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Supreme Court: Suck It, Fourth Amendment!
Back in January, we wrote about Kentucky v. King, when, during the arguments, we got to have Justice Scalia tell us that one important tool of policing was that criminals were stupid. Well, the joke's on us! Eight to one, the Supreme Court agrees (decision here [PDF]) that if the police "hear something" that sounds like evidence being destroyed, because they come a-knocking, they can break down your door. This is one of those special days when liberals and libertarians come together in horror! Hold us closer, Justice Ginsburg, lone dissenter!
Pretty much any time the SC hears a case involving cops, you can be sure the liberals and the libertarians are gonna end up on the same teeth-gnashing boat.
If the acid's brown, flush it down.
Per Justice Alito: Just don't answer the door. With the added benefit that you get to keep your contraband.
@KarenUhOh : As I read it, it's the other way around. Always the picture of wide-eyed innocence, Alito suggests that one should leave one's contraband where it is, go directly to the door, tell the nice officers that they can't enter without a warrant, and then … uh, what? Wait around until they come back with a warrant, and in the meantime don't try to dispose of your contraband, because that will allow them to force entry without a warrant?
I can only suppose that Alito has some kind of bet with the other justices to see who will be first to get Merriam-Webster to excerpt one of their decisions in the entry for "ingenuous".
Just think of it like a zen koan. "What is the sound of evidence being destroyed?"
@boyofdestiny : From now on, the answer is "anything after the sound of one cop knocking on the door."
So no peeing when the cops are around, you guys.
If you're not doing anything illegal then you have nothing to worry about, right?
New phrase all cops will now learn: "I heard a toilet flush so I ordered the SWAT team to tear gas the entire place." Nobody with indoor plumbing is now safe from an unreasonable search.
The most depressing thing in a really long time. What the hell.
Exigent circumstances, this is nothing new. This won't apply in very many cases, because its a narrow area between not having enough to get a warrant, but having enough to think there is evidence to destroy. I would think its mostly applicable when things are happening too quickly to get a warrant, but if they had had time, one would have been granted.
Seriously, this is nothing compared to the ruling that the police can attach a GPS tracker to your vehicle without a warrant.