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US Supreme Court Fucks the Constitution (again . . .)

LeeROI

Member
Supreme Court OKs warrantless searches
The Supreme Court on Monday gave police more leeway to break into homes or apartments in search of illegal drugs when they suspect the evidence might be destroyed.

By Tribune Washington bureau and The New York Times


WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Monday gave police more leeway to break into homes or apartments in search of illegal drugs when they suspect the evidence might be destroyed.

The justices said officers who smell marijuana and loudly knock on the door may break in if they hear sounds that suggest the residents are scurrying to hide the drugs.

Residents who "attempt to destroy evidence have only themselves to blame" when police burst in, Justice Samuel Alito said for an 8-1 majority.

In dissent, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg wrote that she feared the ruling in a Kentucky case had handed the police an important new tool.

"The court today arms the police with a way routinely to dishonor the Fourth Amendment's warrant requirement in drug cases," Ginsburg wrote. "In lieu of presenting their evidence to a neutral magistrate, police officers may now knock, listen, then break the door down, never mind that they had ample time to obtain a warrant."

She said the Fourth Amendment's "core requirement" is that officers have probable cause and a search warrant before they break into a house.

"How 'secure' do our homes remain if police, armed with no warrant, can pound on doors at will and ... forcibly enter?" Ginsburg asked.

An expert on criminal searches agreed, saying the decision would encourage police to undertake "knock and talk" raids.

"I'm surprised the Supreme Court would condone this, that if the police hear suspicious noises inside, they can break in," said John Wesley Hall, a criminal-defense lawyer in Little Rock, Ark. "I'm even more surprised that nearly all of them went along."

The court in the past has insisted that homes are special preserves. As Alito said, the Fourth Amendment "has drawn a firm line at the entrance to the house." One exception to the search-warrant rule involves an emergency, such as screams coming from a house. Police also may pursue a fleeing suspect who enters a residence.

The Kentucky case arose from a mistake. After seeing a drug deal in a parking lot, Lexington police officers rushed into an apartment complex looking for a suspect who had sold cocaine to an informant.

But the smell of burning marijuana led them to the wrong apartment. After knocking and announcing themselves, they heard sounds that they said made them fear that evidence was being destroyed. They kicked the door in and found marijuana and cocaine but not the original suspect.

The Kentucky Supreme Court suppressed the evidence, saying any risk of drugs being destroyed was the result of the decision by police to knock and announce themselves rather than obtain a warrant.

The U.S. Supreme Court reversed that decision Monday, saying police had acted lawfully and that was all that mattered. The defendant, Hollis D. King, had choices other than destroying evidence, Alito wrote.

King could have chosen not to respond to the knocking in any fashion, Alito wrote. Or he could have come to the door and declined to let the officers enter without a warrant.

Alito took pains to say the majority was not deciding whether an emergency justifying an exception to the warrant requirement — an "exigent circumstance," in legal jargon — existed. He said the Kentucky Supreme Court "expressed doubt on this issue" and that "any question about whether an exigency actually existed is better addressed" by the state court.

All the U.S. Supreme Court decided, Alito wrote, was when evidence must be suppressed because police had created the exigency. Lower courts had approached that question in five ways.

The standard announced Monday, Alito wrote, had the virtue of simplicity.

"Where, as here, the police did not create the exigency by engaging or threatening to engage in conduct that violates the Fourth Amendment," he wrote, "warrantless entry to prevent the destruction of evidence is reasonable and thus allowed."

But "there is a strong argument," Alito added, that evidence would have to be suppressed when police did more than knock and announce themselves. In general, he wrote, "the exigent circumstances rule should not apply where the police, without a warrant or any legally sound basis for a warrantless entry, threaten that they will enter without permission unless admitted."

Ginsburg, dissenting, said the majority had taken a wrong turn.

"The urgency must exist, I would rule," she wrote, "when the police come on the scene, not subsequent to their arrival, prompted by their own conduct."

The ruling was not a final loss for King. The justices said the Kentucky state court should consider again whether police faced an emergency situation in this case.
 

