SCOTUS: Police can read your text messages without warrant

[rambone]

The Drug War has truly been the biggest bridge from the days of the "Peace Officer" to the "Enforcer." Prohibition laws completely reshape the nature of the job. It is a routine exercise to perform searches to look for contraband. Now we can look forward to the days when it those road-side fishing expeditions include requests to look in your phone for Thought Crimes.


Supreme Court stands by a ruling on text messages

Text messages: The Supreme Court let stand a ruling that the police can search text messages from an arrested criminal suspect's cell phone without obtaining a warrant.

The justices refused to review the California Supreme Court ruling that upheld the search on the grounds that defendants lose their privacy rights for any items they are carrying when taken into custody.

The Supreme Court rejected without comment an appeal by Gregory Diaz, who was convicted on drug charges. His attorneys said Supreme Court intervention was needed to resolve differing lower court rulings on how to apply precedent to warrantless searches of cell phone data.

In 2007, Diaz was arrested, searched, and taken to a police station after driving a car in which his passenger sold six pills of the drug ecstasy during an undercover operation. A small amount of marijuana also was found in his pocket.

During a break in the interrogation, an officer looked at the text message folder and discovered a coded message that appeared to refer to the ecstasy sales. That was about 90 minutes after Diaz had been arrested.

The Supreme Court case is Diaz v. California, No. 10-1231.

 

[NYFelon]

time for biometric phones.

 

[SemperFiUSMC]

Takeaway: passwords. If you're worried about having your phone searched use one.

Next injustice please.

 

[Kirk Freeman]

1. The Supreme Court refused to hear the case, there has been no ruling.

2. In playing Devil's advocate, how is this any different than search incident to arrest? School me on how it is unreasonable for the cop to press the text message icon on the smart phone?

 

[SemperFiUSMC]

1. The Supreme Court refused to hear the case, there has been no ruling.

2. In playing Devil's advocate, how is this any different than search incident to arrest? School me on how it is unreasonable for the cop to press the text message icon on the smart phone?

It's not. It's just Rambone's Injustice of the Day (there should be a special INGO section for that. He can provide his expert analysis, solicit feedback, and give followup reports to what action he took. You know, like when he filed his complaint against the Chesterton PD for asking him to leave the fair. Damn he sure tore them up, didn't he).

 

[steveh_131]

2. In playing Devil's advocate, how is this any different than search incident to arrest? School me on how it is unreasonable for the cop to press the text message icon on the smart phone?

How far does "reasonable" go? Can they search through your email accounts? Bank records? Phone records? So much information is now available through the "cloud" on a smart phone and it can have all the passwords stored right in it.

So it gets a little tricky...do they need a warrant to search through that sort of information that isn't actually stored on the phone but can be accessible through it? What if you have a remote desktop link for your home computer set up? Can they search your home computer as well using your phone?

 

[Prometheus]

1. The Supreme Court refused to hear the case, there has been no ruling.

2. In playing Devil's advocate, how is this any different than search incident to arrest? School me on how it is unreasonable for the cop to press the text message icon on the smart phone?

US Constitution, Amendment Four-
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

Seems pretty strait forward to me.

So, exactly where is the Constitutional authority for such a search without a warrant, being issued upon probable cause?

 

[Rob377]

US Constitution, Amendment Four-
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

Seems pretty strait forward to me.

So, exactly where is the Constitutional authority for such a search without a warrant, being issued upon probable cause?

At the time of the constitution, warrants were bad things.
The way it worked is that the officer, suspecting something, searched your stuff. If there was evidence there, it was used against you. No exclusionary rule, no get out of jail free card, no technicalities. If he guessed wrong and you were clean, you sued for trespass and there was no "qualified immunity" nonsense.
Warrants, however, gave them that immunity.

Read carefully, there is no requirement that warrant is needed for a search. It says they'll only be issued on probable cause, not that they're required.

But it doesn't matter, because Ron Paul says the 4th (and none of the bill of rights) applies to the states anyway.

 

[Kirk Freeman]

So, exactly where is the Constitutional authority for such a search without a warrant, being issued upon probable cause?

Don't we have a sticky on all the exceptions to the warrant requirement?

How is this not like inventory or search incident to arrest?

 

[rambone]

Takeaway: passwords. If you're worried about having your phone searched use one.

Next injustice please.

WhimperFi sides with the state and mocks our rights. How unexpected.

How far does "reasonable" go? Can they search through your email accounts? Bank records? Phone records? So much information is now available through the "cloud" on a smart phone and it can have all the passwords stored right in it.

