I'm not arguing that the police were in the right in this case, and you're right that the trunk is not (normally) plain-view. I objected to ONE SINGLE SENTENCE in your argument: that all searches without a warrant are unconstitutional.
Also: don't ask if they have a warrant. If they have a warrant, then they won't ask your permission, and if they have probable cause, then they won't ask your permission either. What you say is "I don't consent to any searches." Because guess what? Just because they have a piece of paper saying that they have a warrant does not mean that they have a lawful warrant.
But if cops show up with an unlawful warrant, and ask to search your house, and you say "well, you do have a warrant... so ok." Guess what happens to the unlawful warrant? It's now irrelevant because you just gave them consent to search anyways. So, even though your lawyer could argue that the warrant was unlawfully obtained and thus invalid, and all evidence should be thrown out, the prosecution is going to ask you, "when they showed up, they asked to search your place, you said 'do you have a warrant' and they said 'yes' (N.B. the police are allowed to lie), to which you then consented to a search. Is this a true statement of fact?" When you answer yes, because you're not allowed to lie, they then point out that the search was consensual, and so the defect of the warrant is irrelevant.
What is their reasonable cause to make me slow down or stop in the first place? None.
They're a border control point, they're stopping EVERYONE. The courts have consistently ruled that if you're stopping everyone utilizing a privilege, then there is no unlawful stop.
Try and use this argument for coming into the country, and see how far you get...
Whats with all the logic?! I wanna hear more about how much the cops suck because someone had something in their possession that was illegal. I get people want to smoke it and I could care less but its illegal people need to stop complaining when they get caught.
Ok, two things here: yeah, most people should stop complaining when they get caught. but two) if the cops overstep their lawful powers, and the person never would have been caught if the police had followed the law, then damn fucking straight a person should be pissed.
The government is held to a different standard than most people, because they hold the monopoly on force. As a result, the government cannot let the ends justify the means. The government, and their agents must always be acting as faithfully within the law as possible.
The problem here is that people seem to think that the police shouldn't be allowed to have a drug dog sniff their car, because that somehow violates their 4th amendment rights. But they all forget about the myriad other issues that come into lawful and constitutional searches that do not involve a warrant.
They stop, inconvenience, hassle, and attempt intimidation indiscriminately, i.e.WITH NO REASONABLE CAUSE.
No, they stop and ask you some questions about your citizenship status, and generally where are you coming from and where are you going.
They don't need probable cause to stop YOU because they're stopping everyone.
Cops can't ask you for your papers on the street without cause, but you would probably argue that they can take a picture of your face with a smart phone and detain you "for a reasonable amount of time" while the picture is uploaded and checked against their databases to their heart's content, all without violating your rights.
This has nothing to do with the initiation of a stop. Once a stop is lawful, and then for the entire reasonable duration of that stop, the cops can have a drug dog or look into your vehicle or whatever.
Namely, a cop can't single you out, and stop you on the road and then bring in a dog and search you. No, because the stop isn't lawful in the first place. However, if a cop stops you for speeding, and a K-9 unit just happens to pull up behind them (or was just tagging along to behind with, or was the actual unit that stopped you), then while they're proceeding at a reasonable pace to handle the original stop, the dog can take a walk around your car: that is legal, because THE ORIGINAL STOP WAS LAWFUL.
This isn't just some bullshit that I'm pulling out of a hat like most slashdog lay lawyers and people who like to pretend like they know what the law is... this is supported arguments based on ACTUAL SUPREME COURT PRESIDENT. (Illinois v. Caballes) If you don't like what I'm saying, then arrange a test case, and get it taken to the Supreme Court, until then, stop bitching, it's established law.
It doesn't have to be strictly passive, because IT HAS LEFT YOUR CAR.
It may have left their car, but that doesn't mean they should be able to stop you and order the dog to search around so they can try to punish people for victimless crimes.
