Supreme Court hears Chatrie geofence warrant case

The Supreme Court heard two hours of oral arguments on April 27, 2026, in Chatrie v. United States, a case challenging the constitutionality of geofence warrants — law enforcement demands to Google's Sensorvault database identifying all device users near a crime scene during a specific time window. Virginia man Okello Chatrie was convicted of a 2019 bank robbery after police used a geofence warrant to identify 19 devices near the bank, then narrowed the list to obtain his identity. Justices appeared divided, with some seeking a narrow ruling specific to geofence procedures and others pressing on the broader Fourth Amendment question of whether mass location data requests constitute a search requiring probable cause.