Chimel v. California

When an arrest is made, it is reasonable for an officer to search the person arrested to remove any weapons that the arrestee might use to resist arrest. It is also reasonable for an officer to search and seize any evidence on the arrestee’s person to prevent its concealment or destruction and for the means of committing an escape.

The area that an officer may search is that area within an arrestee’s immediate control. That is the area that the person might gain possession of a weapon, means of escape, or destructible evidence. There is, however, no justification for routinely searching any room other than that in which an arrest occurs, or for that matter, for searching through desk drawers or other closed areas in that room itself. Such searches, in the absence of well-recognized exceptions, may be made only under the authority of a search warrant.

The search in this case went beyond the defendant’s person and the area that he might have obtained a weapon, a means of escape, or something that could have been used as evidence against him. There was no constitutional justification, in the absence of a search warrant, for extending the search beyond the area from which the defendant was arrested.