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U.S. Const. amend. IV — the warrant, and its exceptions at home

Police need a warrant to enter your home. Exceptions: clear consent, hot pursuit, exigent circumstances, plain view.

  • Payton v. New York
  • U.S. Const. amend. IV
  • Ohio Const. art. I, § 14
  • ORC 2933.21
  • ORC 2935.12
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Who handles this in Ohio: legal aid programs, lawyer referral and the state offices, listed in the Ohio directory.

Words some people use here. Nothing requires them.
“I do not consent to a search of my home, do you have a warrant.”
  • Payton v. New York
  • U.S. Const. amend. IV

This is the doorway, not the whole chapter. The exceptions that let police in without a warrant, who can let them in, and what a warrant has to say are each their own section here, and none of them answers whether a particular entry was lawful. That is a suppression question decided on a record.

Sources for this section (6)
  1. U.S. Const. amend. IV — Searches and seizures
  2. Ohio Const. art. I, § 14 — Search warrants and general warrants
  3. Payton v. New York, 445 U.S. 573 (1980) — Warrantless entry into a home to make a routine arrest is barred
  4. ORC 2933.21 — Search warrants, when issued
  5. ORC 2935.12 — Forcible entry in making an arrest or executing a search warrant
  6. Ohio Crim.R. 12 — Pretrial motions, including motions to suppress evidence

Legal information, not legal advice. Verified as of September 2026. Applying it to a particular situation is the work of a licensed Ohio attorney.

From here

Walked through

This section is the long version of a step in 2 walkthroughs. Each one takes the same law one decision at a time, with both sides of the moment written out.