Decision here.
Discussion.

Alvarez falsely claimed in a public meeting to have received the Congressional Medal of Honor. This wasn't a misunderstanding, it was an out-and-out lie. As a result, he was convicted under the Stolen Valor Act, which makes it a crime to lie about receiving military awards. He appealed his conviction, challenging the constitutionality of the act.

The US Supreme Court found the act unconstitutional and set aside his conviction. As grounds for this finding, the court observed that content-based restrictions on speech are presumptively unreasonable. Although there are exceptions to this rule (in specific cases like perjury, fraud, fighting words, lies to government officials related to official investigations, falsely claiming to represent the government.... the list goes on), the mere falsity of speech is not an exception. Generally, there has to be a showing of a specific harm resulting from the false speech. Further, the government has to take the least intrusive means available to proscribe even unprotected speech. The Court suggests that in this case that could mean rewriting the act to include an element that the speech cause some harm to a specific person, or creating a searchable on-line database of legitimate recipients of the medal (private individuals have already done this). That way, public ridicule and rejection of false claimants should take of the rest. The remedy for false speech is true speech.

In any event, since there are less intrusive means available to sanction lies like Alvarez's, and since his attempts to bolster his own reputation don't meet any recognized exception to the First Amendment, he speech (while detestable) is protected.

Decision here.
Discussion.

So Arizona passed a law which mimicked federal immigration laws in order to give their own peace officers authority to deal with illegal immigrants. It's questionable whether or not that's constitutional, since the Supremacy Clause of the Constitution allows the federal government to decide that certain areas of law are off limits to state lawmakers. In this case, there are four sections of the Arizona law which were challenged.

Section 3 made it a state misdemeanor not to comply with federal alien registration requirements. The Supreme Court held that Congress has already regulated this field so completely that it leaves no room for the states to add their own laws, and struck this section down.

Section 5(c) made it a state crime for an alien to seek employment without proper federal authorization. The Supreme Court held that this interferes with the federal legal structure already in place (which punishes the employer, but specifically doesn't punish the employee). This section of the law was struck down.

Section 6 authorized state peace officers to arrest people who were subject to removal from the US. The Supreme Court held that this interferes with federal law (the removal of unauthorized aliens is governed by federal regulations, and this law would have required state peace officers to make arrests not authorized under federal guidelines). Struck down.

Section 2(b) required officers who stopped someone to check with the feds on the detainee's immigration status. Since Congress has already encouraged the sharing of information between state and federal agencies, this section was allowed to stand for now. The Supreme Court put Arizona on notice that this one might get struck down too, depending on unforeseen consequences to the way that it is enforced.

Given that we already leave the enforcement of federal laws to federal law enforcement officers, this one really has limited impact on immediate decision making by the police. It's more relevant to state lawmaking bodies, making it more clear what laws they can and cannot pass.

Decision here.
Discussion.

This decision deals primarily with intricate questions of legal precedent, and in order to simplify the question the court didn't resolve the issue which would have had the most lasting significance. If you decide to skip this post, I understand. If you decide to wade through it, don't say I didn't warn you.

In 2006, Vice President Cheney put in an appearance at a mall in Colorado. Howards was there, and a secret service agent overheard him saying that he was going to ask Cheney how many kids he had killed today. So the secret service decided to keep an eye on Howards. When he did get his chance to talk to the VP, he softened his message a little bit and just told him that his policies in Iraq were disgusting. Cheney thanked him, and walked away. As he was leaving, Howards touched Cheney's shoulder (later, Howards would testify that this was a light pat on the shoulder. Several secret service agents would testify that it was a forceful shove).

It was decided that Reichle (a secret service agent) should have a discussion with Howards. Reichle hadn't heard Howards "how many kids" comment, and also hadn't witnessed the shove (or friendly pat on the shoulder, if you prefer), but he was briefed by officers who had. Reichle met with Howards, and asked him if he had touched the VP. Howards tried to walk away from the stop, and also said that he had not touched Cheney, and Reichle arrested him. Howards was turned over to local law enforcement and charged with harassment, but the charge was dismissed. Howards sued the secret service, alleging that he was arrested and searched in violation of the Fourth Amendment, and that his arrest was made in retaliation for exercising his First Amendment right.

