I, for one, welcome my new robotic insect alien overlords.
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'm primarily assigning degrees of importance that Laz, NJ_G and perhaps you disagree with me on, that's all.
I do what I can to reduce my taxes, which is a DIRECT and DELETERIOUS encroachment on my real personal freedom.
Any effort spent on that, in my opinion, is more effective at preserving my freedom and the freedom of my children than on complaining about a SC ruling against a druggie defended by the ACLU.
It's my personal opinion, and I encourage your action to overcome this ruling....good for y'all. But no need to tell me I'm a friggin ostrich, or Socialist or that I welcome my new overlords or anything like that.
Before Y2K, I was sympathetic to the Alex Jones' warning of the impending police lockdown. But now I think there's far more important (insidious and imperceptable) things to be worried about.
What about insurance checkpoints? There have been some checkpoints set up to see if the drivers are properly insured. This does cause some delays.
I see. And I'm sure that's what brought on this case? The man has a little blow on his bling?
As I state whenever someone bring up this ridiculous phrase (the Constitution is not a suicide pact): "let's think about this for a moment - a group of farmers, lawyers, and businessmen sign their names to an open declaration of treason against the Crown, which controls the largest empire and the most powerful military the world has ever seen, and whose punishment for treason is generally death, and it's *NOT* a suicide pact?! I just love that one. Had the revolution turned out the way that any logically thinking person would have expected (it certainly hadn't completely succeeded just yet - see: War of 1812), every man whose name appeared on that Constitution would have been executed to serve as an example of what happens to traitors. These men put liberty far above their personal safety in the face of nearly certain death - but hey, it's not a suicide pact or anything."
According to the shocked and disturberd, it would only matter if the two legged officer was of German decent to a relative who was a Nazi much like the German shepard who remind them of East Germany's lack of freedom because we are losing the freedom to hide our unlawfull acts.
Maybe one of our freeper cops can tell us why in the hell it takes 20+ minutes for a cop to get a speeding ticket together. I've always figured that they're taking their good old time just to piss me off and make me late.
I know, I've worked with TEMPEST-resistant systems. But this can be done relatively cheap, and without having to get a security clearance to work with TEMPEST.
Since when are roadblocks considered a guilty sentence?
Sorry bro, no one is buying your red herring. I guess I'll worry about post cards and envelopes when they finish catching the druggies. Until then, this sounds like the mounties got another well deserving dope pusher/user.
"In Caballes' case, he was pulled over for driving 71 mph on a stretch of Interstate 80 with a 65 mph limit. The state trooper noticed air freshener in the car and asked for permission to search Caballes' trunk. Caballes refused, but officers searched it later anyway after the dog indicated there were drugs in the trunk.
The troopers subsequently found $250,000 worth of marijuana, a find that Caballes argued was unjustified because they had no reason to suspect he had drugs. His conviction was later thrown out by the Illinois Supreme Court, a ruling that the U.S. Supreme Court reversed."
I think you have a balanced approach to the issue and I welcome it.
I, for one, welcome my new robotic insect alien overlords.
Big problem is how arbitrary the "alert" of the dog is.
I said it earlier, but it is simple to teach a dog to alert on a command or signal, even the wink of an eye.
Once we are in the position that a dog bark is on a par with conviction, nobody is free or safe from ilegal siezure.
"Pull over please."
"Oh, it's that John Lenin guy. Seabiscuit, Who is it?" "wink"
"Woof!Woof!"
"Ok, tear the guy's car apart, cuff him and rip his things to pieces, he's a felon, Seabiscuit finds him guilty."
No, I mean it. I really want to search your house. You sound like a terrorist.
Seriously. You don't have anything to hide, do you? Freepmail me your address. We're going to search.
If you make guns legal in NY, then there is no reason for a search. See - one cancels out the other. It just makes more sense to fight it at the source.
Well, again, as we peel the onion we may agree more than first imagined. I think goverment certainly does create a drag on me, again, primarily through taxes, but of course, also in other ways. Federal regulation on credit cards or prescriptions is certainly heavier than it was then, but it's a constraint on trade that maintains its function, and I certainly can't imagine a private version of that function taking hold without going Enron on us...
But when the Federal Government threw us into WWII, or even the massive spending to dismantle the USSR, the Federal Government created a safer world where my freedoms can flourish in real tangible terms.
So I know that my inalienable rights come from God, and that governments tend to constantly try to erode them. OTOH, I know that if Nazi Germany or the Soviets had won then I would be in a jail cell with Natan Sharansky, or worse, to this day.
In that perspective, the Federal Government has given me quite a bit.
"If a two-legged law officer's nose detects marijuana, is that counted as probable cause to search a car? Your comment is right on the nose!"
Only in the sense that it proves that using something other than that officer's nose amounts to a search.
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