Ruling that a fraternity house deserves the same privacy as a home, the Kentucky Supreme Court on Thursday unanimously reversed the conviction of a University of Kentucky student who was convicted of trafficking in marijuana after a warrantless search of his room in the Delta Tau Delta fraternity.
The court rejected the argument that police had the right to enter the frat because a bolt on its back door was broken.
"A citizen's greatest fortification against government intrusion into his or her home is the Fourth Amendment itself, not a lock," Justice Bill Cunningham wrote for the court. "The doorless threshold of the shanty may defy entry to the state with the same constitutional empowerment as the barred and bolted mansion."
The court suppressed evidence seized in the search and vacated the conviction of David Zac Milam, a 2014 UK grad and a resident of Louisville.
His lawyer, Fred Peters, said his client was ecstatic that his felony conviction will be removed from his record. "It is a great opinion," Peter said.
Although the court returned the case to Fayette Circuit Court, Peters said there is no evidence left with which to prosecute it. The attorney general's office was reviewing the ruling, spokeswoman Allison Martin said.
The court held that police violated the sanctity of the fraternal brotherhood in 2010 when they barged into a foyer of the legendary fraternity that produced both Gov. Steve Beshear and former Gov. Ernie Fletcher and asked where they could find Milam.
The prosecution argued that a frat house is more like an apartment building than a home and police had the same right to enter it as a pizza delivery man looking for a customer.
But the court said that within the rooms of a fraternity, residents take part in rituals that are closed to the rest of the world, and that there is more of a heightened expectation of privacy than in a hotel or apartment.
The facts of the search were disputed, but the court said after police asked a student where they could find Milam, they followed him upstairs, smelled marijuana in the hallway and knocked on Milam's door. He opened it, and police saw a full jar of pot on a coffee table.
Milam consented to a search in which officers found more pot, $1,700, Adderall pills, drug paraphernalia and a fake driver's license.
But the court found that officers had no right to enter the foyer in the first place, noting that every court that has addressed the issue in other states had determined a frat house must be treated like a private residence. It was the first time the issue was presented in Kentucky, the court said.
Although Milam consented to the search of his room, the court said that as a college student, it is unlikely he knew he had a choice.
Milam pleaded guilty but reserved the right to appeal. The Court of Appeals had upheld his conviction.
The national Delta Tau Delta fraternity said in February that while it did not condone Milam's activities, it supported his legal arguments.
"A fraternity house is a private residence owned by a private corporation operated for the exclusive use of its members," Jack Kreman, its chief operating office, said at the time. "It is in no way akin to an apartment or a hotel. "Past, current and future residents should be found to be entitled to the very same protections that the 4th Amendment guarantees and secures to residents of private homes and apartments."
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