You may have been a victim of an illegal search and seizure and now you are facing criminal charges.

As people living in America, we have a constitutional right to privacy.

The Fourth Amendment specifically protects us as a people against unreasonable searches and seizures by authorities.

A police officer may not choose to walk into your private space and search your things without a warrant and /or probable cause.

Often times, authorities partake in illegal searches and seize things that they know can be used against you in the court of law. These “things” seized during an illegal search are referred to fruits of the poisonous tree and can not be used to convict you of a crime. That is where your criminal defense attorney steps in and shows to the court that first off there was no warrant, no probable cause to search the premises in question and so the piece of evidence prosecutors are trying to use against you was an illegal seizure and therefore must be thrown out.

The question often asked is “did the person have a legitimate expectation of privacy as to the place searched and things seized”. For example, if you have a gun laying in the backseat of your car which is parked in a public place, there is no legitimate expectation of privacy in that situation but on the flip side there is an expectation of privacy in one's purse, one's home, one's baggage. Every situation is different and as criminal defense lawyers we want to make sure that you were not a victim of an illegal search and seizure.

Call the Hedding Law firm for a free evaluation and we will let you know immediately what your options are if you are facing a criminal offense and suspect that your Fourth Amendment rights were violated.