California v. Greenwood VI

Greenwood did not win his case for one key reason. One cannot place trash out onto a public street, open to any passer-byes, with an expectation that it will not be looked through. Especially with Greenwood's drug trafficking, he should have known better than to place evidence-containing trash outside of his home. "Finding the probable cause to search the house would not have existed without the evidence obtained from the trash searches, the State Superior Court dismissed the charges under People v. Krivda, 5 Cal.3d 357, 486 P.2d 1262, which held that warrantless trash searches violate the Fourth Amendment and the California Constitution. Although noting a post-Krivda state constitutional amendment eliminating the exclusionary rule for evidence seized in volation of state, but not federal law, the State Court of Appeal affirmed on the ground that Krivda was based on federal, as well as state, law." - http://www.fightidentitytheft.com/shred_supreme_court.html

"The court stated that 'the police cannot reasonably be expected to avert their eyes from evidence of criminal activity that could have been observed by any member of the public.' So the court decided that even though Greenwood had subjective expectation of privacy in those bags, this privacy was not objectively reasonable." - http://www.4lawschool.com/greenwood.htm