The Supreme Court created the federal exclusionary rule in criminal cases.

State officers and a federal marshal conducted a warrantless arrest and search that led to Weeks’s conviction on a charge of using the mail to transport lottery tickets. He challenged the use of the seized materials in court, saying they had been illegally taken. In ruling for Weeks and voiding his conviction, the Supreme Court unanimously ended the long-standing practice of the federal courts accepting illegally gathered evidence in court on the theory that so-called justice was more important than any individual’s right. In the opinion for the Court, Justice William R. DayDay, William R.;Weeks v. United States[Weeks v. United States] ruled that the wrongly seized evidence and its introduction at trial violated the defendant’s Fourth Amendment rights. The exclusion of the tickets voided the conviction, and the Court in effect created the federal exclusionary rule, the significance of which grew in later years.Exclusionary rule;Weeks v. United States[Weeks v. United States]

Due process, procedural

Exclusionary rule

Fourth Amendment

Mapp v. Ohio

Search warrant requirement

Silver platter doctrine