4th amendment ruling

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This doesn't directly bear upon OC or even guns, but it may well affect any armed passengers/permit holdersin vehicles, so I thought I'd pass this along...

The Supreme Court ruled today that 4th amendment protections against unreasonable searches and seizures apply equally to occupants of motor behicles as to the drivers. LEOs had apparently claimed that only drivers had expectations of privacy and the right to refuse searches of their persons during stops. I don't have a direct link to this, and I'm just paraphrasing a radio report that I heard, but it's good to know that the Bill of Rights is still fighting for its life.

-ljp

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I will try to find. Are you looking to find it Legba

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Well, furtively... am attempting a gun inventory this week as well, so I'm distracted.

-ljp


p.s. Here we go - the 1st link I came across:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/06/18/AR2007061800449.html?hpid=topnews

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Wow...

So if I get pulled over, anybody else in the car can just up and leave the vehicle and not have to provide id and just walk on home. The Cop can't do anything about the Passengers????

Please Correct me if I'm wrong.

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UTOC-45-44 wrote:

Wow...

So if I get pulled over, anybody else in the car can just up and leave the vehicle and not have to provide id and just walk on home. The Cop can't do anything about the Passengers????

Please Correct me if I'm wrong.

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Passengers in vech is one of those gray areas. Most of the time, if you get out and walk off, the cop is likely to chase you down and detain you. What this court ruling said that if car is stop and it's found that officer didn't have "reasonable suspesion" (I think that's required for traffic, LEO229 could confirm) to conduct the stop, anything that came up related to passenger would be thrown out.

I think probable cause is still required for LEO to force ID out of any passenger.

In any case, this ruling just confirms that if cops want to stop a car, they need to have a valid reason. Most officers attempt to get that before stopping a vechicle.

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The question answered was narrow folks - if the car stop was unconstitutional, passengers have standing to move to suppress evidence subsequently seized from them even if seized pursuant to Terry stop frisk, etc.

That's it.

The CA AG argued that since as a technical matter, the passengers are free to walk away in a traffic stop, that they were not seized and had no standing. The CA AG lost.

The SC now says that as passenegrs probably don't feel like they can leave the scene, they cannot be lawfully searched if the car was stopped unconstitutionally to begin with.

Don't take the analysis 2-5 steps down the road - it will make your head hurt - and that is not what the court did today.

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Legba wrote:

This doesn't directly bear upon OC or even guns, but it may well affect any armed passengers/permit holdersin vehicles, so I thought I'd pass this along...

The Supreme Court ruled today that 4th amendment protections against unreasonable searches and seizures apply equally to occupants of motor behicles as to the drivers. LEOs had apparently claimed that only drivers had expectations of privacy and the right to refuse searches of their persons during stops. I don't have a direct link to this, and I'm just paraphrasing a radio report that I heard, but it's good to know that the Bill of Rights is still fighting for its life.

-ljp

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The way I am reading this is that SCOTUS ruled that a passenger can challenge the legality of the stop because they are "seized" at the time of the stop.

Passengers have always been protected from unreasonable search and siezure. This ruling doesn't affirm that it simply says they can challenge the stop itself.

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joeroket wrote:

The way I am reading this is that SCOTUS ruled that a passenger can challenge the legality of the stop because they are "seized" at the time of the stop.

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Yes, but they are seized because they will reasonably feel like they canniot levae, and their journey is affected - not that they are legally seized and can;t get out and walk away.

Don't try to understand it - suppression case law is tortured.