The Doctrine: Sullano v. People (2021)
The Supreme Court ruled that for the “Plain View” doctrine to justify a warrantless seizure, the legal justification for the initial intrusion must be valid. If the police are in a place where they have no right to be, anything they see is “fruit of the poisonous tree.”
The 3 Requisites for Plain View (As applied in Sullano):
Prior Valid Intrusion: The law enforcement officer must have a prior justification for an intrusion or must be in a position from which he can view a particular area.
Inadvertent Discovery: The discovery of the evidence in plain view must be inadvertent (not planned or sought out).
Immediately Apparent: It must be immediately apparent to the officer that the item he observes may be evidence of a crime, contraband, or otherwise subject to seizure.
