Posted on 05/16/2011 6:25:46 AM PDT by Cheeks
INDIANAPOLIS | Overturning a common law dating back to the English Magna Carta of 1215, the Indiana Supreme Court ruled Thursday that Hoosiers have no right to resist unlawful police entry into their homes.
In a 3-2 decision, Justice Steven David writing for the court said if a police officer wants to enter a home for any reason or no reason at all, a homeowner cannot do anything to block the officer's entry.
"We believe ... a right to resist an unlawful police entry into a home is against public policy and is incompatible with modern Fourth Amendment jurisprudence," David said. "We also find that allowing resistance unnecessarily escalates the level of violence and therefore the risk of injuries to all parties involved without preventing the arrest."
(Excerpt) Read more at nwitimes.com ...
I guess if I had to boil down my rule it’s this: The police can’t treat what could have been a rational transaction into a violent encounter, then still have the right to legally punish someone for fighting back with violence, especially when that person is on their own property, and especially if it’s one of the cases where the homeowner turns out to be a complete innocent. (If you’re an innocent, you don’t assume it’s the cops breaking down your door but bad guys of one flavor or another. They shouldn’t be punished for that presumption.)
You don't even have to be Mirandized and all that's totally legit. That is, provided the cops never ask you a single question. However, after the arraignment you have the right to legal counsel.
How many times do you think that'll happen, along with the plausible occurances of citizens being beaten to a bloody pulp because they resisted arrest, before the citizens at large get their hackels up?
Cops can enter wherever, whenever, and however, but not without reason. If the information officers have is reliable and reasonable that a crime is in progress or has been comitted, they pretty much have carte blanche.
You're free to resist all you wish, just don't lament all them funerals you will be having.
It has ended up several times that the person who called got arrested because we determined that person was the primary aggressor. That person always wonders why they’re getting arrested when they called police.
>You’re free to resist all you wish, just don’t lament all them funerals you will be having.
I didn’t mention resisting (in the post you’re replying to).
And also, I’m fairly sure I’ll have a maximum of one funeral.
That is not what this case is all about.
The case, and this thread are about that the way to settle the issue of whether or not the cops had a right to enter is before a judge and jury, not with guns at 3:00 AM.
I have never, on this thread, mentioned 0300.
The case, and this thread are about that the way to settle the issue of whether or not the cops had a right to enter is before a judge and jury, not with guns at 3:00 AM.
Yes it is about warrants, at least tangentially, because it is about the lawful entry of police.
Any warrantless entry, even in exigent circumstances, is a violation of the 4TH Amendment. Any allowance of evidence found on such a warrantless entry is a violation of the 5TH Amendment's guarantee of due process (and the 14TH prohibition of the States's violation of due process if on a non-Federal level).
The police already have it easy, when it comes to getting a conviction: In their own words.
This is another reason in which I’m glad each state is sovereign. If I lived in Indiana right now I would be planning on moving to another state. Those who do not move I advise should be learning all about the History on the Soviet Union and China since that is what it will be like to soon live in Indiana. People are moving out in States like New York and New Jersey people get tired of the Oppression and High Taxes and leave sooner or later those states will get the message and reverse course.
It occurred to me that this is also contrary to the third amendment.
The Third amendment prohibits the quartering of soldiers in private people’s homes without their consent in times of peace, and only according to law in times of war.
{The Constitution, in Art I, Sec 8, also provides for the Congress to call up the militia to enforce domestic laws; the Constitution is Supreme even over Posse Comitatus.}
Anyway, as the ruling says there is no right to resist even unlawful entry by LEOs (or military enforcing the law, presumably), there is nothing you can do to force them to leave as there is no time limit for them to be “investigating”, and if they will not leave that is, in practice, quartering.
I was mulling over a similar theory around the time of the “v chip” controversy. Could be used, but would be a stretch. There is some notion that soldiers were quartered just to suppress or discourage opposition by their mere presence.
Plus, the homeowner would have to bring an action that an extended stay had become quartering.
The courts require the law to be blind, but not stupid.
The ONLY issue in this entire debate is whether the appropriate time to contest what a homeowner believes to be an illegal search is at 3:00 AM with guns drawn, or later, in court, when everyone is awake, sober, rested and reasoned.
>Sorry, but that would die a quick death on court.
I would agree that it _should_ die a quick death in court; but when a State Supreme Court says there is NO right to resist even an _unlawful_ entry that is by no means certain.
>The courts require the law to be blind, but not stupid.
I disagree with you; with things like the imprisonment of Brian Aitken, in whose trial the judge refused to allow the jury to read/know the exceptions to the law he was being charged under (one of which was the transportation of weapons between residences), compounded with the open hostility toward the right of Jury Nullification (and given that the Jury is supposed to be representative of the people, is it not meet that they should have the power to say “no, this is NOT what we meant when we sent OUR representatives to make laws?) makes the law VERY stupid indeed.
And the law is not very blind at all; elsewise can you explain the Philadelphia New Black Panther voter intimidation case and its subsequent File-13ing by the “Justice Department?”
>The ONLY issue in this entire debate is whether the appropriate time to contest what a homeowner believes to be an illegal search is at 3:00 AM with guns drawn, or later, in court, when everyone is awake, sober, rested and reasoned.
If that is the case; then why should the law provide protection to someone who is making an ILLEGAL entry into your home, threatening you with force (government *is* force), and claiming to be an agent of the law acting lawfully?
No; what this does is, effectively, make a protected class of citizen. You are free to protect yourself, even with lethal force [in Indiana], from illegal entry. This decision, however, specifically said that there is no right to resist a *Law Enforcement Officer’s* illegal entry; there is one, and only one, distinction in this situation: being an agent of the government. Therefore, it is patently obvious that this decision creates a special, protected class of person.
Hate crime victims, Affirmative Action qualifiers, Food Stamp recipients, Veterans, the elderly, the underage, the poor, the infirm, in-state residents, etc.
The list is endless.
BTW, 80% of so-called home invasions are one drug gang ripping off another.
what about the other 20% of your (made up?) statistic
they should be able to call their lawyer immediately.
so if they can’t afford to call an attorney the 4th amendmend doesnt apply to them?
>There are numerous citizens who enjoy special privileges.
>Hate crime victims, Affirmative Action qualifiers, Food Stamp recipients, Veterans, the elderly, the underage, the poor, the infirm, in-state residents, etc.
>The list is endless.
Not all of them enjoy special LEGAL privileges; and none of them has immunity from being prosecuted for breaking the law.
So, by your own example, you show that this is *not* about the law being blind, but keeping eyes wide open for a shiny badge.
#1, each of the groups have special LEGAL privileges.
#2, This ruling does not give LEO’s one iota of immunity from prosecution. All it says is that you CAN sue if the raid is illegal, but you can't, because YOU think it's illegal, shoot them during the raid.
Read the decision, not what some stupid non-lawyer writer says it says.
#1, each of the groups have special LEGAL privileges.
#2, This ruling does not give LEO’s one iota of immunity from prosecution. All it says is that you CAN sue if the raid is illegal, but you can't, because YOU think it's illegal, shoot them during the raid.
Read the decision, not what some stupid non-lawyer writer says it says.
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