Now for some legal background. The courts have previously held that an arrest which does not violate the Fourth Amendment (because there is probable cause) can still violate the constitution if it violates a different amendment (this is from Whren v. US. In that case, a traffic stop was supported by probable cause but allegedly motivated by racism. The court held that the traffic stop was reasonable under the Fourth Amendment, but that it could still be a violation of the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment). Although an officer's subjective intent when making an arrest is irrelevant to Fourth Amendment analysis, it isn't necessarily irrelevant to First or Fourteenth Amendment analysis. The Supreme Court recently (2006) ruled that in cases where a suspect is prosecuted in retaliation for exercising his First Amendment rights, but the actual charges are supported by probable cause, the suspect can't sue for retaliatory prosecution (that was from Hartman v. Moore, and I have no idea what the facts of that case were).

Here is where the courts really start splitting hairs. The secret service agents moved to dismiss the lawsuit, claiming qualified immunity. The trial court denied the motion, and they appealed. The Tenth Circuit held that Hartman only applied to retaliatory prosecution, and not retaliatory arrest, and so they held that the officers were entitled to qualified immunity on Howards' Fourth Amendment claim (the supposedly unreasonable arrest and search), but that they would have to stand trial on his First Amendment claim (the arrest in retaliation for protected speech). The agents appealed again.

As with all qualified immunity cases, there are two questions to be answered: first, did the police violate a constitutional right? Second, was that right clearly established (so that a reasonable officer would understand the contours of the right)? If the answer to either question is "no," then the officers are entitled to qualified immunity and the case has to be dismissed. If the answer to both questions is "yes," then the officers have to stand trial (where they could still win or lose. Losing qualified immunity isn't the same as being found guilty, it just means that the lawsuit can move forward).

The US Supreme Court held that the decision in Hartman v. Moore had sufficiently muddied the waters so that it was not clearly established whether or not the secret service agents had violated Hartman's constitutional rights. Therefore, the agents are entitled to qualified immunity and the case is dismissed. Since addressing this one question was enough to resolve the case, the court didn't bother to decide whether or not a retaliatory arrest which is supported by probable cause violates any constitutional rights. I suppose that as long as we don't make retaliatory arrests, the question is mostly moot.

Decision here.
Discussion.

This one is more directly relevant to jail staff than to police, but it's still worth knowing about. Florence was arrested for a warrant for failure to pay fines, detained for a few days between two different jails, and then released when it was determined that he had paid his fine (just a little late) and the warrant should have been quashed. At each of the jails where he was detained, he was strip searched prior to being admitted to the general population of the jail.

Florence filed a §1983 suit for violation of his 4th & 14th Amendment Rights, claiming that the strip searches were unreasonable because he was arrested for such a minor offense. He proposed guidelines that would require detention officers to refrain from such invasive searches except for serious offenses or cases where there was reasonable suspicion that the prisoner possessed contraband.

The Supreme Court held that the jail policy of strip searching all prisoners who will be admitted to general population (regardless of their behavior, the crime they were being detained for, or the presence or lack of individualized suspicion) was reasonable. The decision explains that the court should defer to jail and prison officials in matters of security unless there's some showing that the officials are exaggerating the threat or overreacting, and that the across-the-board strip search policy struck a reasonable balance between the prisoner's privacy rights and the government's interest in keeping jails secure.

The court did not address whether or not strip searches would be reasonable for prisoners who will not be interacting with other prisoners, but strongly hinted that the government shouldn't push its luck with that one.

Decision here.
Discussion.

In this cases, Bowen (a known gang member with numerous violent felony convictions) attacked his girlfriend when she broke up with him, because she had called the cops. "Attacked" meaning that he tried to throw her over a second story balcony, dragged her around by her hair, bit her, and shot at her five times with a shotgun. His girlfriend escaped, and reported to the assault to the police. The also gave information regarding his gang affiliation and the location where he could be found (this location was Millender's house. Millender was Bowen's 70 year old former foster parent).

Detectives obtained a warrant for Bowen's arrest, as well as a search warrant for Millender's house. This warrant authorized the seizure of any and all firearms, as well as any evidence of Bowen's gang affiliation. The search warrant was served, and a shotgun was seized along with some ammo and a letter which was addressed to Bowen. Bowen was not found at the residence (he was arrested a couple weeks later, hiding under the bed in a motel room).

