Posted on 01/24/2005 9:20:02 AM PST by Lazamataz
The Supreme Court gave police broader search powers Monday during traffic stops, ruling that drug-sniffing dogs can be used to check out motorists even if officers have no reason to suspect they may be carrying narcotics.
In a 6-2 decision, the court sided with Illinois police who stopped Roy Caballes in 1998 along Interstate 80 for driving 6 miles over the speed limit. Although Caballes lawfully produced his driver's license, troopers brought over a drug dog after Caballes seemed nervous.
Caballes argued the Fourth Amendment protects motorists from searches such as dog sniffing, but Justice John Paul Stevens disagreed, reasoning that the privacy intrusion was minimal.
"The dog sniff was performed on the exterior of respondent's car while he was lawfully seized for a traffic violation. Any intrusion on respondent's privacy expectations does not rise to the level of a constitutionally cognizable infringement," Stevens wrote.
In a dissent, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg bemoaned what she called the broadening of police search powers, saying the use of drug dogs will make routine traffic stops more "adversarial." She was joined in her dissent in part by Justice David H. Souter.
(Excerpt) Read more at sfgate.com ...
I guess we all know which way the court will be deciding when probes and sensors are devised that can peer into your house.
What a sad day for freedom.
I hate it when the dog sniffs your crotch.
.... what little freedom remains, you mean.
I have friends from other countries, a few have settled here, and without fail, they remark "You Americans think you are free. Maybe once you were, but now, you live in a police state that rivals that of East Germany."
Can't say I like this ruling.......
Pretty Sad, when the only justices on the CONSERVATIVE side, are Ginsburg, and Souter.
-Eric
This court, along with too many of our otherwise upstanding citizens, will tolerate any police state measure if is invoked in the "War On Drugs."
Yes.
I hate when I agree with Ginsburg
What happens when the dog sniffs out the drugs that is said to be found on our money?Good point. At the very least that gives them "probable cause" for a greater search.
-Eric
Surrounded by a Praetorian Guard of police officers who all treat them so nice, no wonder they allow law enforcement more and more leeway - aren't all cops like the nice, respectful, good men that drive them around from place to place in their SUVs?
It has happened...
Paranoid bump.
The Ruling Class has decided that there's no such thing as 'Unreasonable' search.
No-suspicion searches, even with a dog, are PRECISELY what the 4th amendment was written to prevent.
American liberty has long been very sick, but I was surprised to see yet another near-death-spasm. It's really all over but the outright revocation of the BoR; the confiscation of the guns; the outright suppression of free speech...
Okay, so in this case the dog was used while the defendant was "lawfully seized in a traffic violation." How long before dogs are used at the drunk-driving roadblocks, where everyone is seized with no probable cause? How long until cops have the dogs stroll around shopping center parking lots? Still slip-sliding down that slippery slope...and the defenders of this crap will only scream bloody murder when it's THEY who are inconvenienced.
You are free to submit... Is this what Bush means by ''freedom''?... hardly worth fighting for.
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