Bulénath

Member
Supreme Court OKs More Warrantless Searches

Supreme Court OKs More Warrantless Searches

Anyone mention this yet?

http://www.npr.org/2011/05/16/136368744/in-warrantless-search-case-top-court-rules-for-police


"Philip Heymann, former head of the U.S. Justice Department's Criminal Division and now a professor at Harvard Law School, says the standard laid out in Monday's decision will be very tempting for law enforcement officers to abuse — namely, allowing police to break in and search without a warrant when they knock on the door and hear sounds suggesting destruction of evidence. "That is a very fuzzy, indeterminate, easily faked — if the policeman wants to — test, when drugs have afterwards been found," says Heymann.

And that, says University of Chicago law professor Bernard Harcourt, will mean a different set of police imperatives. "Once there is probable cause to believe that there are drugs in a home — and in this case the probable cause was the smell of marijuana emanating from the home ... the police no longer need to stop and think about whether they should get a warrant."
 

kobi93

Member
And down the rabbit hole we go...at least Ruth stood up and said something, but again she's the voice screaming in the wilderness. Knock and talks are going to turn into full raids--don't ever open the door or make a sound when they arrive.
 
G

guest121295

I can hardly believe this, I mean what can I say other than "Holy Shit!". This may be one of the most legally screwed things I've seen our own country do, it's a license for corruption and abuse.
 

softyellowlight

Active member
Sounds like your best defense is to get those cameras/audio recorders rolling before you ever do ANYTHING in response to cops at the door.
 

Campfire

Member
And one more of our Rights goes down the pooper. Big Control wins another round in a series of many. Get used to it.
 

resinryder

Rubbing my glands together
Veteran
So the Constitution is now officially a null and void document. Welcome to the Police State of the Untied Stated. Sig Hiel motherfuckers
 

Rouge

Member
Yikes! There goes property rights straight down the toilet. Now it appears that there is nothing that you own that cannot be taken away by the state if Leos THINK it was involved in a crime. Geez, I sure hope the Court knows what they are doing. Can the pendulum swing any farther right?
 

Campfire

Member
Oh, what a happy, happy day for the ever-increasing hoardes of eagerly slavering prosecutors, cops, and other corrections officers.
 

Rouge

Member
mullray, how can you compare what happened to that rich terrorist vs Americans? As much as I would have liked to see Osama bin laden tried in the ICC, a bullet to the head was a merciful death for him. Do you remember those New Yorkers jumping to their deaths from 100 floors in the twin towers rather than burn to death?
I guess if you want a thing done right, ya gots to do it yourself. Them Navy Seals ain't no fuckups!
 

thinkin

Member
When do they start putting people in jail to prevent people for fleeing?
Oh wait USA already does that.. gitmo.

And make it illegal to monitor the police.

What a great system of checks and balances.

When does the book burning start?

Seriously, who is running this country?
It is definitely not "For the People, By the People"
 

paladin420

FACILITATOR
Veteran
Hey leo still got my second ammendment. I won't be movin to destroy any evidence. I won't be the only one payin for a bad day. This time
 

pearlemae

May your race always be in your favor
Veteran
All I can say is those who wish for America to swing further to the right, this is the kind of thinking that is the result.
Vote, vote to change the laws, and then to pick more liberal SCOTUS. Other wise we are on the run away spiral to the bottom.
 

foaf

Well-known member
Veteran
so that means that we all need burglar bars on our windows, and police proof metal security doors, and a fence with crazy bad dogs surrounding our house, and a mote.

I thought that, like free speech, the home would have a sacred place in those gray areas.
 

headband 707

Plant whisperer
Veteran
You seriously have to wonder who these ppl are and what exactly give them this right ? Here they have started to come to ppl's houses that have high hydro bills . These ppl don't even have grows and they are actually being charged for the visit!!!!!!!!! WTF!!!! How the hell can they actually get away with this shit!!! This is what you get when you let Steven Harper back in the game!!! They should really target ppl that smoke cannabis cause the rest of the shit in the world is just so small i.e the nuclear melt down in Japan which we have heard NOTHING about since it happened ... What a fucked up world with the US at the helm.... Problem is when you move they are in everyones business around the world peace out Headband707
 

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