They're not stopping you to let the dog search around your car, they're stopping you to ask you a few questions, etc. I've been through these border control points quite a number of times. You stop, they ask you some basic questions about your citizenship status.
And due to the finding in Illinois v. Caballes they can walk their dog around your car while doing so.
Wrong. Police officers can react to anything that is in "plain sight", meaning anything that escapes from your car, be it photons or small particles which we refer to as "scent"
Not true. The U.S. Supreme Court, which ruled in U.S. v. Kyllo (2001) that the police can not use infrared cameras to locate "suspicious" concentrations of heat in private places and then get warrants to search. So anything that escapes is not "in plain sight".
The ruling in U.S. v. Kyllo (2001) held that the police cannot use equipment not available to the general public to perform searches of a person's home. The home has always had a very strong 4th amendment protection, while cars have less so. Namely, you almost always need a warrant to search a person's house, rather than just reasonable cause for suspicion. (If you see a kilo of coke brought into a house, you need a warrant. If you see a kilo of coke placed into a car, you can stop and search on reasonable suspicion after it leaves the person's property.)
The SCOTUS also held in Illinois v. Caballes that the Fourth Amendment is not violated when the use of a drug-sniffing dog during a routine traffic stop does not unreasonably prolong the length of the stop.
It doesn't have to be strictly passive, because IT HAS LEFT YOUR CAR.
The police can dumpster dive in your trash for all the evidence that they want without a warrant, because you've already disclaimed ownership and thus it is no longer your property, which means that you have no right to be secure that it will not be searched or seized.
Cops are generally allowed to be as vigorous in their plain-view search as they want to be, as long as they do not actually intrude into the space of your vehicle. (But they can only perform such a search for a "reasonable amount of time", otherwise they are detaining you, which they need reasonable cause to do. But their plain-view search is not limited by the 4th amendment search and seizure rights.)
But then all of this was to counter your point #2: "2.) Any search without a warrant is unconstitutional". No, there are constitutional searches that occur without a warrant. If a cop sees you stuff a kilo of coke into your backpack, then he has a specific and articulable fact to justify reasonable cause for a search.
So, stop being an idiot for two seconds, and realize that cops DO NOT HAVE TO ALWAYS HAVE A WARRANT.
In the process of making decaf coffee, they produce raw caffeine, which they can then add to soft drinks, and stay-awake pills.
Your Mountain Dew comes as a direct result of my decaf coffee!
This new variant will reduce the amount of raw caffeine available, or they will have to start growing crops just for the caffeine content, but it doesn't make sense to do this at all, when they could just keep making decaf coffee.
Also, caffeine is an insecticide. These uncaffeinated coffee plants will be more susceptible to pests, and thus be more difficult to raise, or require more pesticides to keep them healthy.
1.) Anything action which is intended to result in evidence is a "search" 2.) Any search without a warrant is unconstitutional
Most people agree with #2 but not #1 -- certainly not the courts. I'm baffled how educated judges could look at a situation where a drug-sniffing dog is sniffing around cars looking for drugs, and not construe that as a search. No matter how you try to justify that, it's absurd.
Because it would be ludicrous for a judge to rule that the pound of coke just sitting on your passenger seat is unconstitutional to find if they don't have a specific warrant for it.
It's called the "plain sight" rule, and it makes perfect legal sense. If the cops just happen to see something, then they should be able to act upon it, the same as if they see you commit a crime, they don't have to wait for an arrest warrant, they can seize you right there.
The "plain scent" rule as I might call it, is just an extension of the plain sight rule: if it comes out of your car, then the police can gather that evidence without your consent. As it is no longer _IN_ your car, it's now outside of your car, and thus not yours anymore. (The same with garbage. Police don't need a warrant to collect evidence from your garbage, because you've thrown it out, and already rejected any claim to ownership to it.)
If you're sending a dog around to sniff a vehicle you've randomly chosen, you're *already* performing the search before the dog alerts. The use of the dog is *part* of the search process.
