Unreasonable Search And Siezure

[steve_bank]

Fourth Amendment

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.

What constitues unreasonable search and seizure?

Yesterday I was waiting for a bus near 3rd and Pike in Seattle. There was a crowd of young people hanging around smoking pot and listening to music. The spot and a few oers are known for drugs.

Recently the police have been making arrests at that spot. The police says it is fentanyl, cocaine, meth, and heroin.

Is it unreasonable search for the police to show up and search each person in the crowd? People in the crowd know what is going on. It Iis an open air drug market.

Go to an airport which is a public venue and you are subject to search.

Can an area in a city have a requirement to be searched for entry?

 

[ZiprHead]

Pot is legal here in Michigan. Smoking it in public is still illegal. I assume that's what's going on here.

 

[Gun Nut]

Fourth Amendment

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.

What constitues unreasonable search and seizure?

Probable cause. The argument would be around standing at a bus stop in a known drug area being probable cause or not. I say not... unless the police can prove there was no intent to take a bus AND there was an intent to commit a crime... which sounds to me like quite a difficult thing to be able to prove without some kind of audio / video evidence of the planning of a crime or something like that.

 

[Jarhyn]

Fourth Amendment

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.

What constitues unreasonable search and seizure?

Probable cause. The argument would be around standing at a bus stop in a known drug area being probable cause or not. I say not... unless the police can prove there was no intent to take a bus AND there was an intent to commit a crime... which sounds to me like quite a difficult thing to be able to prove without some kind of audio / video evidence of the planning of a crime or something like that.

Imagine a bus stop which serves a single route.

The bus comes and goes but the person at the stop remains. The bus has a camera and records this fact.

I would think the presence of drugs or a single observed sale in the "cloud" of social activity of the persons who let the lone bus come and go would be a cue to probable cause of underground economic participation.

That said, one must ask whether this can be addressed in some less violent or active way, perhaps by making a less "underground" surface that is a "harder target" for violence with legal protections against dispute where someone can get those products at similar prices while supporting their local communities economically.

 

[bilby]

Imagine a bus stop which serves a single route.

The bus comes and goes but the person at the stop remains. The bus has a camera and records this fact.

People hang around at bus stops without catching a bus all the time.

I doubt they're all criminals.

I routinely observe:

People taking advantage of the bus shelter for shade or to get out of the rain

Construction workers using the benches as a lunch venue

Elderly people using the benches for a brief rest from walking

People waiting for someone who is arriving by bus

People eating or drinking who hang around until they're done because there's a handy litter bin

People hanging around for no obvious reason at all

It's pretty annoying, as it's difficult to tell whether it's necessary to stop for them. But it's not illegal, and it's not evidence of illegal activity or intent.

 

[Jarhyn]

Imagine a bus stop which serves a single route.

The bus comes and goes but the person at the stop remains. The bus has a camera and records this fact.

People hang around at bus stops without catching a bus all the time.

I doubt they're all criminals.

I routinely observe:

People taking advantage of the bus shelter for shade or to get out of the rain

Construction workers using the benches as a lunch venue

Elderly people using the benches for a brief rest from walking

People waiting for someone who is arriving by bus

People eating or drinking who hang around until they're done because there's a handy litter bin

People hanging around for no obvious reason at all

It's pretty annoying, as it's difficult to tell whether it's necessary to stop for them. But it's not illegal, and it's not evidence of illegal activity or intent.

There are several behavior patterns I have observed which tend towards different conclusions: 2-5 folks hanging out, one of which makes a drug sale to someone else just getting off the bus, on a route with only one bus.

Or, you pop open the door to drop folks off and they're just sayin' "go fast, go fast" out there like that doesn't mean "I'm selling hard stimulants".

 

[Bronzeage]

Fourth Amendment

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.

What constitues unreasonable search and seizure?

Yesterday I was waiting for a bus near 3rd and Pike in Seattle. There was a crowd of young people hanging around smoking pot and listening to music. The spot and a few oers are known for drugs.

Recently the police have been making arrests at that spot. The police says it is fentanyl, cocaine, meth, and heroin.

Is it unreasonable search for the police to show up and search each person in the crowd? People in the crowd know what is going on. It Iis an open air drug market.

Go to an airport which is a public venue and you are subject to search.

Can an area in a city have a requirement to be searched for entry?

Body frisks and searches are the murkiest part of "reasonable search" law. Police have been granted the power to protect themselves by insuring the person they want to question is not armed. Fair enough. Also, a person can give permission to search, but that's murkier still. What constitutes freely giving permission. We've all seen videos of police overstepping the letter of the law and just as many videos of a citizen demanding to know, "Am I under arrest?"

Policy does not exist in a vacuum and it doesn't exist for no reason. If the police are targeting people in a specific area, it's because someone decided they didn't want people to hang around that area. A lot of policy consists of little more than "find the poorest person around and make their life more difficult." Illegal drug use sucks money out of the lowest strata of the economy, so it's social effects are easy to see. Crimes against property and person are higher in poorer neighborhoods as what little money there is gets recycled through burglary and robbery and into drug purchases. It's a lot easier to catch a drug user/buyer on the corner, than a guy kicking in an apartment door.

