Heller v. New York

We granted certiorari in this case to determine whether a judicial officer authorized to issue warrants, who has viewed a film and finds it to be obscene, can issue a constitutionally valid warrant for the film’s seizure as evidence in a prosecution against the exhibitor, without first conducting an adversary hearing on the issue of probable obscenity.

*485Petitioner was manager of a commercial movie theater in the Greenwich Village area of New York City. On July 29, 1969, a film called “Blue Movie” was exhibited there. The film depicts a nude couple engaged in ultimate sexual acts. Three police…