Fourth Amendment Down the Drain
"High Court backs police no-knock searches"
By GINA HOLLAND, Associated Press Writer
June 15, 2006
11:25am
WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court ruled Thursday that police armed with a warrant can barge into homes and seize evidence even if they don't knock, a huge government victory that was decided by President Bush's new justices.
The 5-4 ruling signals the court's conservative shift following the departure of moderate Sandra Day O'Connor.
The case tested previous court rulings that police armed with warrants generally must knock and announce themselves or they run afoul of the Constitution's Fourth Amendment ban on unreasonable searches.
Justice Antonin Scalia, writing for the majority, said Detroit police acknowledge violating that rule when they called out their presence at a man's door then went inside three seconds to five seconds later.
"Whether that preliminary misstep had occurred or not, the police would have executed the warrant they had obtained, and would have discovered the gun and drugs inside the house," Scalia wrote.
But suppressing evidence is too high of a penalty, Scalia said, for errors by police in failing to properly announce themselves.
The outcome might have been different if O'Connor were still on the bench. She seemed ready, when the case was first argued in January, to rule in favor of Booker Hudson, whose house was searched in 1998.
O'Connor had worried aloud that officers around the country might start bursting into homes to execute search warrants. She asked: "Is there no policy of protecting the home owner a little bit and the sanctity of the home from this immediate entry?"
She retired before the case was decided, and a new argument was held so that Justice Samuel Alito could participate in deliberations. Alito and Bush's other Supreme Court pick, Chief Justice John Roberts, both supported Scalia's opinion.
Hudson's lawyers argued that evidence against him was connected to the improper search and could not be used against him.
Scalia said that a victory for Hudson would have given "a get-out-of-jail-free card" to him and others.
In a dissent, four justices complained that the decision erases more than 90 years of Supreme Court precedent.
"It weakens, perhaps destroys, much of the practical value of the Constitution's knock-and-announce protection," Justice Stephen Breyer wrote for himself and the three other liberal members.
Breyer said that police will feel free to enter homes without knocking and waiting a short time if they know that there is no punishment for it.
Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, a moderate, joined the conservatives in most of the ruling. He wrote his own opinion, however, to say "it bears repeating that it is a serious matter if law enforcement officers violate the sanctity of the home by ignoring the requisites of lawful entry."
The case is Hudson v. Michigan, 04-1360.
* * * * * * * * * *
Ladies and gentelmen, this is quite dire and the consequences are going to be disasterous.
With last year's Supreme Court decision to force people out of their homes for 'economic gain' and this decision to perform raids, the next step will be making 'probable cause' ill-defined and/or defined as the regime sees fit.
A man's castle is no longer his home - it is now the property of the government. A man can no longer defend his home against invaders, especially now that the new invaders will be carrying badges and the power of the Federal Empire at their backs. Citizens who object to the new Empire will be given labels of 'probable cause' and their property seized without due order, then convicted of unspecified charges in secret trials and hustled off to prisons (permitted under the Patriot Act).
THERE WAS A REASON OUR FOREFATHERS CREATED THE CONSTITUTION - TO PREVENT THE GOVERNMENT FROM DOING TO ITS CITIZENS THE SAME AS WHAT THE BRITISH EMPIRE WAS DOING TO THEM.
That sound is the First and Second Continental Congress participants spinning in their graves.
Spread this across all of Live Journal, MySpace, or wherever you can. We are American citizens - this is NOT Europe, NOT the Middle East, NOT anywhere else in the world. I don't care what they're doing elsewhere in the world, this is America, and our Rights are being stripped away one by one.
By GINA HOLLAND, Associated Press Writer
June 15, 2006
11:25am
WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court ruled Thursday that police armed with a warrant can barge into homes and seize evidence even if they don't knock, a huge government victory that was decided by President Bush's new justices.
The 5-4 ruling signals the court's conservative shift following the departure of moderate Sandra Day O'Connor.
The case tested previous court rulings that police armed with warrants generally must knock and announce themselves or they run afoul of the Constitution's Fourth Amendment ban on unreasonable searches.
Justice Antonin Scalia, writing for the majority, said Detroit police acknowledge violating that rule when they called out their presence at a man's door then went inside three seconds to five seconds later.
"Whether that preliminary misstep had occurred or not, the police would have executed the warrant they had obtained, and would have discovered the gun and drugs inside the house," Scalia wrote.
But suppressing evidence is too high of a penalty, Scalia said, for errors by police in failing to properly announce themselves.
The outcome might have been different if O'Connor were still on the bench. She seemed ready, when the case was first argued in January, to rule in favor of Booker Hudson, whose house was searched in 1998.
O'Connor had worried aloud that officers around the country might start bursting into homes to execute search warrants. She asked: "Is there no policy of protecting the home owner a little bit and the sanctity of the home from this immediate entry?"
She retired before the case was decided, and a new argument was held so that Justice Samuel Alito could participate in deliberations. Alito and Bush's other Supreme Court pick, Chief Justice John Roberts, both supported Scalia's opinion.
Hudson's lawyers argued that evidence against him was connected to the improper search and could not be used against him.
Scalia said that a victory for Hudson would have given "a get-out-of-jail-free card" to him and others.
In a dissent, four justices complained that the decision erases more than 90 years of Supreme Court precedent.
"It weakens, perhaps destroys, much of the practical value of the Constitution's knock-and-announce protection," Justice Stephen Breyer wrote for himself and the three other liberal members.
Breyer said that police will feel free to enter homes without knocking and waiting a short time if they know that there is no punishment for it.
Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, a moderate, joined the conservatives in most of the ruling. He wrote his own opinion, however, to say "it bears repeating that it is a serious matter if law enforcement officers violate the sanctity of the home by ignoring the requisites of lawful entry."
The case is Hudson v. Michigan, 04-1360.
* * * * * * * * * *
Ladies and gentelmen, this is quite dire and the consequences are going to be disasterous.
With last year's Supreme Court decision to force people out of their homes for 'economic gain' and this decision to perform raids, the next step will be making 'probable cause' ill-defined and/or defined as the regime sees fit.
A man's castle is no longer his home - it is now the property of the government. A man can no longer defend his home against invaders, especially now that the new invaders will be carrying badges and the power of the Federal Empire at their backs. Citizens who object to the new Empire will be given labels of 'probable cause' and their property seized without due order, then convicted of unspecified charges in secret trials and hustled off to prisons (permitted under the Patriot Act).
THERE WAS A REASON OUR FOREFATHERS CREATED THE CONSTITUTION - TO PREVENT THE GOVERNMENT FROM DOING TO ITS CITIZENS THE SAME AS WHAT THE BRITISH EMPIRE WAS DOING TO THEM.
That sound is the First and Second Continental Congress participants spinning in their graves.
Spread this across all of Live Journal, MySpace, or wherever you can. We are American citizens - this is NOT Europe, NOT the Middle East, NOT anywhere else in the world. I don't care what they're doing elsewhere in the world, this is America, and our Rights are being stripped away one by one.