House Parties: Backyard Fun, Answering the Door, and Undercover Guests

Off-campus block and house parties are as much a part of the full Fling experience as fried oreos or inevitably complaining about the unworthiness of the headlining band.  Here, we’ll discuss the bread and butter of your legal concerns at Fling:  how to manage a house party in such a way as to keep out unwarranted police attention, and how to respond if cops, uniformed or undercover, try to enter your private residence.  We’ll first discuss some more obvious tips for not garnering police attention, and then move on to properly responding to the cops if they do start bothering you.  

Be aware, cops will lie, sneak, and intimidate to get you to admit to a crime to facilitate arrest and prosecution. In many situations, the correct response is to know your rights and argue your position in court; if you have handled yourself properly, you should be in the legal right.  Do not cite your rights and relevant court cases while interacting with police, as that will encourage them to be more careful and limit your ability to protect yourself. It will also unnecessarily antagonize the officers which will make your situation even more difficult.  Be polite, cooperative within the limitations outlined below, and truthful if you choose to speak.  

Tips for Beginners

Uniformed officers can show up at your house under the pretense of noise complaints, drinking in public on the street outside of it, or if they become aware of “word of mouth” about an open party at your address.  You can’t avoid the last one if you’re actually throwing a party, but you can avoid the other situations by limiting your drinking and speaker setups to indoors or back yards.  

-If you have neighbors who have reported you in the past, talk with them about a possible resolution.  

-Solo cups on your front porch are an obvious no-no if you have underage drinking on your premises, as well as generally drunk crowds on your front lawn.  Occasionally, a back yard will count as public view if the alleyway situation is right, so make sure that if your situation is questionable or your party big enough, you’ve posted doormen at all entrances and are generally avoiding a public view of your guests.  

-If your party is big enough that you don’t know all of your guests, you can have a doorman search guests under the pretense of looking for weapons or unsafe items.  While the doorman can’t say he’s looking for undercover cops (as that would provoke suspicion), he can search in a cursory manner for cop-related items such as badges, breathalyzers, or guns.  Requiring a PennCard for party admission seems to be out as a viable strategy, as officers used PennCards to enter parties during Fling 2013.

Uniformed Officers Arrive Outside

If uniformed officers show up at your party, you and your guests are still ok provided that you are clearly separated from them, that is, that your party is well contained within the premises and you are interacting with them outside.  

-As recommended by this (mostly) helpful site, you should have a friend come outside with you as a witness to all statements made in case the officers escalate the situation.  

-While you are interacting with the cops outside, you should have the people inside the party turn down the music and hide all possible incriminating evidence from plain view.  This means, take all the underage partiers and drug paraphernalia upstairs, into locked rooms if you can.  If the cops ask you for your consent to open up those rooms, you can say, “I do not consent.”   If they say, you must comply, then you must open up the rooms.  However, if you did not consent, then the evidence that they collect from those rooms will almost certainly be inadmissible because they did not have search warrants or probable cause.   

-Much like vampires, cops can’t just come into your home unless invited.  If officers knock on your door and ask you questions, respond in a truthful and limited manner.

• If they ask, “Is there a party here?”, respond something along the lines of “I have a few friends over.”  Don’t say no, and don’t lie.
• If they ask to come in for any reason say, “I’m sorry officer, I don’t consent to having my property searched.”  Anything they threaten after that, fines, noise complaints, is a bluff.  Be polite, but continue to refuse.  If they say that you are required to comply, then you are required to comply, as discussed previously.  Clarify that they are no longer asking for your permission, but are requiring you to comply. Then, almost always anything they collect will be inadmissible in court for the reasons discussed in the previous bullet point.  

-Cops can only enter your home, if not invited in, if

• They determine someone in the house is in immediate danger.
• They determine evidence is in danger of being destroyed.
• They determine that a suspect is in danger of escaping.

All of these require probable cause, which they cannot obtain if you respond carefully and your guests are not in public view.  

-Hotel rooms and rental/sublet properties are still afforded the same expectations of privacy, since you pay money to live there and continue to live there.  

Officers (Plainclothes or Undercover) Enter Your Home

This is the most delicate situation, and the one in which you may need to be willing to go to court.  The officers will try to isolate and intimidate you and your friends to seek an admission of guilt out of fear of arrest.  However, the Constitution and several recent court cases are on your side.  Once again, do not lie, and do not admit to any crimes.  

-You are only required to provide verbal identification to police.  You are not required to state your age, or produce a state-issued identification card.  Under no circumstance should you present an officer with a fake ID. Instead, keep in mind that if there is probable cause that you committed a crime, the police can still only frisk you for the sole purpose of finding weapons (Terry v. Ohio). This is for the safety of the police officer and even then he has to have reasonable suspicion that you could be carrying a weapon.  Should they forcibly go into your wallet to procure your ID, that’s favorable for you, as it is inadmissible in court.

-Silence is not considered indicative of guilt.  If an officer asks you a question which you do not want to answer, you can remain silent as is your right under the 5th Amendment.  In this situation, officers may try to intimidate you, so remain consistent in your behavior and do not cave in.  

-Being drunk in a private setting in of itself is not a crime.  It is a crime if you are under 21. However, the police are limited in their options.

• If cops ask you how old you are, just politely ask if you are free to go.  
• If you say something along the lines of, “I have to go now, I’m going home to the quad,” that will provide the cops with reasonable suspicion that you aren’t 21.  Don’t do that.  
• Simply being at a party does not constitute reasonable suspicion or probable cause, as most recently upheld in Commonwealth v. Mistler.  The cops cannot detain every person at the party and then later separate them by age.  The underage drinkers in this case were considered unconstitutionally detained and the results of their breathalyzer tests were considered inadmissible.  If the cops do not let you leave, they are risking setting up this situation again.  Again, simply ask if you are free to go, don’t ask more and don’t bring up legal precedent.
• As the wonderful people at Fairlie Law have emphasized, a very recent court case in Pennsylvania, Commonwealth v. Brigidi, has established legal precedent that most hand-held breathalyzer test results are inadmissible.  For a breathalyzer result to be admissible, each test must be properly calibrated and administered with the same device and standards that are commonly used for things like DUIs, for example.  It’s unlikely that BCLE officers will be able to properly do this on the scale of the entire party, so it’s likely that your personal test will be deemed inadmissible.  

This post was extra long, but we only write more because we care.  Read carefully, feel free to post questions, know your rights, and party on.  

Cheers,

-BW & TR