Student phone searches at school
O. W. v. Carr
In brief
- Where it stands
- Dismissed
Petition denied.
- What it’s about
- O.W. asked the Supreme Court to review questions about school searches of a student’s phone, police questioning at school, a 13-year-old’s statements, and related legal issues.
- Who it affects
- O.W. received no Supreme Court review, and the Court issued no ruling on the questions raised in the petition.
Summary: written with AI from the case record.

What it's about
The Court refused to hear the case (denied review) and did not decide those questions.
O.W.’s petition also raised questions about a 13-year-old’s statements and other legal issues in the Fourth Circuit case.
Question presented
1. Whether, under the Fourth Amendment, a school official may search the digital contents of a student’s cellular phone without a warrant, probable cause, or consent. 2. Whether a school and police may, through a school resource officer partnership, conduct routine criminal investigations of students — searching and interrogating them — under the relaxed standards governing school discipline, rather than the Fourth, Fifth, and Fourteenth Amendment safeguards that would apply if law enforcement acted directly. 3. Whether a court assessing the voluntariness of a thirteen-year-old’s statements must account for the child’s age under J.D.B. v. North Carolina and this Court’s related juvenile precedents. 4. Whether the voluntariness of a confession, and the disputed historical facts underlying it, may be resolved at summary judgment, or must be submitted to a jury under the Seventh Amendment when those facts are genuinely disputed. 5. Whether the Fourth Circuit erred in requiring a § 1983 litigant to prove civil conspiracy by (1) direct proof of an express unlawful agreement and (2) “nefarious motive” of defendants. 6. Whether a court of appeals departs from its adjudicative role, and the principle of party presentation, when it formulates a general legal standard that no party advanced and applies it as the governing rule of decision.
Documents
Docket activity
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AI analysis generated: Case Briefing
AI analysis generated: Decision Record
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Brief added: Petition
Sources
Primary materials plus reporting. Best-effort analysis: this explainer relies on a mix of primary materials and trusted secondary sources. Official filings and opinions remain authoritative.