Wrong. Police officers can react to anything that is in "plain sight", meaning anything that escapes from your car, be it photons or small particles which we refer to as "scent".
They already stop EVERYONE (when they're open) and ask you a few simple questions. If they see a kilo of coke sitting in the passenger seat, then that gives them reasonable cause for a search. If they smell pot, then that gives them reasonable cause for a search. If a dog alerts to pot, then that gives them reasonable cause for a search.
At no point are they actually searching you in the legal sense, you were just retarded enough to let your crime become evident outside of your car. (They do not need a warrant to look at your car, or smell your car.)
So, either basic logic escapes you, or you're simply unaware that they don't just have random dogs wandering around the checkpoint aimlessly. I'm betting it's the prior.
I've been through these checkpoints a lot. They don't normally have random dogs wandering around, but it wouldn't surprise me that for SXSW, they would bring dogs out and have them just hanging out near where the cars stop. (They stop one at a time.)
The reality is the west Texas I-10 check point outside El Paso may be 30-40 miles from the city, but that stretch of I-10 closely (within 2-5 miles) parallel's the border for about 50-60 miles, and the checkpoint is located where the highway/border start to diverege.
What about the border checkpoint between Las Cruces and Truth or Consequences?
She selects this password: allthatiwantforyoumysonistobesatisfied
This assumes that you're trying to brute force it, and you're not using a dictionary attack that is aided by a markov chain, so that the brute forcing algorithm only uses words that it has seen together. In fact, using the markov chain, you can try all the most likely combinations of words first.
He's reminding us what female pubes are supposed to look like.
... I know that our pubes are triangular shaped, but this has a gap in the middle, like it's just two lines come together. If you want that sort of pube hedging on a girl, that seems quite a bit odd... it would be like a double landing strip or something...
The first link (filament/coronal sphere event) is apparently a wrong link and not what the poster is referring to. Try the second link for a flat photo, third link for the SDO interactive camera page. I tried the AIA settings; it shows up in a lot of them. This may be a "standard" event (I have no clue one way or the other), but it's monstrously large; I'd love an explanation or link to similar solar event if it's not totally anomalous.
If I'm seeing what everyone is going on about, it's just two lines that meet at a common point. WTF? There's nothing special about this.
v --- LOOK! IT'S A TRIANGLE... OH NO! THERE'S ANOTHER ONE THERE, TOO!
Honestly, it's a perfectly valid point that there are no reasonable accommodations that a company could make to permit a psychopath to be a complete asshole.
But then, this is the whole point, because it's a slope, and the legal world is deathly afraid of slippery slopes (so much so, that each Bill of Rights amendment has to be explicitly incorporated against the states, and as such it's still possible that your state could quarter National Guard troops in your house). And because they're so afraid of slippery slopes, they usually interpret protected classes in the most harshly narrow constraints possible.
For example, there is a protected class against sexism. But what about transsexuals? If they're being fired for being transsexual, then that clearly means that they're being discriminated against on account of sex, right? Nope, not according to US federal law. But what about women who dress too feminine, or women who don't dress feminine enough? Good news, the Supreme Court has ruled that discrimination as a result of not conforming to gender stereotypes is discrimination based on sex. But back to transsexuals now, they're being discriminated against because they're rejecting gender stereotypes and going to an extreme of gender stereotype non-conformance. Well, it turns out that now that we've said that gender stereotype discrimination is not allowed, "there is no point at which non-conformity with gender stereotypes becomes so drastic as to not be protected", so some federal courts have started holding that transsexuals are part of the protected status of sex.
The whole point of the matter is that the courts are super crazy careful about letting legal president avalanche down a slope, even when it's not a slippery one.
And it all also comes down to reasonable accommodation. Sure, blind people are a protected class of disability, but that doesn't mean that they have to be hired or kept for a job that involves say hypothetically, sorting M&M's. There is no way for there to be reasonable accommodations for that job.