Millender sued the detectives, saying that the warrant was unconstitutionally overbroad because it specified "any and all" firearms rather than just the firearm actually used in this case, and because it allowed for the seizure of gang paraphernalia when the case at issue was a domestic violence incident. The detectives tried to claim qualified immunity. When the case worked its way up to the 9th Circuit, the court agreed with Millender, and denied qualified immunity. The court held that the warrant was defective because there was no PC to believe that there were additional guns in the residence, and that a reasonable officer should have known this.

The Supreme Court (as usual) reversed the judgment of the 9th Circuit. The court specifically declined to decide whether or not there was PC to search for any and all firearms and gang paraphernalia, although the language of this decision strongly suggests that there was. The court did decide, however that even if there wasn't PC it was a close enough call that a detective, the detectives supervisor, a deputy DA, and an independent magistrate all reasonably believed that there was PC. The court further held that there was nothing obviously wrong with the warrant, so the police acted reasonably in relying on the warrant and on the judgment of the magistrate. The court contrasted this decision with another case where officers were denied qualified immunity, even though they had obtained a warrant. In that case (Groh v. Ramirez), the warrant didn't describe the items to be seized at all. That's a pretty obvious violation of the 4th amendment, and anyone glancing at the warrant could have seen it, which makes it so different from the case at hand that it is irrelevant.

So anyway, the court ruled that the officers in this case were entitled to qualified immunity. The court explained that although there are circumstances where an officer relying on a warrant would not be entitled to qualified immunity, those cases are extremely rare.

Decision here.
Discussion.

Fields was serving a sentence in a Michigan state prison for an offense unrelated to this case when sheriff's deputies wanted to question him about some sexual activity with a 12 year old boy which he had engaged in prior to his incarceration. Fields was escorted away from the general population to an average sized conference room to meet with the deputies, who were armed. Fields was told at least twice that he was free to return to his cell at any time, he was not handcuffed or restrained, and the door to the conference room was sometimes open and sometimes closed during the interrogation. Fields was offered food at some point during the interrogation, which lasted between 5 and 7 hours. Fields said at some point during the interrogation that he didn't want to talk to the deputies any more, but never asked to be returned to his cell (and the interrogation continued). One of the deputies used a stern tone and profanity with Fields, at one point ordering him to sit down and telling him that if he didn't want to cooperate he could go back to his cell. At no time during the interrogation was Fields ever given Miranda warnings.

Fields eventually confessed, and the interrogation was ended. Fields had to wait about 20 minutes for correctional officers to arrive and escort him back to his cell. He was charged with and convicted of (insert name of applicable Michigan crime here), but his conviction was eventually overturned by the 6th Circuit, which held that his statement should have been suppressed. The 6th Circuit held that being incarcerated creates a per se rule that a person is in custody for Miranda purposes, and needs to be advised of his rights.

The US Supreme Court reversed the 6th Circuit, holding that being incarcerated for an unrelated offense does not mean that a suspect is in custody for Miranda purposes. The court reasoned that "n: Questioning a person who is already in prison does not generally involve the shock that very often accompanies arrest; a prisoner is unlikely to be lured into speaking by a longing for prompt release; and a prisoner knows that his questioners probably lack authority to affect the duration of his sentence. Thus, service of a prison term, without more, is not enough to constitute Miranda custody."

So there is no rule that an incarcerated person is automatically in custody under Miranda. It depends on whether or not the circumstances of the interrogation itself would create the sort of coercive pressure that Miranda warnings are designed to prevent. Also, the court recognizes that an incarcerated prisoner's sense of what is normal is going to be vastly different than an unincarcerated person, so the fact that the prisoner is not allowed to wander about freely (or otherwise violate prison rules) also has no bearing on whether the suspect is in custody.

Related to this specific case, the court recognized that there were aspects of the interrogation which would support a finding that Fields was in custody (such as the length of the interrogation, the fact that the deputies were armed, and the stern tone used by one of the deputies). Those factors were countered and outweighed by other circumstances, though (the door was left open sometimes, he was not restrained, he was offered food, the room was well it and comfortable, and especially that he was told repeatedly that he could return to his cell at any time). Fields' conviction was upheld.

Decision here.
Discussion here.

