With respect to the 4th ammendment, briefly explain the following Essay

With respect to the 4th ammendment, briefly explain the following concepts, in doing so be sure to present the respective cases - Essay Example In the landmark case of Silverthorne Lumber Co. v. United States [1920], Federal agents that illegally seized tax books of a suspect and made copies as records of tax evasion. The Court held that such illegal seizure circumvented the Fourth Amendment, and that the records made are fruits from the poisonous tree (illegal seizure of tax books), hence may not be considered in court. However, under the independent source doctrine evidence that is obtained based upon information unrelated to an unlawful search is not fruit of the poisonous tree. In the case of Segura v. United States (1984), law enforcers entered the private premises of the suspect and remained in there until the search warrant arrived. The Supreme Court admitted the evidence found after the search warrant arrived but excluded all others as upon entry without the warrant. The Court held that the question on the legality of entry was irrelevant to challenge the admissibility of evidence due to the independent source of the warrant. In the case of United States v. Leon (1984), a police officer that relied on a defective search warrant with no knowledge of the validity of the basis for how it was obtained was said to have acted in good faith, and the evidence obtained from such defective search warrant was allowed in Court.

Effective Bookkeeping Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Effective Bookkeeping - Essay Example A failure to keep books properly can have very real ramifications for a school, a district, and the workers in it: it could cause intense scandal and cost people jobs and the district money. Furthermore, regular audits are done to ensure that all moneys are accounted for in reasonable ways, meaning that mistakes will get found and will have real consequences for everyone in the chain of bookkeeping, which could possibly include dismissal. It is difficult to overemphasize the importance of proper bookkeeping. This will simply serve as a refresher, please remember that the full description of appropriate policies and legislation relating to school accounting can be found in the Tennessee Internal School Uniform Accounting Policy Manual. There are several things that can lead to effective bookkeeping, and it is firstly important to emphasize basic and fundamental general rules before moving on to the specifics. Firstly, a record keeping must be orderly and complete. Any transaction incl uding school funds should be kept in a safe location, organized by date and able to be recalled at will. Secondly, transparency is of fundamental importance. If anything does seem to be amiss, it is my responsibility as principle to immediately notify a superior, and thus it is your responsibility to immediately notify me. ... These include funds of a variety of sources, including rental fees for non-district use of school property, student activity fees, donations, and even including cafeteria money. One of the most important and sometimes irking aspects of accounting is that specific fees sometimes need to be assigned to specific tasks, and cannot be used for other tasks. A school’s general fund, which constitutes money gained for the operation of a school, for instance, are only allowed to be use to supplement and not to replace the obligations of the school board, for instance. This means that while the general fund should not be used for school repairs, for instance, which are the responsibility of the district. Thus it is important to keep auditors happy and the whole process smooth that we be very conservative when administering funds, keeping careful track of the money flow and be able to demonstrate that moneys collected under one fund, the general fund, for instance, are not used in inappr opriate, or even seemingly inappropriate ways. Thus, it is incredibly important to keep strong firewalls between different kinds of funds used by the school, and flag any funds that might transfer between the two. Finally, it is of the greatest importance that enough internal controls are in place to ensure that the school is not damaged or defrauded, and that moneys are not misused. There can be very serious consequences from lack internal controls, including bank deposits being stolen, money being diverted for internal use, and so forth. This means things discussed above such as physical control of records, but also daily tallying of cash flows in and out (in cafeterias, and with cash registers, for instance) as well as ensuring proper security