I fail to see how "green-eyed" people are any less of a race than "dark-skinned" people. If you get racial protection for having brown skin, why shouldn't the same protections apply for having green eyes? Because it's a different organ?
Because "race" is a quasi-defined legal concept, and it does not apply to "green-eyed" people.
It's a court, with a judge. IANAL but I imagine that the judge can garnish the contents of any bank account you may own in order to pay for an attorney that the court appoints.
I suspect you forfeit your right to an attorney by refusing to pay if you are able, and that your right to representation is still supported by your right to conduct your own defense.
No, and no. See your sibling post, that's what a judge would do.
You can't just say "I can't afford an attorney". If you have any money in the bank, or if you have a job, or both, you don't get a court-appointed attorney.
Well, if you're willing to be a test case, and willing to sit for awhile (a long time) in jail, refuse to retain a lawyer on your own dime, and refuse to forfeit your right to representation. Without refusing to forfeit your right to representation, the court likely cannot constitutionally proceed without appointing a lawyer to represent you.
Of course, you would also probably have to sue and appeal to get the judgement in your favor, which would require a lawyer...
But then I did preface all of this with "willing to get screwed"...
Slashdot Mirror
I'm not arguing that the police were in the right in this case, and you're right that the trunk is not (normally) plain-view. I objected to ONE SINGLE SENTENCE in your argument: that all searches without a warrant are unconstitutional.
Also: don't ask if they have a warrant. If they have a warrant, then they won't ask your permission, and if they have probable cause, then they won't ask your permission either. What you say is "I don't consent to any searches." Because guess what? Just because they have a piece of paper saying that they have a warrant does not mean that they have a lawful warrant.
But if cops show up with an unlawful warrant, and ask to search your house, and you say "well, you do have a warrant... so ok." Guess what happens to the unlawful warrant? It's now irrelevant because you just gave them consent to search anyways. So, even though your lawyer could argue that the warrant was unlawfully obtained and thus invalid, and all evidence should be thrown out, the prosecution is going to ask you, "when they showed up, they asked to search your place, you said 'do you have a warrant' and they said 'yes' (N.B. the police are allowed to lie), to which you then consented to a search. Is this a true statement of fact?" When you answer yes, because you're not allowed to lie, they then point out that the search was consensual, and so the defect of the warrant is irrelevant.
What is their reasonable cause to make me slow down or stop in the first place? None.
They're a border control point, they're stopping EVERYONE. The courts have consistently ruled that if you're stopping everyone utilizing a privilege, then there is no unlawful stop.
Try and use this argument for coming into the country, and see how far you get...
Whats with all the logic?! I wanna hear more about how much the cops suck because someone had something in their possession that was illegal. I get people want to smoke it and I could care less but its illegal people need to stop complaining when they get caught.
Ok, two things here: yeah, most people should stop complaining when they get caught. but two) if the cops overstep their lawful powers, and the person never would have been caught if the police had followed the law, then damn fucking straight a person should be pissed.
The government is held to a different standard than most people, because they hold the monopoly on force. As a result, the government cannot let the ends justify the means. The government, and their agents must always be acting as faithfully within the law as possible.
The problem here is that people seem to think that the police shouldn't be allowed to have a drug dog sniff their car, because that somehow violates their 4th amendment rights. But they all forget about the myriad other issues that come into lawful and constitutional searches that do not involve a warrant.
They stop, inconvenience, hassle, and attempt intimidation indiscriminately, i.e.WITH NO REASONABLE CAUSE.
No, they stop and ask you some questions about your citizenship status, and generally where are you coming from and where are you going.
They don't need probable cause to stop YOU because they're stopping everyone.
Cops can't ask you for your papers on the street without cause, but you would probably argue that they can take a picture of your face with a smart phone and detain you "for a reasonable amount of time" while the picture is uploaded and checked against their databases to their heart's content, all without violating your rights.