As we all learned from the Uvalde school shooting, the police are not here to protect us. It's just a coincidental effect and if there's not too much risk involved, we get a little protection. In the meantime, they have to look like they are doing something.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

I would think the presence of drugs or a single observed sale in the "cloud" of social activity of the persons who let the lone bus come and go would be a cue to probable cause of underground economic participation.

That said, one must ask whether this can be addressed in some less violent or active way, perhaps by making a less "underground" surface that is a "harder target" for violence with legal protections against dispute where someone can get those products at similar prices while supporting their local communities economically.

That wouldn't be enough for me, I would want to see an extended pattern of not getting on the bus.

More than once I've seen my SIL choose to let a subway train go past because she felt it was crowded, waiting for the next one was likely to let us ride sitting instead of standing. (Her city, we deferred to her judgment. At high demand there would be little chance of sitting, at low demand there's seats, but there's a middle range where some trains will be standing room only and others will have seats.) There certainly could be other reasons to skip a particular bus. It's also possible they were waiting for someone they expected to come by bus.

 

[Gospel]

Body frisks and searches are the murkiest part of "reasonable search" law. Police have been granted the power to protect themselves by insuring the person they want to question is not armed.

Bullshit, the police have no duty to protect (themselves).

 

[Bronzeage]

Body frisks and searches are the murkiest part of "reasonable search" law. Police have been granted the power to protect themselves by insuring the person they want to question is not armed.

Bullshit, the police have no duty to protect (themselves).

You know how when the flight attendant is demonstrating the oxygen mask and tells you to put yours on first, before helping someone else put theirs own? It's that sort of "protecting yourself" kind of thing.

 

[Gospel]

Body frisks and searches are the murkiest part of "reasonable search" law. Police have been granted the power to protect themselves by insuring the person they want to question is not armed.

Bullshit, the police have no duty to protect (themselves).

You know how when the flight attendant is demonstrating the oxygen mask and tells you to put yours on first, before helping someone else put theirs own? It's that sort of "protecting yourself" kind of thing.

My comment is based on a supreme court ruling (twice). If the duty to protect themselves was put before the supreme court, I'm inclined to believe the courts would side with me.

What part of reality is your fantasy analogy based on? The way I see it the court would say they don't have duty to put a mask on anyone including themselves.

 

[Gospel]

Then again, maybe it's a custodial relationship thing. Working for the state can mean the state has a responsibility to keep an officer safe.

 

[atrib]

Is it unreasonable search for the police to show up and search each person in the crowd? People in the crowd know what is going on. It Iis an open air drug market.

It is. Unless the police have probable cause to believe that every single person in the crowd has done something illegal, is doing something illegal, or is about to do something illegal. As to whether the police actually conduct illegal searches on a habitual basis is a different matter altogether.

Go to an airport which is a public venue and you are subject to search.

Can an area in a city have a requirement to be searched for entry?

Portions of the airport open to the general public do not require searches to enter. Only secured areas that are accessible only to the people with boarding passes require a search (and Secure ID) to enter.

The government cannot make a law to allow all public areas to be subject to searches. Specific areas, like the airport secured area, courts, and certain sensitive government facilities can be designated as secured areas that do require a search to enter. It is unlikely that the city government could designate a public bus stop serving local commuter traffic as a secured area simply because the area is also used for drug sales. There are other solutions to deter the drug trafficking, like placing uniformed officers on patrol at the location, than to subject every single commuter from having to go through a search before they are allowed to travel. It is a matter of balance, public interest and safety versus the constitutional rights of the ppeople.

 

[bilby]

It is a matter of balance, public interest and safety versus the constitutional rights of the ppeople

Public interest is the goal of striking a balance.

Safety is an imposition, and the constitutional rights of people are just a bunch of hot air that's two hundred years out of date, unless they are interpreted as embodying the principle of maximum individual freedom (in which case, just say "freedom"; your nation's constitution is, at best, a dated subset of that ideal).

It's a matter of balance between law and freedom, which are polar opposites.

People, organisations, and institutions (including, notably, political parties) that promote "law and order" are, necessarily and unavoidably, opposing freedom by doing so.

The opposite of freedom is law.

If you don't care much for freedom, it's perfectly reasonable for police to search random people on the most flimsy of pretexts, or none at all. Guilt by association is fine; Guilt by suspicion is also fine. If you suspect that some people at a bus stop might be dealing drugs, it's therefore perfectly fine to have police search them all. If you don't care much for freedom.

The problem is that Americans have come to misuse the word "freedom" to mean "stuff I personally approve of", which is absurd - freedom is always primarily about other people, and to what extent you want them to be bound by rules and laws. The impact on you as an advocate for law (or for freedom) is secondary.

"I believe in freedom and the rule of law" is typically used to mean "I should be allowed to do what I please, and you should not", rather than that the two polar opposites should be balanced for the greatest benefit to society as a whole.