[Joe 6-pack]

"Sgt. Newburn was responding to a possible drug deal and found a loaded gun for which the driver had no pistol permit. In the second, the woman he questioned was parked on the side of the road in a known drug area..."

I guess if you throw the word "drug" in there enough you can try to excuse just about anything.

[wideawake]

If his excuse for confiscation was that they were confiscated in the course of a narcotics investigation, it changes nothing.

Either he was stealing the property of law-abiding citizens, or he was stealing evidence taken in two criminal investigations.

No matter how you interpret the confiscation, he is still a thief.

[Scotsman will be Free]

It’s the police version of “National Security”.

[Boogieman]

Good point. The drug war hysteria doesn’t just give police cover to curtail the 4th amendment rights of drug dealers and drug users. It gives them cover to curtail the rights of pretty much any person in the country, at whim. Any neighborhood can be labeled a “known drug area”, and any cop can say they got a tip about a drug deal, and get an informant to back their story if necessary.

When it comes to search & seizure, the Constitution put the onus on the police to justify themselves beforehand, because it is better for everyone to have their rights protected, even if that means a few criminals elude justice. We’re getting to the point where we are nearly at the opposite position: to infringe the rights of everyone in order to catch a few more criminals, allowing the police to construct an excuse for the search after the fact.