fourth amendment

The United States Supreme Court has granted certiori in United States v. Jones, but they have also added an additional question for the parties to argue: "Whether the government violated respondent’s Fourth Amendment rights by  installing the GPS tracking device on his vehicle without a valid warrant and without his consent.”

This should be interesting, but I sincerely doubt that the Court will rule that as a violation of the Fourth Amendment.

The Supreme Court issued their opinion in Ashcroft v. al-Kidd earlier this week. And as expected, it has generated a lot of buzz among Fourth Amendment activists and Libertarians. On the surface, I would have to agree with the outcry that the Supreme Court was unanimously wrong.

After all, detaining an American citizen not involved in a crime as a "material witness" with no intention of using their testimony in court is wrong. So naturally, Reason must be right in saying that "Supreme Court Says Pretending to Detain People As Material Witnesses Is Constitutional".

About a week ago, the ACLU of Michigan issued a press release detailing its dealings with the Michigan State Police regarding the use of a device to extract data from cell phones during traffic stops. I found out about it through Mike McCarville's blog.

The ACLU asserts that these searches may be in violation of the Fourth Amendment. On the surface, it would seem that it would need to be determined whether cell phones are open or closed containers within an automobile, but because a traffic stop is not analogous to an arrest such determination is not necessary. Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1 (1968).

The Feds are still pushing for the clear legal ability to track your cell phone without a warrant.  Many people thought that, with the election of Barack Obama, that is issue would be over.  After all, it was supposedly struck from being explicit authorized by Bush's PATRIOT Act.

However, the Obama Administration takes the position that Americans have "no reasonable expectation of privacy" in their whereabouts, and therefore warrantless tracking of American citizens subjects should be permitted.  U.S. Dept. of Justice lawyers contend that your rights, which should be protected by the Fourth Amendment, are not violated when a phone company reveals records of your whereabouts to the government at their warrantless request.