Hudson County Criminal Lawyer Blog
The United States Constitution, through the Fourth Amendment, protects against unreasonable searches and seizures by the government. Article I, Paragraph 7 of the New Jersey Constitution, however, provides even greater protections against these unreasonable searches and seizures.
Evidence obtained in violation of these constitutional protections is usually inadmissible as per the exclusionary rule. The “Fruit of the Poisonous Tree” is a legal metaphor used to describe such illegally gathered evidence and the inadmissibility of any additional evidence derived from it.
On November 3, 2021 the Appellate Division of the Superior Court of New Jersey addressed the appropriate remedy for such unreasonable searches and seizures in State v. Caronna and State v. Collado.