Beware The Campus Police

geisler writes: "According to the Chronicle of Higher Education, a professor at Virginia Tech had her computer seized so that university police could try to track down someone who emailed her. She was denied the chance to backup before the computer was taken, and there seems to be some differences in stories between her and the authorities."

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[bmasel]

VA Tech is a State School. Unlike the security department of a private employer, it's Police are State actors. As such, they are indeed constrained by the 4th Amendment, and any parallel language in the State Constitution.

Justice Scalia, in Krillo, the heat imaging case a year ago, still cites Katz (any relation?) favorably "As Justice Harlans oft-quoted concurrence described it, a Fourth Amendment search occurs when the government violates a subjective expectation of privacy that society recognizes as reasonable."

Widely accepted professional doctrines of Acedemic Freedom, as benchmarks of social expectations, can thus trump the University's Acceptable Use Policies.