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Federal Court Nixes Weeks of Warrantless Video Surveillance
An anonymous reader writes with this news from the EFF's Deep Links:
The public got an early holiday gift today when a federal court agreed with us that six weeks of continually video recording the front yard of someone's home without a search warrant violates the Fourth Amendment. In United States v. Vargas local police in rural Washington suspected Vargas of drug trafficking. In April 2013, police installed a camera on top of a utility pole overlooking his home. Even though police did not have a warrant, they nonetheless pointed the camera at his front door and driveway and began watching every day. A month later, police observed Vargas shoot some beer bottles with a gun and because Vargas was an undocumented immigrant, they had probable cause to believe he was illegally possessing a firearm. They used the video surveillance to obtain a warrant to search his home, which uncovered drugs and guns, leading to a federal indictment against Vargas.
I'm all for the forth amendment and all, but having a camera pointed to the outside of his house is no different than having a cop sitting outside the house in a car.
The courts are starting to recognize that using technology in ways like this is different. They've decided that placing a GPS tracker on your car is different than than following you around, and that using infrared scanning of your house is different than a visual inspection, and that searching through your smart phone when they arrest you is different than looking through your wallet.
The reason these things are looked at differently is that courts have recognized that our privacy protections, as conceived in the 18th century, still need to be enforced, and that technology makes violating privacy a lot less costly for law enforcement. That is, there were natural protections due to resource constraints - pervasive surveillance of every citizen was simply not possible. Just because a technology comes along that eliminates those resource requirements does not mean that privacy is no longer protected.
"Somebody has to do something. It's just incredibly pathetic it has to be us."
--- Jerry Garcia
Anything not forbidden to the Federal Government by the Constitution is allowed, assuming the appropriate laws are passed
You have this backwards. Everything is forbidden to the Federal Government, except that explicitly granted by the Constitution.
Prove anything by multiplying Huge Number times Tiny Number
No problem if plain sight from public property, but if they stuck it on the pole to see in the backyard that's otherwise obscured, that's a violation of privacy.
Actually, it is still a problem. Cyber-stalking, for one thing. The cops, without a warrant, have no more right to stalk someone than you do.
"Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
Anything not forbidden to the Federal Government by the Constitution is allowed, assuming the appropriate laws are passed
This is incorrect, anything not allowed the Federal Gov by the Constitution is forbidden. That's the opposite of what you said. The 9th and 10th amendments were added to clarify this point. This is why we have arguments about the scope of things like the general welfare clause.
This posting is provided 'AS IS' without warranty of any kind, implied or otherwise.
Anything not forbidden to the Federal Government by the Constitution is allowed, assuming the appropriate laws are passed.
Uhh, no. Rather it is quite the opposite.
"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people." http://www.law.cornell.edu/con...
Limited government, and explicitly so at the Federal level
Behold, this dreamer cometh. Come now, and let us slay him... and we shall see what will become of his dreams.
Do you let random people walk into your home any time of the day or night without knowing who they are?
If not, why should the United States?
Because a free market in labour is as important as a free market in goods.
I should use this sig to advertise my book ISBN-13 : 978-1501515132.
Won't work, the US military is too busy 'securing' other countries...
In the free world the media isn't government run; the government is media run.
Notably us white Northerners were not suddenly beset with swarthy skinned Southerners taking our jobs.
Which explains why David Cameron is trying to amend the freedom of movement to gain the ability to deport EU nationals that move to the UK without first securing employment. Or the borderline racism I personally observed in Sweden and Finland directed at EU nationals who moved there from the former Eastern Bloc.
You might ask why your American governments don't afford you the same freedoms.
You can freely move through the 50 States with more ease than EU nationals can establish themselves in another EU State. Common language and all, plus there's no such thing in the States as a residency permit for American citizens. But don't let the facts get in the way of your conceptions. :)
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
The powers of the federal government are lusted in Article I, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution. The Constitution says:
The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts ...
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.
You might want to read that last part twice. Anything not explicitly allowed to the feds is reserved to the states and the people.
By 1819, Chief Justice Marshall said the meaning of that is so clear that McCulloch didn't need to spend time belaboring the point, everyone knows the feds can only do what they are specifically authorized to do. Marshall wrote:
"This government is acknowledged by all, to be one of enumerated powers. The principle, that it can exercise only the powers granted to it, would seem too apparent, to have required to be enforced by all those arguments, which its enlightened friends, while it was depending before the people, found it necessary to urge; that principle is now universally admitted."
The Supreme Court does not interpret the constitution to be either completely restrictive of the Federal Government only to those powers and authorities granted to it by the Constitiution, nor is it completely free to do whatever it wants so long as it is not prohibited by the Constitution. An example is a federal bank. Nowhere in the Constitution does it say the Feds can have a bank, or create the Federal Reserve (try to find authority for this in the Constitution). Early on in the republic, there was a big fight over this. Eventually the Supreme Court decided that anything that was necessary and proper to effect the powers granted to the feds by the Constitution was allowed. So, a federal bank was allowed, because that was considered necessary and proper for collecting taxes, and spending the revenues collected. Many of the States Rights folks specifically raised the ninth and tenth amendment arguements, but they did not win with the Supremes. But not just anything is allowed. My guess is that if the Feds decided to open Federal Liquor Stores or have a Federal Lottery that would get struck down in the courts for being unnecessary and/or improper to effect some federal power. States can do these things, but the Feds probably can't. So, the real situation is not so black and white as either post tries to make it.
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It should also be noted that Federal law aside, the surveillance activities of the police is clearly against Washington State privacy laws.
In general, it is illegal for law enforcement to use ANY means that is not available to a casual passerby on the sidewalk, to see what is happening on private land. Using a stepladder on the sidewalk to look over the back fence is illegal without a warrant, as is the use of a drone, or even just standing in front of a house and peering through the front window with binoculars.
In general, the activity is undertaken specifically in order to see what cannot be casually seen, or is done over a period of time ("surveilling"), it is illegal without a warrant.