This has nothing to do with the initiation of a stop. Once a stop is lawful, and then for the entire reasonable duration of that stop, the cops can have a drug dog or look into your vehicle or whatever.
Namely, a cop can't single you out, and stop you on the road and then bring in a dog and search you. No, because the stop isn't lawful in the first place. However, if a cop stops you for speeding, and a K-9 unit just happens to pull up behind them (or was just tagging along to behind with, or was the actual unit that stopped you), then while they're proceeding at a reasonable pace to handle the original stop, the dog can take a walk around your car: that is legal, because THE ORIGINAL STOP WAS LAWFUL.
This isn't just some bullshit that I'm pulling out of a hat like most slashdog lay lawyers and people who like to pretend like they know what the law is... this is supported arguments based on ACTUAL SUPREME COURT PRESIDENT. (Illinois v. Caballes) If you don't like what I'm saying, then arrange a test case, and get it taken to the Supreme Court, until then, stop bitching, it's established law.
It doesn't have to be strictly passive, because IT HAS LEFT YOUR CAR.
It may have left their car, but that doesn't mean they should be able to stop you and order the dog to search around so they can try to punish people for victimless crimes.
They're not stopping you to let the dog search around your car, they're stopping you to ask you a few questions, etc. I've been through these border control points quite a number of times. You stop, they ask you some basic questions about your citizenship status.
And due to the finding in Illinois v. Caballes they can walk their dog around your car while doing so.
Mt. Dew is corn-poison. I'm a San Pelligrino guy - cos I like the size of the bubbles.
And what about the throwback Mt. Dew?
Seriously, high fructose corn syrup isn't "poison"... it's actually in fact the same mix of glucose-fructose as is in honey.
Even regular sugar is dangerous in large quantities (true, HFCS appears to be worse, but then so would honey).
Wrong. Police officers can react to anything that is in "plain sight", meaning anything that escapes from your car, be it photons or small particles which we refer to as "scent"
Not true. The U.S. Supreme Court, which ruled in U.S. v. Kyllo (2001) that the police can not use infrared cameras to locate "suspicious" concentrations of heat in private places and then get warrants to search. So anything that escapes is not "in plain sight".
The ruling in U.S. v. Kyllo (2001) held that the police cannot use equipment not available to the general public to perform searches of a person's home. The home has always had a very strong 4th amendment protection, while cars have less so. Namely, you almost always need a warrant to search a person's house, rather than just reasonable cause for suspicion. (If you see a kilo of coke brought into a house, you need a warrant. If you see a kilo of coke placed into a car, you can stop and search on reasonable suspicion after it leaves the person's property.)
The SCOTUS also held in Illinois v. Caballes that the Fourth Amendment is not violated when the use of a drug-sniffing dog during a routine traffic stop does not unreasonably prolong the length of the stop.
It is not a strictly passive search.
It doesn't have to be strictly passive, because IT HAS LEFT YOUR CAR.
The police can dumpster dive in your trash for all the evidence that they want without a warrant, because you've already disclaimed ownership and thus it is no longer your property, which means that you have no right to be secure that it will not be searched or seized.
Cops are generally allowed to be as vigorous in their plain-view search as they want to be, as long as they do not actually intrude into the space of your vehicle. (But they can only perform such a search for a "reasonable amount of time", otherwise they are detaining you, which they need reasonable cause to do. But their plain-view search is not limited by the 4th amendment search and seizure rights.)
But then all of this was to counter your point #2: "2.) Any search without a warrant is unconstitutional". No, there are constitutional searches that occur without a warrant. If a cop sees you stuff a kilo of coke into your backpack, then he has a specific and articulable fact to justify reasonable cause for a search.
So, stop being an idiot for two seconds, and realize that cops DO NOT HAVE TO ALWAYS HAVE A WARRANT.
