Geofence Warrants Implicate but May Not Violate Fourth Amendment Rights

With all of the decisions from the United States Supreme Court released at the end of the October 2025 Term, there is one case involving Fourth Amendment rights that is worthy of note. In Chatrie v. United States, No. 25-112 (June 29, 2025) the Court held that individuals have a reasonable expectation of privacy in cell-phone location data but then remanded the case to the Fourth Circuit to determine if the warrant was based on probable cause.  It seems that individuals were given at least half a loaf but maybe not.

The Court found that there was a search and Chatrie’s Fourth Amendment right to privacy was involved. So far so good.  However, the Court remanded the case for a determination as to whether or not the geofence warrant satisfied the Fourth Amendment’s requirements of particularity and probable cause for the issuance by a neutral and detached magistrate.    In other words, the Court left it for the court below to determine whether “probable cause  [was] properly established and the scope of the authorized warrant [was] set out with particularity” even though, by their nature, geofence warrants invade the privacy of random individuals.

Aside from the bizarre mechanisms of the three-step warrant in this case (which seemed to leave discretion to define the search in the hands of police not the magistrate), the Court seemed to agree that random individuals who find themselves within a location adjacent to a crime scene may be subject to search of their location data and other information without a particularized judicial finding.  The Court could have held that geofence searches are unlawful general searches. It could have given meaning to the reasonable expectation of privacy in cell-phone location data it said was possessed by the general public.  But the Court did not.  I am not sure this is even a half a loaf.