Tag: Fourth Amendment: Page 3

Patrol

Visual Enhancement and the Fourth Amendment

What if an object only comes into plain view after an officer shines a flashlight or spotlight into an area, or looks through binoculars? Does this use of sense-enhancing devices make a difference in the Fourth Amendment calculation of reasonableness?

December 5, 2013

Technology

Video and You

If you aren't speaking and behaving at all times in public the way you want to appear when you're uploaded on YouTube, you could have some unpleasant surprises in store.

October 1, 2013

Special Units

SCOTUS To Hear Co-Tenant Search Case

The U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to hear a California case involving a suspect arrested by police after his girlfriend allowed officers to search the couple's apartment.

September 5, 2013

Patrol

Open Wide and Say, "Ahhh"

Under what circumstances would the Fourth Amendment allow routine collection of DNA samples upon arrest and booking? A recent Supreme Court decision addressed this issue.

August 4, 2013

Technology

ACLU Attacks License Plate Readers

License-plate readers give law enforcement a location tracking tool that may violate constitutional privacy rights, the American Civil Liberties Union argues in a new report released today.

July 16, 2013

Patrol

Video: Driver Questions Deputy at DUI Checkpoint

A Libertarian Party member's recording of his interaction with a Rutherford County (Tenn.) Sheriff's deputy at a DUI checkpoint went viral following the July 4 stop.

July 8, 2013

Patrol

DOJ: L.A. Sheriff's Deputies Targeted Blacks

The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department has agreed to make changes, after a two-year Department of Justice probe uncovered "widespread" unlawful detentions and searches of blacks, Latinos, and other residents of subsidized housing.

June 30, 2013

Patrol

Prosecutor: Ohio Agency's Fake Drug Checkpoints Legal

An Ohio agency's face drug checkpoints don't violate a 2000 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that officers can't randomly stop cars to search motorists for drugs, a prosecutor told The Plain Dealer.

June 30, 2013

Technology

N.J. Bill Would Allow Police Cell Phone Searches After Accidents

A state bill in New Jersey would allow police officers to search the cell phones of drivers at accident scenes to determine if they were talking or texting before the crash.

June 10, 2013

Patrol

Forced Blood From Impaired Drivers

The Supreme Court has made it more difficult for law enforcement officers to obtain the most probative evidence of impaired driving—a measure of the alcohol concentration in a sample of the suspect's blood.

June 6, 2013

Patrol

Fourth Amendment Blues

Essentially, because of the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution, you are damned if you do and damned if you don't. And the public has no sympathy whatsoever for your precarious position.

June 4, 2013

Patrol

SCOTUS Allows DNA Swabs During Arrests

The 5-4 ruling came in Maryland v. King, where a convicted rapist had argued his Fourth Amendment privacy rights were violated when police used DNA to connect him to an earlier crime.

June 2, 2013