In the process of making decaf coffee, they produce raw caffeine, which they can then add to soft drinks, and stay-awake pills.
Your Mountain Dew comes as a direct result of my decaf coffee!
This new variant will reduce the amount of raw caffeine available, or they will have to start growing crops just for the caffeine content, but it doesn't make sense to do this at all, when they could just keep making decaf coffee.
Also, caffeine is an insecticide. These uncaffeinated coffee plants will be more susceptible to pests, and thus be more difficult to raise, or require more pesticides to keep them healthy.
And how much do you think that trial is going to cost you?
Would you rather spend 1~3 weeks in jail, or spend the money necessary to defend yourself at trial? Because that is what the plea deal will look like.
And any contraband must be thrown out, since a judge-issued warrant was not obtained, and the search is unconstitutional.
NO! Cops can act on anything that is in plain-view, this doesn't stop just because it's a border checkpoint.
Once it leaves your car, it is no longer 4th amendment protected, whether it be photons, or chemicals wafting in the wind.
In my opinion:
1.) Anything action which is intended to result in evidence is a "search"
2.) Any search without a warrant is unconstitutional
Most people agree with #2 but not #1 -- certainly not the courts. I'm baffled how educated judges could look at a situation where a drug-sniffing dog is sniffing around cars looking for drugs, and not construe that as a search. No matter how you try to justify that, it's absurd.
Because it would be ludicrous for a judge to rule that the pound of coke just sitting on your passenger seat is unconstitutional to find if they don't have a specific warrant for it.
It's called the "plain sight" rule, and it makes perfect legal sense. If the cops just happen to see something, then they should be able to act upon it, the same as if they see you commit a crime, they don't have to wait for an arrest warrant, they can seize you right there.
The "plain scent" rule as I might call it, is just an extension of the plain sight rule: if it comes out of your car, then the police can gather that evidence without your consent. As it is no longer _IN_ your car, it's now outside of your car, and thus not yours anymore. (The same with garbage. Police don't need a warrant to collect evidence from your garbage, because you've thrown it out, and already rejected any claim to ownership to it.)
If you're sending a dog around to sniff a vehicle you've randomly chosen, you're *already* performing the search before the dog alerts. The use of the dog is *part* of the search process.
Wrong. Police officers can react to anything that is in "plain sight", meaning anything that escapes from your car, be it photons or small particles which we refer to as "scent".
They already stop EVERYONE (when they're open) and ask you a few simple questions. If they see a kilo of coke sitting in the passenger seat, then that gives them reasonable cause for a search. If they smell pot, then that gives them reasonable cause for a search. If a dog alerts to pot, then that gives them reasonable cause for a search.
At no point are they actually searching you in the legal sense, you were just retarded enough to let your crime become evident outside of your car. (They do not need a warrant to look at your car, or smell your car.)
So, either basic logic escapes you, or you're simply unaware that they don't just have random dogs wandering around the checkpoint aimlessly. I'm betting it's the prior.
I've been through these checkpoints a lot. They don't normally have random dogs wandering around, but it wouldn't surprise me that for SXSW, they would bring dogs out and have them just hanging out near where the cars stop. (They stop one at a time.)
The reality is the west Texas I-10 check point outside El Paso may be 30-40 miles from the city, but that stretch of I-10 closely (within 2-5 miles) parallel's the border for about 50-60 miles, and the checkpoint is located where the highway/border start to diverege.
What about the border checkpoint between Las Cruces and Truth or Consequences?
She selects this password: allthatiwantforyoumysonistobesatisfied
This assumes that you're trying to brute force it, and you're not using a dictionary attack that is aided by a markov chain, so that the brute forcing algorithm only uses words that it has seen together. In fact, using the markov chain, you can try all the most likely combinations of words first.
My most secure password has a range of at best 14 hundred million centuries.
Although my standard-use passwords seem to be stuck at the 2 second mark...
