Chapman v. United States

Acting without a warrant but with the consent of the petitioner’s landlord, Georgia law enforcement officers entered — through an unlocked window- — and searched petitioner’s rented house, in his absence, and there found and seized an unregistered “distillery” and 1,300 gallons of “mash.” Soon afterward petitioner was indicted in *611the District Court for the Middle District of Georgia for violations of the federal liquor laws.1 He promptly moved the court for an order suppressing the use of the seized items as evidence at his impending criminal trial on the ground that they were obtained by an…