An acquaintance of mine, who I'll say off the bat is a pathological
liar, told me a story I don't believe.  He says he was at home, and he
had a seizure.  His roommate called 911.  The police showed up and
ramsacked his apartment looking for drugs.

Would the police show up if someone called 911 to report an illness,
even if it was a seizure?  My brother was epileptic and he once had a
seizure when the two of us were alone.  I called 911 and no cops
showed up, only an ambulance.  A few years ago, I was at work, and a
customer collapsed.  Again, I called 911 and no cops showed up.

If he did have a seizure, and if the cops did come and look around his
apartment to see if he had taken some drug that was causing the
seizure, and they found something, could they use it in court against
him?  Is having a seizure probably cause to conduct a search for drugs
without a search warrant?

I am in Pennsylvania, if that matters.

Dear baerana-ga;

Thank you for allowing me an opportunity to answer your interesting
question. You question requires a great deal of speculation about
hypothetical situations and we do not offer legal advice in this forum
but as a 20+ year member of law enforcement myself I can give you some
insight into some probable scenarios.

It would not be uncommon in my experience for the police to go to the
scene of an ambulance call if (a) the ambulance personnel requested
assistance because the neighborhood was not safe of they feared
something else (b) the ambulance call was related to a potential drug
overdose or (c) attempted suicide.

While there, if necessary, officers might assist medical personnel in
trying to locate medications or other substances which might have
caused the seizure or may even perform a cursory search of the area
for evidence if the incident ended up being self-inflicted. In some
instances when a resident is removed from an apartment due to medical
necessity, officers might perform a cursory inventory of an apartment
before locking it behind them.

In any of these situations, if an officer, acting in good faith
(assisting medical personnel) saw illegal drugs or indeed any other
illegal substance or object, YES, he COULD use this as evidence
against the homeowner. This is known as the PLAIN VIEW DOCTRINE.

PLAIN VIEW DOCTRINE
http://www.csudh.edu/dearhabermas/plainv.htm

Now, in order to qualify as evidence the officer will be required
under this doctrine to show the court that his discovery of the
evidence was inadvertent, in other words, he didn?t go looking for it,
that he didn?t excessively intrude on order to obtain the evidence,
that he had the authority to be in proximity of the evidence (for
medical assist or whatever reason), and that he the evidence was
readily recognizable as being illegal.

Having a seizure, in itself, is not a valid reason for police to
search for illegal drugs without a warrant. It is, however, in some
instances, reason to look for evidence during an overdose or attempted
suicide investigation. A warrant isn?t needed because emergency
personnel are summoned to the location and, for all intents and
purposes, invited in. Once in, they can do things they normally would
not be allowed to do had they arrived without cause. If, in whatever
capacity and scope the police were acting within their authority, they
observe or discover contraband, it can be seized and used as evidence
in a criminal proceeding. Emptying drawers and trashing closets though
usually aren?t acceptable practices within this ?assisting? scope.
This leads me to believe that the story you have told may have been
embellished or was perhaps incomplete (whether intentionally or
unintentionally on the part of your friend).

I can?t say of course that these officers didn?t do what your friend
says they did ? stranger things have happened and no one would be
terribly shocked if they did ? but IF they did, they probably had a
reason OR ? and this is VERY important -  there?s possibly more to
this story that he isn?t sharing with you or DOESN?T KNOW HIMSELF. On
the other hand, if they did it and they HAD NO valid reason, your
friend has a cut-and-dried civil case in my opinion and a clever
attorney would probably say that he may not have to worry about making
his rent payments for a long, long time, not to mention of course that
any evidence obtained against him could theoretically be suppressed
and/or any subsequent criminal charges reduced or dropped.

The fact remains that not enough is truly known about what the police
did (if anything) and why they did it (if they did). I suspect that if
they did search for drugs (legally or illegally) your friend will find
out "why" soon enough.

Below you will find that I have carefully defined my search strategy
for you in the event that you need to search for more information. By
following the same type of searches that I did you may be able to
enhance the research I have provided even further. I hope you find
that my research exceeds your expectations. If you have any questions
about my research please post a clarification request prior to rating
the answer. Otherwise, I welcome your rating and your final comments
and I look forward to working with you again in the near future. Thank
you for bringing your question to us.

Best regards;
Tutuzdad ? Google Answers Researcher


INFORMATION SOURCES

PLAIN VIEW DOCTRINE
http://www.csudh.edu/dearhabermas/plainv.htm


SEARCH STRATEGY


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SEARCH TERMS USED:

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Search

Plain view doctrine

well-written and informative, complete answer

In our town, the police almost always arrive for a medical emergency
911 call.  The reasons given are several.
--They have some basic first aid training
--They are already on the street, and invariably can get there first
--They can give an evaluation as to the level of the emergency,
perhaps calling for more (or less) response than the standard level.