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Police Nation-Wide Use Wall-Penetrating Radars To Peer Into Homes
mi writes At least 50 U.S. law enforcement agencies have secretly equipped their officers with radar devices that allow them to effectively peer through the walls of houses to see whether anyone is inside. The device the Marshals Service and others are using, known as the Range-R, looks like a sophisticated stud-finder. Its display shows whether it has detected movement on the other side of a wall and, if so, how far away it is — but it does not show a picture of what's happening inside. The Range-R's maker, L-3 Communications, estimates it has sold about 200 devices to 50 law enforcement agencies at a cost of about $6,000 each. Other radar devices have far more advanced capabilities, including three-dimensional displays of where people are located inside a building, according to marketing materials from their manufacturers. One is capable of being mounted on a drone. And the Justice Department has funded research to develop systems that can map the interiors of buildings and locate the people within them.
No, we already have a ruling, Kyllo vs U.S. where the court quite clearly stated the limits of extra-sensory detection equipment:
"Where, as here, the Government uses a device that is not in general public use, to explore details of the home that would previously have been unknowable without physical intrusion, the surveillance is a "search" and is presumptively unreasonable without a warrant."
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
Actually, the distinction is "naked eye".
Katz v. United States.
There is a subsequent ruling that essentially allows a drone to spot what's in plain view in the backyard of a home, even if that stuff is within the curtilage behind a fence, but Katz seems to establish the right to privacy where one has a reasonable expectation of privacy, so long as there isn't a warrant.
Any technology that could see into someone's home through an opaque barrier would seem to be in violation of that.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.