Hallelujah, the 4th Amendment Lives!

[Bible_Belt]

Good news stories are rare. This is one to be thankful about. The 4th Amendment of the Bill of Rights guarantees your right in the US to be free from unreasonable government searches. It's the reason that police have to get search warrants. Your right to not consent to a search is something most Americans take for granted. It also has been dying just a little bit every year for a long time. If this case had gone the other way, it would have meant that police could kick in anyone's door, as long as they brought a dog with them.

http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Justic...o-sniff-outside-your-door-Supreme-Court-rules

Drug dogs need a warrant to sniff outside your door, Supreme Court rules

March 26, 2013

When police brought a trained drug dog to the outside of a Florida home to sniff for evidence, that violated the homeowner's Fourth Amendment rights, the Supreme Court justices said in a 5-to-4 decision.

 

[taiyuu_otoko]

Thank God for the hoodies!

What's your opinion on those clowns broadcasting the audio of the gay marriage debate? I kinda think it's a bad idea. They might get the idea that they are celebrities or something.

 

[Bible_Belt]

Everybody knows how the gay marriage debate is going to end up; just like Roe V Wade, the court will say that they suddenly found the part in the Constitution that addresses the issue. Then it will become a Constitutional right, and just like abortion, every state law restricting it will get invalidated.

Personally, I don't care who gets married, but I am against the court suddenly reading new rights into the Constitution all the time. They always act like the right was there all the time, we could just never see it, like somebody spilled coffee on that part.

Much more disturbing to me was that in the case I linked to above, it was a 4-3 vote. Three supreme court justices are basically saying that police should be exempt from the 4th Amendment. It's not "the hoodies" that affects - it's everyone with a front door that they don't want kicked it.

Police dogs are notoriously inaccurate, when error of both dog and handler is taken into consideration. Usually the problem is the handler, but there are also a lot of sleazy dog trainers who scam police departments into paying $4,000 for a $400 German Shepherd because they pretend its trained. Judges are reluctant to validate those arguments, though, because it would throw out all searches that began with a dog and then the resulting convictions could get tossed, too.

 

[Bible_Belt]

A lot of it is about Federal government employees who want health insurance and benefits for their same-sex partners, which is what straight married people get. The US Government is just about to become even more broke.

 

[Deep Dish]

Bible_Belt:
Police dogs are notoriously inaccurate, when error of both dog and handler is taken into consideration. Usually the problem is the handler, but there are also a lot of sleazy dog trainers who scam police departments into paying $4,000 for a $400 German Shepherd because they pretend its trained.

It's not just inadvertent mistakes, the dogs can be intentionally tricked to give false alerts on cue.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MdOKUb0jQko
(watch from 23:33-26:05)

Case in point: the Nevada Highway Patrol.

http://www.8newsnow.com/story/18886948/2012/06/26/nhp-troopers-sue-department-over-k-9-program