Entick v Carrington [1765] EWHC KB J98; 95 ER 807
Trespass, executive search warrants and the need for lawful authority to enter private premises and seize papers.
Facts
On 11 November 1762, Nathan Carrington and three other King’s messengers entered John Entick’s home under a warrant issued by the Earl of Halifax, a Secretary of State. Entick was suspected of involvement in writing allegedly seditious editions of The Monitor, or British Freeholder.
The warrant directed the messengers to apprehend Entick and bring him, together with his books and papers, before Halifax. The messengers spent four hours in the house, searching rooms, a bureau, a writing desk and drawers, reading papers and taking away some books and papers. They entered through an open outer door and did not take a constable with them as the warrant required. They delivered the seized material to Halifax’s law clerk.
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Entick sued the messengers in trespass. The jury returned a special verdict setting out its findings and leaving the court to determine the legal justification. It assessed £300 damages if the court found for Entick. The £2,000 stated in his declaration was the sum he claimed, not the jury’s award.
Issues
Could the Secretary of State lawfully authorise this entry, search and seizure? Did the established practice of issuing similar warrants supply the necessary authority? The messengers also claimed the protection of the Justices Protection Act 1751, relying on Entick’s failure to satisfy its procedural requirements.
Decision
The court gave judgment for Entick. It held the warrant wholly unlawful and void, and rejected the messengers’ statutory defence. Acting under a Secretary of State’s warrant did not justify a trespass where the warrant itself lacked legal authority.
Reasoning
The search required a legal basis
The court treated entry onto another person’s property without permission as a trespass unless justified by law, even where no physical damage resulted. The government’s interest in investigating a suspected libel did not itself provide that justification.
The breadth of the power claimed was significant. The warrant allowed officers to examine and seize private papers before any hearing or proof that Entick had written the alleged libels. It exposed personal and valuable documents to removal without the safeguards that the court associated with recognised search powers.
Official practice did not create the missing power
The defendants relied on the issuing of similar warrants since the Revolution of 1688. The court rejected the suggestion that the modern practice of a government office could, by itself, establish a common-law power to enter homes and seize papers. The absence of earlier successful challenges did not make the practice lawful.
The analogy with warrants for stolen goods also failed. Those warrants belonged to a recognised legal process and were subject to safeguards concerning the alleged theft and the place to be searched. They did not establish a general authority to seize someone’s private papers in a libel investigation. If the legislature wished to authorise the claimed power, it could enact a law to do so.
The statutory defence was unavailable
The court held that a Secretary of State acting in that capacity, and the messengers executing his warrant, did not come within the protection claimed under the 1751 Act. It also noted their departures from the warrant’s directions, including proceeding without a constable and taking the material to the law clerk rather than Halifax.
The decision rested on the absence of lawful authority for this interference with Entick’s property. It was not a rule that officials could never enter private premises: the essential question was whether the law authorised the particular action.
