[4] In the 1950s the Supreme Court of the United States addressed for the first time whether the constitution permits law enforcement to forcibly extract evidence from inside the human body.

[2] The first case to address this question, Rochin v. California, set strict limits on the power of police to remove evidence from inside the human body.

[5] In Rochin, police officers broke into the home of an individual who was suspected of selling narcotics and observed him place several small capsules into his mouth.

[9] In a unanimous decision, the United States Supreme Court held the forced stomach pumping violated the suspect's Fourteenth Amendment rights to substantive due process.

[10] Writing for the majority, Justice Felix Frankfurter stated: [W]e are compelled to conclude that the proceedings by which this conviction was obtained do more than offend some fastidious squeamishness or private sentimentalism about combatting crime too energetically.

Illegally breaking into the privacy of the petitioner, the struggle to open his mouth and remove what was there, the forcible extraction of his stomach's contents — this course of proceeding by agents of government to obtain evidence is bound to offend even hardened sensibilities.

[12] Likewise, the Court left unanswered the question of whether evidence obtained through involuntary blood samples violates the Fifth Amendment's privilege against self incrimination.

[18] He then filed an appeal with the Supreme Court of the United States, claiming the taking of the blood sample violated his rights to substantive due process.

"[25] However, Justice Clark also cautioned in dicta that "indiscriminate taking of blood under different conditions or by those not competent to do so" may rise to the level of "brutality" set forth in Rochin.

[34] Justice Douglas also advocated for an expansive interpretation of the right against self incrimination, and that "under our system of government, police cannot compel people to furnish the evidence necessary to send them to prison.