Radley Balko’s post on an attention-hungry ex-narc reverse stinging drug agents brought me to the Supreme Court decision Kyllo v. United States. It declared use of a thermal imaging device to constitute a “search”, requiring a warrant. I think that’s wrong, for the reasons Stevens gives in the wikipedia summary. Why should cops not be allowed to do something any member of the general public could do without a warrant? If the house is emitting something (heat, smoke, noise, flashing lights) are they obligated to ignore it? If the Fourth Amendment were viewed simply as a property right (which I would prefer), this would be a no-brainer. Cops busting into your house without a warrant would constitute breaking & entering, just as it would for any criminal, and there would be repercussions if they didn’t find any evidence to use against you in court (the only time when the Fourth Amendment through the exclusionary rule goes into effect in our current system).
December 6, 2008
I’m with Stevens against Scalia for less restrictions on cops
Posted by teageegeepea under Uncategorized[6] Comments
December 6, 2008 at 3:00 pm
Although the point about the thermal imager is quite reasonable, I doubt the police would ever accept your second point.
There should be repercussions if cops burst in without a warrant, whether they find evidence against you or not. Otherwise no one can have a reasonable expectation of safety in their homes – and cops would have even more reasons to plant evidence.
December 7, 2008 at 2:08 pm
I think the thing is you could watch people having sex with these things. If there’s two people lying on each other on a bed…?
December 7, 2008 at 4:11 pm
I don’t know if that’s possible, but as a Transparent Society booster I wouldn’t mind. The exclusionary rule wouldn’t prevent cops from peeping on folks, as long as they don’t present it as evidence in court.
December 8, 2008 at 9:35 am
We haven’t even scratched the surface of how powerful and omnipresent remote sensing can get. Allowing one method without a warrant and you’ve set a precedent for effectively allowing cameras into every room of every home in the country.
I understand we have a philosophical difference on the transparency of society, but you’ll have to admit the above would be a hard sell.
December 8, 2008 at 10:16 pm
A lot of my ideas are unpopular, and I have no intention of selling them. Part of Brin’s idea is that surveillance will become so easy that people won’t have an option to be free of it and their opinion won’t really matter.
February 3, 2009 at 11:48 pm
[…] Uncategorized UPDATE: Barnett tries to justify his prohibition of comments. I’ve complained about the exclusionary rule before, which protects both police and civilian criminals from […]