So it gets a little tricky...do they need a warrant to search through that sort of information that isn't actually stored on the phone but can be accessible through it? What if you have a remote desktop link for your home computer set up? Can they search your home computer as well using your phone?

Kirk: I agree with all of the above. Phones today are mini-computers. Would it be reasonable for cops to power up your laptop on the side of the highway and start snooping around? Every intimate detail of people's lives is accessible through their computers and phones. I would argue 'no', it is absolutely not a reasonable search for a 'suspect' on the side of the highway. Get a warrant if the drug offender is so bloody important.

 

[Rob377]

WhimperFi sides with the state and mocks our rights. How unexpected.

...

So does your man, Ron Paul.

[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]If anything, the Supreme Court should have refused to hear the Kelo case on the grounds that the 5th amendment does not apply to states.[/FONT]

Lessons From the Kelo Decision by Rep. Ron Paul

For Paul, same principle applies to the 4th. He's applauding this. They refused to hear it, just like he said they should do for Kelo.

 

[level.eleven]

How far does "reasonable" go? Can they search through your email accounts? Bank records? Phone records? So much information is now available through the "cloud" on a smart phone and it can have all the passwords stored right in it.

So it gets a little tricky...do they need a warrant to search through that sort of information that isn't actually stored on the phone but can be accessible through it? What if you have a remote desktop link for your home computer set up? Can they search your home computer as well using your phone?

Law will always lag behind technology. Worse yet, the people responsible for legislating and ruling on such matters will never be positioned, due to age, to understand such technology. Series of tubes.

 

[NYFelon]

Law will always lag behind technology. Worse yet, the people responsible for legislating and ruling on such matters will never be positioned, due to age, to understand such technology. Series of tubes.

resisting urge to post meme.....

 

[public servant]

Leave either your drugs or your phone at home.

 

[level.eleven]

Leave either your drugs or your phone at home.

Better yet, leave people alone.

 

[Kirk Freeman]

Kirk: I agree with all of the above. Phones today are mini-computers. Would it be reasonable for cops to power up your laptop on the side of the highway and start snooping around?

Oh, it's definitely an argument and I'm not saying I disagree. Just pointing out that if it would be upheld it will be search incident or inventory.

We'll have to wait and see how it is resolved.

So does your man, Ron Paul.

Forget it, Robb, you'll never getting anywhere reminding INGO that Ron Paul spits on the Constitution. The cult of personality is too strong.

 

[SemperFiUSMC]

So does your man, Ron Paul.

Lessons From the Kelo Decision by Rep. Ron Paul

For Paul, same principle applies to the 4th. He's applauding this. They refused to hear it, just like he said they should do for Kelo.

My favorite quote from the article:

We are supposed to be a nation of laws, not men, and the fixation on individuals as saviors of our freedoms is misplaced.

I wonder if he includes himself on that list.

 

[steveh_131]

Forget it, Robb, you'll never getting anywhere reminding INGO that Ron Paul spits on the Constitution. The cult of personality is too strong.

I'm not sure I would agree that his criticism of the incorporation doctrine amounts to "spitting on the constitution". I'm also not saying that I agree with him on the subject.

However, up until the early 1900's didn't the U.S. supreme court largely agree with Ron Paul's interpretation of the 14th amendment?

Jefferson himself said:

While we deny that Congress have a right to control the freedom of the press, we have ever asserted the rights of the states, and their exclusive right, to do so.

 

[Prometheus]

Don't we have a sticky on all the exceptions to the warrant requirement?

How is this not like inventory or search incident to arrest?

Inventory... yeah. 1 belt, 1 phone, 1 pair shoes.... check and done.

Search... was originally justified as for safety and preventing contraband from entering the jail.

The phone isn't entering jail and that original plea of the tyrants thus falls on it face.

That a few lawyers in black dresses have been saying otherwise these past few decades means nothing in the grand scheme of the Republic.... aside from illustrating tyranny.

 

[Kirk Freeman]

Pro, right there with ya on inventory, but an exception such as the inventory exception potentially gives a judge or group of judges something to hand their hat on.

I do know there have been mixed decisions on this across the country. All the computer cases I've run into have involved warrants. No smart phones as of yet.

However, up until the early 1900's didn't the U.S. supreme court largely agree with Ron Paul's interpretation of the 14th amendment?

Yes, you are correct in that SCOTUS did not stick to the original intent of the Framers of the 14th and went a la carte.