Thursday, April 24, 2008

Expanding Probable Cause

The right against unreasonable searches and seizure was weakened by the Supreme Court in a unanimous decision in the case of Virginia v. Moore.

Virginia police violated procedure by searching a man they pulled over for an offense punishable by a citation. A citation does not justify a search, only an arrest allows that to happen, but he was searched anyway and the police found 16 grams of crack cocaine.

Among other things the court saw no historical reason why citations should be treated differently than arrests and that there is a legitimate government interest served in allowing the search to continue based on the discretion of the police at the scene. That's my best take anyway.

The case uses as precedence a notorious dispute from Lago Vista where a woman was arrested an detained for not wearing seat belts and having seat belts on her kids.