Criminal Procedure—Search and Seizure—Electronic Eavesdropping—Abortion: Recording of Voluntary Conversation Between Police Agent and Defendant Admissible in Evidence.—State v. Wright, 74 Wn. 2d 355, 444 P.2d 867 (1968)

Authors

anon

Abstract

Informed that defendant had committed an abortion in his home, the police hired a female agent who made arrangements with the defendant by telephonic conversations, which were monitored and recorded. The agent, equipped with a hidden transmitter, kept her appointment and transmitted defendant's explanation of the abortion to the police, who again monitored and recorded the conversation. That evening she returned to defendant's home and paid the fee, and, as defendant prepared her for the operation, sent the conversation to monitoring police, who recorded it. All monitoring was done without prior court order. Just before the operation was to occur, the agent alerted the police, who then entered, seized the defendant's medical instruments, and arrested him. At trial, defendant was convicted of abortion and unlawful medical practice. On appeal to the Washington Supreme Court, Held: Recordings of the conversations, monitored in defendant's home, were properly admitted into evidence since, under existing United States Supreme Court decisions, there was no "search and seizure" of the conversations, and thus, even though the monitoring was undertaken without a warrant, there was no violation of defendant's rights under the fourth amendment. State v. Wright, 74 Wn. 2d 355, 444 P.2d 867 (1968).

First Page

411

Recommended Citation

anon, Recent Developments, Criminal Procedure—Search and Seizure—Electronic Eavesdropping—Abortion: Recording of Voluntary Conversation Between Police Agent and Defendant Admissible in Evidence.—State v. Wright, 74 Wn. 2d 355, 444 P.2d 867 (1968), 45 Wash. L. Rev. 411 (1970).
Available at: https://digitalcommons.law.uw.edu/wlr/vol45/iss2/9