United States, Petitioner v. Brima Wurie

Questions presented

SCOTUS records, cert granted 17 Jan 2014

Whether the Fourth Amendment permits the police, without obtaining a warrant, to review the call log of a cell phone found on a person who has been lawfully arrested.

Opinion summary

Etalia.ai summary of the majority opinion

The case involved the legality of warrantless searches of cell phones incident to arrest. Brima Wurie was arrested, and his flip phone was seized by police who noticed repeated calls from a number labeled 'my house.' Without obtaining a warrant, officers accessed call logs and traced the number to an address where they found drugs and firearms. The central issue was whether such searches violated the Fourth Amendment's protection against unreasonable searches and seizures. The Supreme Court ruled that searching digital information on a cell phone without a warrant is unconstitutional as it intrudes upon privacy interests far beyond those implicated in other physical object searches during arrests.