence found pertaining to a new crime can be seized under the plain view doctrine without an additional search
Yet they have different suppositions about whether or not computers and other storage devices should be considered as one single closed container or that each individual file should be thought of as separate individual containers. Even though courts differ on how they classify any electronic storage device, plain view doctrine can still apply. Such as if a private party has conducted a search of certain files and found evidence of illegal financial crimes. Upon search of the storage device conducted by authorities in good faith of a valid search warrant, in which new evidence such as child pornography was found. Officers can seize this new evidence so long as the officers did not exceed the scope of the original private search that was conducted. “First, in United States v. Runyan, 275 F.3d 449, 464-65 (5th Cir. 2001), in which private parties had searched certain files and found child pornography, the Fifth Circuit held that the police did not exceed the scope of the private search when they examined additional files on any disk that had been, in part, privately searched. Analogizing a disk to a closed container, the court explained that “police do not exceed the private search when they examine more items within a closed container than did the private searchers.” Id. at 464” (Jarrett and Bailie,