But we know that all of those things have very little to do with catching a sniper. The chances of the sniper being drunk or mad are nil. He may have refused to be searched and that's where the facts and circumstances are on his side even though the police could dredge up any number of witnesses for white vans. But if there are no witness of shooters entering white vans and weeks of television coverage telling people to look for white vans, then those white van sightings have no LE value.
If you want me to agree that the police did not have the right to walk up to his van, without saying a word, and pull him out and through him to the ground, I agree. I am with you on that.
A more realistic scenario is he saw lots of weapons pointed at him, didn't understand English and panicked. Again, the problem is police behavior, not whether they are legally correct. Does the need to catch the sniper justify the risk of accidentally shooting someone considering the extremely low probability that any particular white van is involved never mind any white vans at all.
So, as I read it, your position is that IF the police, while doing their legitimate search, should come upon someone who is falling down drunk and/or combative, they should just ignore that?
How do we know that? You presume that you know what law enforcement knows. Wrong. Also, you presume that law enforcement had no basis to dro that dragnet and profile those specific types of vans. Why on earth would they do that if they were not satisfied they had enough credible evidence to put the men and resources into that overwhelming task! I presume they are acting on some level of verifiable information. (They debunked several witnesses, so we know they are working hard to make sure the info they use is credible.)
If its credible information, and probable cause exists, than it is absolutely related to catching this sniper. Of the 1000 LE officials now on the Job, do you think that any off them might have some idea of how to employ resources based on the hard evidence they have and we don't. Get real.
This is all about catching the sniper, and making sure that in doing so, the rights of average americans , under the Constitution, are not abridged. as I said before, bring me one person whose rights were wrongly trampled in a dragnet, and I will evaluate their case for free, and if meritorious, I will file it for free.