Posted on 01/27/2015 1:17:30 PM PST by Yellowstone Joe
WASHINGTON, D.C. — In a blow to the constitutional rights of citizens, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 8-1 in Heien v. State of North Carolina that police officers are permitted to violate American citizens’ Fourth Amendment rights if the violation results from a “reasonable” mistake about the law on the part of police. Acting contrary to the venerable principle that “ignorance of the law is no excuse,” the Court ruled that evidence obtained by police during a traffic stop that was not legally justified can be used to prosecute the person if police were reasonably mistaken that the person had violated the law. The Rutherford Institute had asked the U.S. Supreme Court to hold law enforcement officials accountable to knowing and abiding by the rule of law. Justice Sonia Sotomayor, the Court’s lone dissenter, warned that the court’s ruling “means further eroding the Fourth Amendment’s protection of civil liberties in a context where that protection has already been worn down.”
“By refusing to hold police accountable to knowing and abiding by the rule of law, the Supreme Court has given government officials a green light to routinely violate the law,” said John W. Whitehead, president of The Rutherford Institute and author of the award-winning book A Government of Wolves: The Emerging American Police State. “This case may have started out with an improper traffic stop, but where it will end—given the turbulence of our age, with its police overreach, military training drills on American soil, domestic surveillance, SWAT team raids, asset forfeiture, wrongful convictions, and corporate corruption—is not hard to predict. This ruling is what I would call a one-way, nonrefundable ticket to the police state.”
(Excerpt) Read more at google.com ...
Following a suspicious vehicle, Sergeant Matt Darisse noticed that only one of the vehicle’s brake lights was working and pulled the driver over. While issuing a warning ticket for the broken brake light, Dar- isse became suspicious of the actions of the two occupants and their answers to his questions. Petitioner Nicholas Brady Heien, the car’s owner, gave Darisse consent to search the vehicle. Darisse found co- caine, and Heien was arrested and charged with attempted traffick- ing. The trial court denied Heien’s motion to suppress the seized evi- dence on Fourth Amendment grounds, concluding that the vehicle’s faulty brake light gave Darisse reasonable suspicion to initiate the stop. The North Carolina Court of Appeals reversed, holding that the relevant code provision, which requires that a car be “equipped with a stop lamp,” N. C. Gen. Stat. Ann. §20–129(g), requires only a single lamp—which Heien’s vehicle had—and therefore the justification for the stop was objectively unreasonable. Reversing in turn, the State Supreme Court held that, even assuming no violation of the state law had occurred, Darisse’s mistaken understanding of the law was rea- sonable, and thus the stop was valid.NOBODY expects a cop to know EXACTLY what the law is in every nuance. They're not trained lawyers. Seems this cop was unclear about what combination of non-functioning rear lights constituted legally dysfunctional, investigated on the reasonable grounds of a transgression probably having happened, and from there whilst investigating found, with driver's consent, evidence of a much greater crime.Held: Because Darisse’s mistake of law was reasonable, there was rea- sonable suspicion justifying the stop under the Fourth Amendment.
Don't give up on Zero Hedge entirely. Just know that they slant everything to make it sound more sensational. And I've detected a subtle anti-Jewish bias there.
But...they are very anti-Obama and very anti-nanny state, and their reader comments are often extremely funny. I go there for the humor.
I’m sorry, again, none of your theories fit the case. The homeowner in your hypothetical example would have to consent to the search of their home, and the end crime would have to be utterly unrelated to the initial stop. I would also hope that no one would consent to their home being searched without securing their animals.
So, how would you have ruled? The initial stop was done for a broken taillight. Up until the time the appeals court ruled that since that ONE line in the vehicle code said ‘light’ instead of ‘lights’ like all other lines, it only required ONE working taillight. They threw out the stop, and then went further, and claimed that the consent to search the vehicle and the resulting evidence of a drug crime was also to be thrown out, as the initial stop was suddenly invalid.
I think the appeals court felt generous, but I don’t agree that the resulting search that was consented to should be thrown out as well. It wasn’t just a good faith mistake, it was the way the law was enforced up until that point. I think SCOTUS ruled correctly; fortune telling isn’t something officers are expected to perform as part of their duties. All state literature and officer training was that all lights must function. The lack of an (s) at the end of a line of code shouldn’t undo the stop and consented search.
Well, your post #41 actually changed my mind. At first I agreed with the SC ruling, but now I don’t. The cop had no legal reason to stop that car. And, yes, a traffic cop should know all the traffic laws, each one of them. That’s his job. If he doesn’t know, it’s on him, and on him alone.
I figured as much Zero Hedge
Zero Hedge is the new DEBKAfile
The supremes have been wrong before.
State law can’t override the constitution so I see this being appealed and headed to the SCOTUS.
This was a SCOTUS decision.
Brain fart on that post... I read that all wrong in about 10 seconds! I need a beer.
Maybe I should go for the humor, sad part is that there are people who think it’s the truth and then repeat it as if it were fact.
Just curious: before creating this thread, did you have any idea at all that this ruling was issued and fully discussed SIX WEEKS AGO? In other words, if you’re so concerned about Supreme Court rulings, why aren’t you aware of them?
Reading the case further (it’s actually quite short, I recommend you do), seems the law in question was actually unclear, and could reasonably be read to mean two different conditions. As worded, a reasonable person could conclude just one broken lamp was enough to constitute a violation, while another reasonable person could conclude that the presence of multiple lights providing the same indication (most cars have at least 3 brake lights) means so long as one indicator works the vehicle & driver are legally OK.
When it takes a court ruling to discern what a particular law actually means, it is not unreasonable for the arresting officer to apprehend the suspect and let a judge make the final detailed determination.
The core issue of the case is that the officer is empowered to stop someone acting suspiciously and investigate further ... and may ask “may I search” to go where he is otherwise not empowered to. A cop may ask you for no reason “may I search your premises”; if you consent, you are liable for the results. If the driver had said “no” the contraband would not have been found; he attracted the cop’s attention, was further investigated, a warning issued based on a reasonable unclarity of law, a search request made based on reasonably suspicious behavior, the request approved, and the contraband found.
Sorry, but I’ve got to conclude there was no 4th Amendment violation. The warning could have been challenged in court (the only way the unclear law would get clarified) and thrown out, but that’s irrelevant to the fact that suspicion arose and the driver consented to search - he could have held his 4th Amendment right precisely by saying one word: “no.”
No, more like: the raid commences, the SWAT team knocks on what they think is the right door, resident answers, fails to clarify whether it’s the right or wrong house, SWAT team asks if they can search, resident consents, and while it turns out to be the wrong house the team finds a meth lab.
“The cop had no legal reason to stop that car.”
More concisely: the law was unclear and the cop proceeded with a reasonable, albeit ultimately overturned, interpretation of that law. It took a court case to clarify it, which could only come by a cop acting on the dissenting interpretation.
Another reason why I’m glad that I’m *much* closer to the grave than to the cradle.
You missed a key point - SWAT teams don’t knock.
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