Reading A Search Warrant
SDCL § 23A-35-4 — searched within ten days, served in the daytime, notice before breaking in, and a copy and a receipt
Ten days, by day. A warrant commands the search within a specified period not to exceed ten days. It is served in the daytime unless the magistrate, for reasonable cause shown, authorizes it at night.
It identifies the property to be seized and names or describes the person or place to be searched, on probable cause set out in an affidavit.
Notice first. The officer may break open a building to execute the warrant after giving notice of authority and purpose and being refused admittance. A magistrate may excuse the notice only on probable cause that the evidence would be destroyed or someone endangered.
An officer taking property gives a copy of the warrant and a receipt, or leaves them at the place. The inventory is made under oath, and the magistrate delivers a copy on request.
How a warrant is served is also measured by the Fourth Amendment. The Supreme Court of the United States has held that whether officers knocked and announced their presence before entering is part of whether the entry was reasonable, and that the knock and announce principle forms part of that analysis rather than being a rigid rule without exceptions. Those holdings are a floor: a state's own constitution and statutes can give more protection than they do, never less.
Whether a particular warrant was valid is a question for a court and a licensed South Dakota attorney.
Sources for this section (5)
- SDCL § 23A-35-4 — Affidavits furnishing probable cause for warrant; Examination of witnesses by magistrate; Record of proceedings; Contents of warrant
- SDCL § 23A-35-8 — Breaking in to execute warrant after refusal of admittance; Liberation of person executing warrant
- SDCL § 23A-35-9 — Grounds for no-knock warrant; Powers of officer executing
- SDCL § 23A-35-10 — Receipt and copy of warrant given to person from whom property taken; Inventory filed with return of warrant; Copies of inventory
- Wilson v. Arkansas, 514 U.S. 927 (1995) — Knocking and announcing is part of whether an entry is reasonable
Legal information, not legal advice. Verified as of October 2026. Applying it to a particular situation is the work of a licensed South Dakota attorney.