Knock-and-announce

[6] However, in Wilson v. Arkansas (1995) the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that a knock-and-announce before entry was a factor that must be considered in reviewing the overall constitutionality of a Fourth Amendment search.

[7] After several state attempts[citation needed] to exclude specific categories (e.g. drug crimes) from the knock-and-announce rule, the Supreme Court in Richards v. Wisconsin prohibited the policy, and demanded a return to a case-by-case review scenario.

That is primarily because the goals served by a knock-and-announce policy tend to be lesser than other requirements, such as the warrant requirement, of a valid Fourth Amendment search, but the latter is to protect a reasonable expectation of privacy in a person's body, papers, and effects (among other things), the knock-and-announce rule is designed only to provide a brief moment of privacy for an individual to compose themself before a valid search occurs, to prevent an individual from mistakenly believing that police are common intruders and thus endangering them and to prevent property damage from a forcible entry.

[19] Because police with probable cause and a valid warrant are already entitled to an entry and search, violation of the simple knock-and-announce rule has not been deemed grave enough in the federal courts or in most states to justify suppression of the evidence.

[citation needed] In July 2020, the podcast Criminal released an episode called "Knock and Announce" about the 2015 police raid on Julian Betton's apartment in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.