United States v. Miller
425 U.S. 435 (1976)
Premium Feature
Subscribe to Lexplug to listen to the Case Podcast.
Rule of Law:
A bank depositor has no legitimate Fourth Amendment expectation of privacy in financial information voluntarily conveyed to and held by their financial institution. Therefore, financial records held by a bank are not a depositor's 'private papers' and can be obtained by the government through a subpoena issued to the bank without violating the depositor's constitutional rights.
Facts:
- In response to an informant's tip regarding an illegal distillery, a Houston County, Georgia, deputy sheriff stopped a van occupied by two of Mitch Miller's alleged co-conspirators, which contained distillery equipment.
- Shortly thereafter, a fire broke out in a warehouse rented to Miller, where firefighters and sheriff's officials discovered a large distillery, 175 gallons of non-tax-paid whiskey, and related paraphernalia.
- Federal Treasury agents, investigating Miller for tax and conspiracy violations, presented grand jury subpoenas to the presidents of two banks where Miller maintained accounts.
- The subpoenas demanded the production of all records related to Miller's accounts for a specified period.
- The banks complied with the subpoenas without notifying Miller, making microfilm records available to the agents and providing copies of checks, deposit slips, financial statements, and monthly statements.
- The government used the information from the bank records as investigatory leads and introduced copies of the checks at trial to establish overt acts in the alleged conspiracy.
Procedural Posture:
- Mitch Miller was indicted for federal alcohol tax violations and conspiracy in the U.S. District Court.
- Prior to trial, Miller filed a motion to suppress copies of his bank records, arguing they were obtained with defective subpoenas in violation of his Fourth Amendment rights.
- The District Court denied the motion to suppress.
- The evidence was admitted at trial, and Miller was convicted.
- Miller (as appellant) appealed his conviction to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.
- The Court of Appeals (with the United States as appellee) reversed the conviction, holding that a depositor's Fourth Amendment rights are violated when bank records are obtained via a defective subpoena.
- The United States (as petitioner) petitioned the Supreme Court of the United States for a writ of certiorari, which was granted.
Premium Content
Subscribe to Lexplug to view the complete brief
You're viewing a preview with Rule of Law, Facts, and Procedural Posture
Issue:
Does a bank depositor have a protected Fourth Amendment interest in financial records, such as checks and deposit slips, maintained by their bank, making the government's acquisition of these records through a subpoena an unconstitutional search or seizure?
Opinions:
Majority - Mr. Justice Powell
No. A bank depositor does not have a protected Fourth Amendment interest in financial records maintained by a bank. The subpoenaed documents are not the depositor's private papers but are the business records of the bank, to which the depositor can assert neither ownership nor possession. By voluntarily conveying information to the banks and their employees in the ordinary course of business, the depositor knowingly exposes that information and assumes the risk that it will be conveyed to the government. This 'third-party doctrine' means there is no legitimate expectation of privacy in the contents of checks, deposit slips, or financial statements held by a bank, and thus no Fourth Amendment interest is implicated by a subpoena to the bank for those records.
Dissenting - Mr. Justice Brennan
Yes. A bank depositor has a reasonable expectation of privacy in their financial records that is protected by the Fourth Amendment. Participation in modern economic life requires a bank account, making the disclosure of financial information to a bank practically non-volitional. The totality of these records provides a 'virtual current biography,' revealing a person's affairs, opinions, and associations, and a depositor reasonably expects this information will remain confidential absent compulsion by proper legal process. The court should follow the reasoning of the California Supreme Court in Burrows v. Superior Court, which found a similar privacy right under its state constitution.
Dissenting - Mr. Justice Marshall
Yes. A depositor's Fourth Amendment rights are violated because the Bank Secrecy Act's recordkeeping requirement itself constitutes a seizure of a customer's records without a warrant or probable cause. The Act is unconstitutional because it forces banks to create and maintain records of their customers' private transactions for the government's benefit. Since the Act is unconstitutional, the government cannot rely on records kept pursuant to it in a criminal prosecution, and the evidence obtained in this case should be suppressed.
Analysis:
This case firmly established the 'third-party doctrine' under the Fourth Amendment, significantly narrowing the scope of individual privacy rights. The holding that individuals lose their expectation of privacy in information voluntarily shared with a third party has had profound implications, particularly in the digital age. This precedent has been applied to government access to telephone records, internet data, and other information held by commercial entities, creating an ongoing tension between law enforcement needs and privacy concerns that Congress and state legislatures have sometimes addressed through statutory protections where the Constitution does not apply.
Unlock the full brief for United States v. Miller