Your bill is higher so you must be growing pot........such a gross injustice and a travesty to the limits government are supposed to have. Like the one where people are supposed to feel secure in their person and effects.
Sigh.....and some say we don't have a tyrannical government.....
This did make me want to find out what ever happened to the guy in Texas who entrapped the cops by growing legal plants in a house and video'd the raid.
It's worse than that. Just a short time ago a home was raided, with warrant in hand, because the couple bought hydroponics equipment. What the cops found was an indoor garden in their basement and apparently the whol place was thrashed pretty well in the search for contraband. Oh yeah, the couple were retired CIA agents with high end security clearances...maybe the beast was repaying them for any ills they had perpetrated upon others?
As for other posters, and the use of thermal imaging.
The use of the FLIR in this instance did not violate Supreme Court stare decisis. In Kyollo the court held that officers could not use technology not generally available to the public for purposes of determining what was going on within the HOME and the curtilage of the home without a warrant (of consent which always negates the need for a warrant). I think it would be insane to argue that the property owner in this instance did not give consent since he noticed the blood and called the police.
Further, the helicopter being outfitted with the FLIR is not a violation in and of itself so long as the technology installed on the aircraft is not used to violate the sanctity of the home or its curtilage without a warrant or consent. FLIR is a great technology that gives a very clear image based on thermal differences. Its legitimate uses are many and the possibility of its misuse is insufficient to keep it from being installed.