His post was clear. The password "1/2a£o2pr,1/2a£ot" was generated non-randomly from the phrase.
He's reminding us what female pubes are supposed to look like.
... I know that our pubes are triangular shaped, but this has a gap in the middle, like it's just two lines come together. If you want that sort of pube hedging on a girl, that seems quite a bit odd... it would be like a double landing strip or something...
The first link (filament/coronal sphere event) is apparently a wrong link and not what the poster is referring to. Try the second link for a flat photo, third link for the SDO interactive camera page. I tried the AIA settings; it shows up in a lot of them. This may be a "standard" event (I have no clue one way or the other), but it's monstrously large; I'd love an explanation or link to similar solar event if it's not totally anomalous.
If I'm seeing what everyone is going on about, it's just two lines that meet at a common point. WTF? There's nothing special about this.
v --- LOOK! IT'S A TRIANGLE... OH NO! THERE'S ANOTHER ONE THERE, TOO!
Yes it is a slope, but not a slippery slope.
Honestly, it's a perfectly valid point that there are no reasonable accommodations that a company could make to permit a psychopath to be a complete asshole.
But then, this is the whole point, because it's a slope, and the legal world is deathly afraid of slippery slopes (so much so, that each Bill of Rights amendment has to be explicitly incorporated against the states, and as such it's still possible that your state could quarter National Guard troops in your house). And because they're so afraid of slippery slopes, they usually interpret protected classes in the most harshly narrow constraints possible.
For example, there is a protected class against sexism. But what about transsexuals? If they're being fired for being transsexual, then that clearly means that they're being discriminated against on account of sex, right? Nope, not according to US federal law. But what about women who dress too feminine, or women who don't dress feminine enough? Good news, the Supreme Court has ruled that discrimination as a result of not conforming to gender stereotypes is discrimination based on sex. But back to transsexuals now, they're being discriminated against because they're rejecting gender stereotypes and going to an extreme of gender stereotype non-conformance. Well, it turns out that now that we've said that gender stereotype discrimination is not allowed, "there is no point at which non-conformity with gender stereotypes becomes so drastic as to not be protected", so some federal courts have started holding that transsexuals are part of the protected status of sex.
The whole point of the matter is that the courts are super crazy careful about letting legal president avalanche down a slope, even when it's not a slippery one.
And it all also comes down to reasonable accommodation. Sure, blind people are a protected class of disability, but that doesn't mean that they have to be hired or kept for a job that involves say hypothetically, sorting M&M's. There is no way for there to be reasonable accommodations for that job.
I fail to see how "green-eyed" people are any less of a race than "dark-skinned" people. If you get racial protection for having brown skin, why shouldn't the same protections apply for having green eyes? Because it's a different organ?
Because "race" is a quasi-defined legal concept, and it does not apply to "green-eyed" people.
why would they fire them? they're more likely to get promoted to management...if they aren't already.
I would tell people to mod this funny, but honestly, it's one of those things that is no longer funny once you realize that it's true. :(
It's a court, with a judge. IANAL but I imagine that the judge can garnish the contents of any bank account you may own in order to pay for an attorney that the court appoints.
Ah indeed.
I suspect you forfeit your right to an attorney by refusing to pay if you are able, and that your right to representation is still supported by your right to conduct your own defense.
No, and no. See your sibling post, that's what a judge would do.
You can't just say "I can't afford an attorney". If you have any money in the bank, or if you have a job, or both, you don't get a court-appointed attorney.
Well, if you're willing to be a test case, and willing to sit for awhile (a long time) in jail, refuse to retain a lawyer on your own dime, and refuse to forfeit your right to representation. Without refusing to forfeit your right to representation, the court likely cannot constitutionally proceed without appointing a lawyer to represent you.
Of course, you would also probably have to sue and appeal to get the judgement in your favor, which would require a lawyer...
But then I did preface all of this with "willing to get screwed"...