18 U.S.C. § 2236
Section 2236 · Searches without warrant
Amended 3 times on record
Applied in 11 court decisions — leading case Bivens v. Six Unknown Named Agents of Federal Bureau of Narcotics (1969)
Most recently applied in In re the United States for an Order Authorizing Disclosure of Location Information of a Specified Wireless Telephone (August 2011)
How often courts cite this section
Court decisions citing this, by year.Markers show enactment, consequential amendments, and circuit splits over this section — watch for a citation surge after a change or a disagreement. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.
Whoever, being an officer, agent, or employee of the United States or any department or agency thereof, engaged in the enforcement of any law of the United States, searches any private dwelling used and occupied as such dwelling without a warrant directing such search, or maliciously and without reasonable cause searches any other building or property without a search warrant, shall be fined under this title for a first offense; and, for a subsequent offense, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than one year, or both.
This section shall not apply to any person—
(a) serving a warrant of arrest; or
(b) arresting or attempting to arrest a person committing or attempting to commit an offense in his presence, or who has committed or is suspected on reasonable grounds of having committed a felony; or
(c) making a search at the request or invitation or with the consent of the occupant of the premises.
Editorial notes U.S. Code · Office of the Law Revision Counsel
Historical and Revision Notes
Based on title 18, U.S.C., 1940 ed., §53a (Aug. 27, 1935, ch. 740, §201, 49 Stat. 877).
Words “or any department or agency thereof” were inserted to avoid ambiguity as to scope of section. (See definitive section 6 of this title.)
The exception in the case of an invitation or the consent of the occupant, was inserted to make the section complete and remove any doubt as to the application of this section to searches which have uniformly been upheld.
Reference to misdemeanor was omitted in view of definitive section 1 of this title. (See reviser's note under section 212 of this title.)
Words “upon conviction thereof shall be” were omitted as surplusage, since punishment cannot be imposed until conviction is secured.
Minor changes were made in phraseology.
Amendments
2002—Pub. L. 107–273 inserted “under this title” after “warrant, shall be fined” and struck out “not more than $1,000” after “for a first offense”.
1996—Pub. L. 104–294 substituted “fined under this title” for “fined not more than $1,000”.