Date: Tue, 8 Dec 1998 09:20:57 -0800
Reply-To: Michael Harrnacker <harrnack@YAHOO.COM>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@vanagon.com>
From: Michael Harrnacker <harrnack@YAHOO.COM>
Subject: search of your van
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The topic of when/how a cop could search your van/bus was a hot topic
a few weeks ago. This might shed some light on the discussion:
U.S. Supreme Court Bans Searches In Traffic Cases
By James Vicini
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A unanimous U.S. Supreme Court ruled Tuesday
that the police may not do a full-blown search of motorists and their
vehicles if they have only been stopped and ticketed for routine
traffic violations.
The high court, in an opinion by Chief Justice William Rehnquist,
refused to give the police the same power to conduct a search in cases
of traffic citations as has existed since 1973 for motorists who have
been arrested.
The ruling was unusual in that the conservative-controlled court in
recent years has generally expanded the power of the police to conduct
searches and seizures of evidence, especially in traffic-stop
situations.
The ruling was a victory for the American Civil Liberties Union and a
defeat for police groups. The National Association of Police
Organizations told the high court that traffic stops were inherently
dangerous and posed a significant threat to the safety of law
enforcement officers.
The ruling's impact, however, will be limited as Iowa has been the
only state to allow a search of someone stopped for a traffic citation
-- a law that has been in effect since 1983.
The case involved an Iowa police officer who stopped Patrick Knowles
for speeding on March 6, 1996, in Newton, Iowa, and issued him a
citation rather than arresting him.
The officer then conducted a full search of the car, without Knowles'
consent or suspicion a crime may have been committed. He found
marijuana and a pot pipe, and arrested Knowles.
Knowles was convicted of possession of marijuana and sentenced to 90
days in jail. He sought to suppress the evidence on the grounds that
it was an illegal search.
Rehnquist said the search was authorized by state law, but nonetheless
violated the constitutional guarantee under the Fourth Amendment
protecting privacy rights and guarding against unreasonable searches
and seizures of evidence.
Rehnquist said searches have been allowed when a suspect has been
arrested because of concern for officer safety and because of the need
to discover and preserve evidence. These two conditions do not apply
to traffic citations, he said.
"While concern for officer safety ... may justify the 'minimal'
additional intrusion of ordering a driver and passengers out of the
car, it does not by itself justify the often considerably greater
intrusions attending a full ... search," Rehnquist wrote in the
six-page opinion.
He said officers have other independent ways to search for weapons and
protect themselves from danger, and concluded that the search was not
justified to get evidence.
"Once Knowles was stopped for speeding and issued a citation, all the
evidence necessary to prosecute that offense had been obtained,"
Rehnquist said.
"No further evidence of excessive speed was going to be found either
on the person of the offender or in the passenger compartment of the
car," he said.
If a police officer suspects the driver of an undetected crime, the
motorist then should be arrested, Rehnquist said.
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