Court: No warrant needed to search cell phone

Scary ruling by the California Supreme Court, scary indeed.

The California Supreme Court ruled Monday that police can search the cell phone of a person who's been arrested -- including text messages -- without obtaining a warrant, and use that data as evidence. The ruling opens up disturbing possibilities, such as broad, warrantless searches of e-mails, documents and contacts on smart phones, tablet computers, and perhaps even laptop computers, according to legal expert Mark Rasch.

The majority of Justices found:

"The cell phone was an item (of personal property) on (Diaz's) person at the time of his arrest and during the administrative processing at the police station," the justices wrote. "Because the cell phone was immediately associated with defendant’s person, (police were) entitled to inspect its contents without a warrant."

The article goes on to say that this will logically be extended to include laptops. I phones and other smart phones are already included in this ruling, apparently.

Article here.

forget the writing on the wall...

... they are carving it on our foreheads!

reply to post by Oaktree


Jeeze!! Making it all so easy to just bypass the U S Constitution.

So my plan is.................Mr. kyred, give me your cell phone. I want to search it.
My response? Drop it on the ground or floor and stomp it. Might that work? I dunno.

What I'd really like to do in such a situation? Slam that cell phone upside the perp's head and just destroy it and it shatters into millions of pieces. Yeah, really. I would enjoy that, and also, in my fantasy, I would be hailed a hero and there would be a big parade, and the perp would go to prison for a very long time for being such a traitor to his/her own country.

Oh oh oh! And released from prison at an old age, and taken to a beach and told to swim to some other country, because you certainly don't belong here!

"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."

This ruling flies in the face of established law, which prohibits the warrantless search of briefcases by police, other than a quick search for weapons

The first few issues that come to mind are:

At the point of arrest, you are not guilty, and there is, presumably, no cause regarding the phone.

How long before this property is returned, if ever?

I can only believe that every divorced officer, of which there are many, have now been given the ability to verify their fears about their ex's actions,
meaning, if you are dating a cop's ex, you should now fully expect to be arrested for some charge, have your phone's call logs and text messages searched, and God forbid you are "found guilty" of dating this cop's ex, prepare for the beat down.

reply to post by pianopraze


It has long been my sincere belief that most cops have no respect for our Constitutional rights.
I believe their line of thought is
"Arrest the bad guys, get them off the street, throw every charge possible at them, and let the courts sort it out".

The fact that the Supreme court of CA. affirmed this line of thought terrifies me.

Originally posted by kyred
reply to post by Oaktree

 

Jeeze!! Making it all so easy to just bypass the U S Constitution.

So my plan is.................Mr. kyred, give me your cell phone. I want to search it.
My response? Drop it on the ground or floor and stomp it. Might that work? I dunno.

What I'd really like to do in such a situation? Slam that cell phone upside the perp's head and just destroy it and it shatters into millions of pieces. Yeah, really. I would enjoy that, and also, in my fantasy, I would be hailed a hero and there would be a big parade, and the perp would go to prison for a very long time for being such a traitor to his/her own country.

Oh oh oh! And released from prison at an old age, and taken to a beach and told to swim to some other country, because you certainly don't belong here!

Trippy that we both have had the same fantasy, except in mine, when released from prison at an old age, they'd already be in some other country.

Cuba (Guantanamo), perhaps? Or any other extraordinary rendition complacent country.

It would appear that a thread has already been started on this, Here.

For what it's worth, I searched the exact wording of the title of the article, and nothing showed.

My bad.

Originally posted by kyred
reply to post by Oaktree

 

Jeeze!! Making it all so easy to just bypass the U S Constitution.

So my plan is.................Mr. kyred, give me your cell phone. I want to search it.
My response? Drop it on the ground or floor and stomp it. Might that work? I dunno.

i can promise they would tack on "destroying evidence" to your list of charges pretty fast., then take out the sim card and get the info anyway.

Existing thread here:
www.abovetopsecret.com...

Please add further comments to the ongoing discussion.
Thank you







-thread closed-



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