{"id":991,"date":"2012-02-06T08:45:10","date_gmt":"2012-02-06T14:45:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/?p=991"},"modified":"2012-02-06T08:45:10","modified_gmt":"2012-02-06T14:45:10","slug":"same-results-different-reasoning","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/?p=991","title":{"rendered":"Same Results; Different Reasoning"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Last November, I wrote a blog<\/a> about how the Fourth Amendment is losing its meaning.\u00a0\u00a0 One of the examples I had used was the case of United States v. Jones<\/a>.\u00a0 The facts of the case are as follows:\u00a0\u00a0 Antoine Jones and Lawrence Maynard were business partners.\u00a0 In 2004, both were suspected of being involved in drug trafficking, so the FBI attached a Global Positioning System (GPS) to the Jeep that Jones drove \u2013 his wife\u2019s.\u00a0 A federal judge had issued a warrant to attach the GPS to Jones\u2019 vehicle, but the judge limited the warrant to the District of Columbia and for a specific ten-day period.\u00a0 FBI agents didn\u2019t get around to installing the GPS device until the 11th<\/sup> day, and then they attached it to the Jeep while it was parked in a public parking lot in Maryland.<\/p>\n

This case involves the question of 1) whether the warrantless use of a tracking device (GPS) on a vehicle to monitor its movements on public streets violates the Fourth Amendment, and 2) whether the government violated Jones\u2019 Fourth Amendment rights by attaching the GPS tracking device to his vehicle without seeking a valid warrant and without his consent.\u00a0 At the time of the posting, the United States Supreme Court was hearing oral arguments.<\/p>\n

On January 23, the Court handed down its decision.\u00a0 Yes, \u201cthe Government physically occupied private proper\u00adty for the purpose of obtaining information. [The Court has] no doubt that such a physical intrusion would have been considered a \u201csearch\u201d within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment when it was adopted.\u201d\u00a0 Justice Scalia, the self-appointed historian of the Bench, went on to justify the decision by using case law on trespass as old as the country.\u00a0 But Justice Stotomayor explained it best in her concurrence: \u00a0\u201c[T]he Gov\u00adernment installed a Global Positioning System (GPS) tracking device on respondent Antoine Jones\u2019 Jeep without a valid warrant and without Jones\u2019 consent, then used that device to monitor the Jeep\u2019s movements over the course of four weeks. The Government usurped Jones\u2019 property for the purpose of conducting surveillance on him, thereby invading privacy interests long afforded, and undoubtedly entitled to, Fourth Amendment protection.\u201d<\/p>\n

Stotomayor used a different reasoning than Scalia to come to the same conclusion.\u00a0 Citing People v. Weaver<\/a>, 12 N. Y. 3d 433, 441\u2013442, 909 N. E. 2d 1195, 1199 (2009), she noted that the GPS will go far beyond providing the government with information that will use as evidence; it will also include \u201c(\u2018trips to the psychiatrist, the plastic surgeon, the abortion clinic, the AIDS treatment center, the strip club, the criminal defense attorney, the by-the-hour motel, the union meet\u00ading, the mosque, synagogue or church, the gay bar and on and on\u2019)\u201d.\u00a0 Justice Stotomayor pointed out that she \u201cwould also consider the appropriateness of entrusting to the Executive, in the absence of any over\u00adsight from a coordinate branch, a tool so amenable to misuse, especially in light of the Fourth Amendment\u2019s goal to curb arbitrary exercises of police power to and prevent \u201ca too permeating police surveillance.\u201d\u00a0 We can agree with that!<\/p>\n

Both the majority and Stotomayor criticized Justice Alito\u2019s concurrence.\u00a0 Alito\u2019s opinion was well-thought out and brought technology into the frame of the argument.\u00a0 However, he lost me also when he began to compare this situation with tort law and then suggested that this matter be taken up by Congress and the states.\u00a0 \u201cA legislative body is well situ\u00adated to gauge changing public attitudes, to draw detailed lines, and to balance privacy and public safety in a com\u00adprehensive way.\u201d\u00a0 That statement makes me think that Justice Alito doesn\u2019t see the magnitude of the Fourth Amendment violation.\u00a0 I\u2019ve seen legislative bodies attempt to comply with constitutional questions.\u00a0 It isn\u2019t pretty.<\/p>\n

In any case (no pun intended), the Court came to correct conclusion.\u00a0 We can sigh a bit, smile, and know that some fragment of the Fourth Amendment remains \u2013 for now.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Last November, I wrote a blog about how the Fourth Amendment is losing its meaning.\u00a0\u00a0 One of the examples I had used was the case of United States v. Jones.\u00a0 The facts of the case are as follows:\u00a0\u00a0 Antoine Jones … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[42,17],"tags":[340,234,339,341,366,239,365,230,364],"class_list":["post-991","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-criminal-justice","category-issues","tag-fbi","tag-fourth-amendment","tag-global-positioning-system","tag-gps-tracking-device","tag-justice-alito","tag-justice-scalia","tag-justice-stotomayor","tag-united-states-supreme-court","tag-untied-states-v-jones"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/991","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=991"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/991\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":995,"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/991\/revisions\/995"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=991"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=991"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=991"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}