Officers received a call that Vincent Huff had threatened to shoot up his school. They interviewed school staff and other students, and learned that Huff had been bullied and was frequently absent (and therefore, based on their training, he met the profile of a school shooter). Huff was not at school, so they went to his house to meet with him.

There was no answer when they knocked on the door, so they tried to call into the house by phone. They eventually got ahold of Huff's mother by cell phone. She told them that she was inside the house with her son, and they told her they wanted to speak with him. She hung up. Eventually, she met with officers in front of the house and brought her son with her. She never asked why the officers were there, and refused to allow the officers into the house, which the officers noted as strange. One of the police asked if there were weapons in the house.

Testimony conficts as to what happened next. Mrs. Huff claims that she said she was going inside to get her husband, the officers claim that she suddenly turned and ran into the house. Four officers followed her into the house (including two who had been standing outside of earshot for this exchange and believed that she had given consent for entry). They all remained in the front room with Vincent and Mrs. Huff, until Vincent's father entered and "challenged the officers' authority to be there." The officers remained in the house for five or ten minutes to conduct their investigation, then concluded that the rumors regarding Vincent's threats were unfounded, and left.

The Huffs sued, and the district court ruled in favor of the officers, saying that they were entitled to qualified immunity. The Huffs appealed, and the Ninth Circuit held that the last two officers to enter the house (who entered on the erroneous belief that consent had been given) were entitled to qualified immunity, but the first two to enter (for officer safety reasons) were not. The Ninth "acknowledged that police officers are allowed to enter a home without a warrant if they reasonably believe that immediate entry is necessary to protect themselves or others from serious harm, even if the officers lack probable cause to believe that a crime has been or is about to be committed," but held that in this case Mrs. Huff was simply asserting her right to end her conversation with the officers and return to her home.

The officers who had now been denied qualified immunity appealed, and the Supreme Court reversed. The Supreme Court held that:
1- Based on current case law, a reasonable officer could have believed that he was justified in making warrantless entry under the circumstances of this case.
2- Although none of Mrs. Huff's actions were illegal, there are many circumstances in which lawful conduct may portend imminent violence.
3- Even when each of the events of a case are mundane when viewed in isolation, they may paint an alarming picture when viewed together.
4- The lower court's second guessing of the officers in this case doesn't jibe with Graham v. Conner. Judged from the perspective of a reasonable officer on the scene, the officers' actions were a reasonable response to Mrs. Huff's behavior.

And so the officers were granted qualified immunity.

Decision here.
Discussion here.

I meant to write this one up last Monday, but I've been in training all week and haven't had time.

Here's the facts: Jones was being investigated for drug trafficking, and as part of of the investigation the government (an FBI/Metro PD task force) obtained a search warrant to place a GPS on his jeep (his wife's actually, but he was the only driver). The warrant authorized the police to install the GPS on the jeep within 10 days of its issuance, and the installation had to occur within Washington, D.C. So they did what anyone would do, and installed the GPS 11 days later while the jeep was parked in Maryland. They continued their investigation using the GPS, and eventually Jones was convicted of drug trafficking. After his conviction, Jones was sentenced to life in prison.

Prior to his trial, Jones had filed a motion to suppress the evidence obtained from the GPS, which was substantial in that it tied him to a stash house that contained lots of money and cocaine. The district court suppressed the evidence obtained while the jeep was parked at Jones' residence, but admitted the rest because it held that Jones had no reasonable expectation of privacy in his location while moving along a public roadway. The first trial resulted in a hung jury, and a retrial ended with his conviction. Jones appealed, on the grounds that the GPS evidence should have been suppressed.

The court of appeals held that the GPS evidence should have been suppressed. The government appealed, arguing that the GPS was not a search for Fourth Amendment purposes (because Jones didn't have a REP in his location?). At first, I thought that the government had effectively abrogated this position back in the beginning of the investigation, when they applied for a warrant (something that we don't normally do when our intended activity doesn't amount to a search). But since an officer's subjective intent doesn't matter for Fourth Amendment analysis, so long as the facts are reasonable, the government could have argued that the officers thought they were conducting a search (and therefore applied for a warrant) even though they actually weren't... I don't know if that's what they were going for, it's just the only thing I could think of to salvage such a bizarre argument. The government raised an alternate argument on appeal that even if this was a search, it was a reasonable one. Since this argument was first raised on appeal, the Court refused to consider it.

