Supreme Court Limits Warrantless Geofence Searches
The Supreme Court ruled 6-3 in Chatrie v. United States that law enforcement must generally obtain warrants before conducting broad geofence searches of cell phone location data at crime scenes. The decision addresses how Fourth Amendment protections apply to digital records that can show where smartphone users have been.
The case arose from the 2019 robbery of a Virginia bank. Investigators obtained a warrant seeking location information from devices near the bank around the time of the crime. The search, which created a virtual boundary around the area, helped identify Okello T. Chatrie as a suspect. Chatrie was later convicted, but his attorneys argued that the government’s request collected an overly broad set of data and violated protections against unreasonable searches and seizures.
The Justice Department argued that police did not need a warrant to review anonymized location records, particularly because users had allowed companies such as Google and Apple to collect that information. A majority of the Court rejected that position. Writing for the majority, Justice Elena Kagan said individuals have a reasonable expectation of privacy in records showing their phones’ locations, even when those records are held by a third-party technology company and cover a limited period. Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Ketanji Brown Jackson, Brett Kavanaugh and Neil Gorsuch joined the outcome, though Gorsuch did not fully adopt the majority’s reasoning.
The ruling comes as smartphones routinely collect location information through apps and services, including navigation platforms. Users may be able to view, change or delete some location records, but investigators have sought such data from several technology companies.
The Court did not decide whether the specific warrant in Chatrie’s case was valid. It sent that question back to an appeals court for further review and legal proceedings.