UT: Livestock inspector could enter open field

A state livestock inspector’s entry into an open field to inspect defendant’s cattle was into an open field and did not violate any rights of trespass under Jones. State v. Lamb, 2013 UT App 5, 725 Utah Adv. Rep. 15, 294 P.3d 639 (2013):

[*P16] We agree that the Fourth Amendment does not protect “open fields.” See Hester v. United States, 265 U.S. 57, 59, 44 S. Ct. 445, 68 L. Ed. 898 (1924) (“[T]he special protection accorded by the Fourth Amendment to the people in their ‘persons, houses, papers, and effects,’ is not extended to the open fields.”); see also [several cases involving livestock in fields]. As the State persuasively argues in its brief, “[w]hatever ‘open field’ means, the phrase surely applies to a field that is out in the open.”

[*P17] Even if it constituted a trespass, the State’s physical intrusion on an open field is of no Fourth Amendment significance. See United States v. Jones, 132 S. Ct. 945, 953, 181 L. Ed. 2d 911 (2012) (“Quite simply, an open field, unlike the curtilage of a home, is not one of those protected areas enumerated in the Fourth Amendment.” (citation omitted)); see also Casey v. State, 87 Nev. 413, 488 P.2d 546, 547-48 (Nev. 1971) (citing cases demonstrating that open fields remain unprotected under the Fourth Amendment, even when fenced, or posted with “no trespassing” signs, and regardless of plain view). Accordingly, any authorization that section 4-24-28 gives to search an open field does not raise constitutional concerns.

[*P18] Lamb does not argue that the property where the stolen cattle were found was something other than an open field. As a result, the trial court correctly concluded that “there was not a search in this case proscribed by the Fourth Amendment because … the acts of the brand inspectors occurred in an open field where [Lamb] had no reasonable expectation of privacy.” Thus, the trial court properly denied Lamb’s motion to suppress.