Legal Question in Civil Rights Law in Washington

Re: Unlawful Detainment by Security Guard

Private security personnel currently outnumber police officers in the United States by three to one. As a result, whether you're shopping in a supermarket or a pharmacy, working in an office building, or visiting a friend in a housing project, you may be more likely to be confronted by a security guard than by a police officer. At the present time, the Fourth Amendment does not apply to searches carried out by non-governmental employees like private security guards.

Here unfortunately, based on your facts, the store security guard was acting on a pure hunch when he made the search of your person. Thereafter, the guard found the incriminating evidence. The "private" guard could then legally detain you, call the police, and arguably turn the incriminating evidence over to a police officer. The evidence is deemed admissible because the search was conducted by a private security guard. However, you could feasibly argue in defense that you were orignally falsely held without reasonable suspicion or probable cause, and for an unreasonable amount of time prior to the evidence being discovered by the private security guard at issue. This would arguably be "false imprisonment", and further, as a matter law, argue that historically private security guards are increasingly exercising more traditional police functions, and that they should now be held to the same "search standards" since they perform their duties "under the color of government" moreso now in today's society than maybe they once did in the past. Thus, the evidence under the factual circumstances herein was obtained illegally, by analogy, and should be properly suppressed.