Read the full resource: Amicus Brief in Killgore v. City of South El Monte — Read the full resource: Amicus Brief in *Killgore v. City of South El Monte*

Amicus Brief in Killgore v. City of South El Monte re: "Pervasively Regulated" industries

Overview

The Policing Project filed an amicus brief in Killgore v. City of South El Monte urging the Ninth Circuit to reconsider the panel opinion and hear the case en banc. The brief addresses the "pervasively-regulated industry" doctrine--a narrow exception to the general rule that government officials must obtain a warrant before entering a business to conduct an administrative search. We argue that the panel's over-broad interpretation of the exception is contrary to Supreme Court precedent, and will effectively result in large swaths of the modern economy being stripped of core Fourth Amendment protections. A consequence of this erosion of privacy and property rights will be that police and other government agents will have largely unbridled discretion to select which businesses to search and when. This unchecked discretion can often lead to discrimination and arbitrariness: the very ills that motivated the founding generation to adopt the Fourth Amendment. The Ninth Circuit should vacate the panel's erroneous opinion, and conform its interpretation of the pervasively-regulated industry doctrine to Supreme Court precedent and Fourth Amendment values.