Posted on 12/06/2016 11:56:55 AM PST by MeganC
Police officers may only conduct a search following a traffic stop if they believe there is probable cause a crime was committed, the Supreme Court ruled unanimously Monday in a child pornography case involving a bicyclist pulled over for rolling through a stop sign.
Torrance police stopped bicyclist Paul Macabeo in 2012 after following him a short distance with their patrol car's headlights off. They acknowledged he was not riding erratically and did not try to flee.
Macabeo was arrested after the officers searched his phone and said they found photos of underage girls.
The state's highest court said that when officers stopped Macabeo, the most they could have done to him was give him a traffic ticket. Because they had no probable cause to arrest him for a crime, they had no cause to search his phone.
"Under these circumstances the search violated the Fourth Amendment," the justices ruled in their 24-page opinion citing a person's Constitutional protection against unreasonable searches.
They ordered the case returned to a state appellate court, which was directed to instruct a trial court to suppress any evidence gathered from the phone.
The officers said they searched Macabeo's phone after he appeared fidgety and told them he wasn't sure if he was still on probation for a previous crime. It turned out he wasn't on probation.
When one of the officers asked if he could search through Macabeo's pockets, the cyclist told him he could. After the officer removed the phone from Macabeo's pocket, he handed it to another officer, who found the photos.
We need to liberate this state.
how do folks feel though in cases like this when it is revealed he had child porn on his phone, but cant do anything because the search wasnt legal.....
“Police officers may only conduct a search following a traffic stop if they believe there is probable cause a crime was committed”
Finally, a California court rules correctly on something. Now just rule that bringing in a “drug dog” to sniff around your car to pretend to give you probable cause is itself a search, and we’ll be getting somewhere.
Just another case of,
Special rights
For Bikes
?
http://www.cnn.com/2014/06/25/justice/supreme-court-cell-phones/
Either you want to live in a police state, where they can catch most of the criminals (along with lots of innocent people too), or you want to have liberty, in which case some criminals are going to get away with it.
There isn’t a third option.
Probable Cause.
Someone’s opinion is NOT Probably Cause.
Our system is built under the assumption it’s better to let the guilty go free than imprison the innocent. It was a bad search, it wasn’t even a legit traffic stop, much less cause to start checking his phone.
This nothing new. There was no way the memory of his phone held a weapon.
This stop happened in 2012, so that ruling didn’t apply at the time.
Well this statement isn't exactly groundbreaking. It's been the law in Federal Court at least since Carroll v. U. S. in 1925 and was applied to the states in Wolf v. Colorado in 1949.
I’ve been stopped by cops quite a bit. I’ve never had one ask to search my phone. It also takes a swipe pattern to open it.
This is weird.
The protection of the integrity of the law trumps any individual case.
I bet Anthony Weiner was on speed dial.
Great reason to lock your phone with a passcode (not fingerprint).
Hard to say if it's good or bad in this particular case - the guy allowed them to search his phone just because they asked. If he had said "no" and they did it, then I would agree 100%.
Far as I know, this is the correct Constitutional call. The police can’t just go on a fishing expedition. They can’t subject a person to a search if that person is not under arrest, if there is no search warrant, and if there is no probable cause.
I thought this was basic.
“When one of the officers asked if he could search through Macabeo’s pockets, the cyclist told him he could.”
==
Made his mistake in saying “yes” to the body search.
I believe a case before SCOTUS, Terry v Ohio, has also ruled that an officer may not stop a person because of moving violation, non- working safety equipment or such and then demand to question or search the person or the vehicle for a totally different reason, like where are you going, where did you come from, state your business, etc.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.