Did the Supreme Court Just Effectively Gut the Fourth Amendment’s Exclusionary Rule?

[channonc 466]

You can thank the Patriot Act for this. The congress pretty much threw the constitution out with that act.

This! +1000

[aujeff11 6,243]

Why yes they did, Fourth Amendment be damned.

Sotomayor's dissent is one for the ages.

By legitimizing the conduct that produces this double consciousness, this case tells everyone, white and black, guilty and innocent, that an officer can verify your legal status at any time. It says that your body is subject to invasion while courts excuse the violation of your rights. It implies that you are not a citizen of a democracy but the subject of a carceral state, just waiting to be cataloged.

PDF of the ruling. Sotomayor's dissent starts on page 14.

Your assumption that the 4th amendment has been gutted must be based on a very lenient perspective as it relates to probable cause and policing criminal activity. The cautionary tale here is don't make your drug habit conspicuous. The police had every right to search this guy and it never fails to amuse me that those most eager to see stricter gun laws have the most lenient attitude concerning crime and the most restrictive attitude toward law enforcement.

The police had every right to stop this guy if he did something wrong after leaving the drug dealing house such as run a stop sign, broken tail light, etc. Stopping a car for no reason is unconstitutional though. The police doesn't have the right to stop every car that leaves a suspected drug dealers house.

In Alabama it is legal to stop a car without a traffic violation as long as reasonable suspicion exist. Example, car pulls into known drug house and maybe the driver goes in for a really short period of time and leaves. Or, maybe a known drug dealer comes out of the house and has a short interaction with the occupants. In both instances, I would assert that reasonable suspicion exists for a traffic stop which is all that is necessary for a traffic stop, reasonable suspicion. Also, Alabama is a pre textual stop state as well.

I knew Alabama was a pretextual stop state. Reasonable suspicion is ridiculous though. Threshold needs to be probable cause just to help avoid racial profiling and stereotyping. Just because there are visitors at a dealers house, that doesn't mean ALL the visitors are buying, using, or selling drugs. Likewise, just because one lives in the "wrong section of town," that doesn't mean he is probably also a criminal. This type of policing was exactly what Sotomayor was blasting in her dissenting opinion.

Probable cause is to high because that's what arrest, search warrants and such are based on which is far more invasive than a traffic stop. As long as the officers stay within the scope of the stop, those who are visiting the "trap" will get nothing more than told why they were stopped. Quite honestly though, trap houses normally don't have average Joe coming by for a casual visit, or at least that hasn't been my experience while working in a multi jurisdictional task force.

I don't remember the case but I believe the SCOTUS decided that being stopped is considered being seized temporarily which is by itself invasive enough, not to mention reasonable suspicion is also the legal threshold necessary to stop and frisk the suspects for weapons as well, that too is invasive enough. I'm not sure what these "traps" are but I can assure you this I've been in a friends residence plenty of times and he sold weed and he had plenty of visitor, not all smoked or bought any either.

"Trap" is a trap house. A trap house is generally used by the dope dealer to sell his dope and to keep law enforcement from getting to where he lives and or where he stores his money/drugs. And yes, a traffic stop is a detention/seizure because you're not free to leave at any time as you would be in a consensual stop (like if Jonny cop approached you for a field interview but didn't have reasonable suspicion for a detention, you tell him to kick rocks). Being at the friends house that sold marihuana was a sticky situation. Had the house been raided, you'd have more than likely been arrested along with the friend.

Just for the disclaimer, this is only a friend from high school and he occasionally sells weed to his friends. I'm never at his house when he is smoking or selling or anything like that that though.

They probably could've brought me to the station if they decided to raid while we were both sober and we were watching a game or swimming or something I suppose. They wouldn't have any dirt on me though. I'm pretty sure the cops can figure out the level of involvement for each person in each case. So I can imagine they know who is at the wrong place at the wrong time. After all, I'm sure they have done their due diligence of investigations before conducting the raid to begin with.

[aubearcat 2,153]

Jeff, Absolutely a thorough investigation should take place before any operation of that type. However, if during the raid substantial dugs are found and your friend did not say it was all his and you had nothing to do with it, there is a high probability you'd be arrested as well. In that case I can't see a scenario in which most people would say that the police did anything wrong by arresting you as well. Most persons would probably say that if you knew your friend was selling illegal drugs from the house, you were taking substantial risk by hanging out at that house. From what you have described though, it sounds like this person was selling from where he lives which is in general a big mistake in the dope game. 95% of the houses we raid are heroin/cocaine/meth dealers. I can't remember the last time that we ran a raid on a marihuana dealer.

[channonc 466]

I find assaults on the 4th amendment to be downright disturbing. Put me squarely in the Rand Paul corner on this kind of stuff. Policing powers have grown far too much and too wide, and I find it troubling. The number of innocent people in prisons right now is sad and disturbing. These kind of rulings continue to increase the chances of stuff like that happening.

[homersapien 12,172]

I find assaults on the 4th amendment to be downright disturbing. Put me squarely in the Rand Paul corner on this kind of stuff. Policing powers have grown far too much and too wide, and I find it troubling. The number of innocent people in prisons right now is sad and disturbing. These kind of rulings continue to increase the chances of stuff like that happening.

I heard the following statistic: The US has 4% of the world's population but 25% of the world's imprisoned people.

[channonc 466]

I find assaults on the 4th amendment to be downright disturbing. Put me squarely in the Rand Paul corner on this kind of stuff. Policing powers have grown far too much and too wide, and I find it troubling. The number of innocent people in prisons right now is sad and disturbing. These kind of rulings continue to increase the chances of stuff like that happening.

I heard the following statistic: The US has 4% of the world's population but 25% of the world's imprisoned people.

I think I saw that stat in a story not too long ago from Vox. That stat should concern every American.