Anyway, the opinion. Here's where it gets confusing. There are actually three opinions written for this decision. Every Justice held that the evidence should have been suppressed, but they couldn't seem to agree on why. Five justices joined in the majority opinion, and one of those also wrote her own concurring opinion. The four remaining justices joined in a concurring opinion which concurred only in the outcome. So:

Majority (barely) opinion: For most of US history, the primary test for determining whether or not something was a search for Fourth Amendment purposes was whether or not the government's actions would have been trespass under common law (specifically, trespass against someone's person, house, papers, or effects. Even though it was possible to commit common law trespass in an open field, open fields are not mentioned in the Fourth Amendment, so the Fourth Amendment is not implicated at all when an open field is searched. A vehicle, on the other hand, is someone's "affect," so the Fourth Amendment is implicated here). In 1967, the Supreme Court in Katz v. US created the reasonable expectation of privacy test (that phrase actually appears in a concurring opinion, but subsequent search and seizure decisions have followed its reasoning). However, nothing in that decision actually abrogated the old test, but only added to it. In this case, the police installed a hidden device on Jones' car (the Court compares this to a constable stowing away in a carriage to obtain information that would incriminate the occupants, such as their destination or conversations). Under the English Common Law prevalent at the time that the Fourth Amendment was drafted, this would have been a trespass. Therefore, installing the GPS was a search. Since installing the GPS was a search, and since there was no valid warrant or exception to the requirement for one, the evidence should be supressed.

Concurring opinion #1: One of the Justices who joined in the majority opinion wrote this. This opinion suggests that the real concern isn't the installation of the GPS device, but the detailed personal information which can be surreptitiously obtained by one. This opinion suggests that a person's expectation of privacy in her GPS location may be something that society is prepared to recognize as reasonable, because of the wealth of personal information that can be obtained. Under the reasoning of this opinion, obtaining someone's location by using GPS information signals from their own phone might be protected by the Fourth Amendment (as it should be, in my opinion). However, since the trespass test is sufficient to dispose of the case at hand, it isn't necessary to make a ruling on the other issues raised by this opinion.

Concurring opinion #2 (in which four justices joined): This opinion suggest that the actual installation of the GPS isn't the issue, and criticizes the majority for using 18th century common law as the basis for a decision on 21st century technology. Regarding the stowaway constable metaphor, this decision says "The Court suggests that something like this might have occurred in 1791, but this would have required either a gigantic coach, a very tiny constable, or both—not to mention a constable with incredible fortitude and patience." This opinion suggests that the issue is the amount of time that the police continued to monitor Jones' location by GPS, and that sometime before reaching the four week mark this became a search for Fourth Amendment purposes. Prior to the advent of GPS technology, this kind of surveillance would have required a team of agents, multiple vehicles, and perhaps aerial assistance. The amount of resources required meant that only important investigations would include this sort of tactic. Now, this kind of surveillance can be accomplished cheaply and easily. This opinion reasons that relatively short-term surveillance is ok, but longer term surveillance conflicts with a person's reasonable expectation of privacy (depending in part on the severity of the offense). The only guidance this opinion offers to differentiate between short term and long term surveillance is that four weeks falls well within the realm of long term.

Personally, I'd have liked to see a majority opinion that more closely resembled concurring opinion #1. It was the opinion that made the most sense to me, and that focused the most on what I see as the real issue in this case (electronically monitoring someone's location without their knowledge). But I guess that unless I eventually end up with "the honorable" in front of my name, I'll just have to roll with what the court gives me.

Read the decision here.
Discussion here.

When I first heard about this case, I thought the Supreme Court was going to rule on whether or not show-up field identifications were permissible. After I read the decision, it turned out that wasn't quite the issue (but close enough).

Here's the facts: Police in New Hampshire were investigating a call of suspect breaking into cars. While an officer waited with the suspect in the parking lot, another officer met with the reporting party. When asked to describe the suspect, the reporting party instead walked over to her window and pointed the suspect out. He was subsequently arrested and charged with... doesn't really matter. He was convicted, and he appealed. The defendant (Perry) wanted the court to suppress his identification as the suspect because the manner in which the identification was carried out was too suggestive and therefore unreliable.

A couple of things stood out for me about this case. First, this wasn't a typical field identification. There's a somewhat formal process in place for those... a suspect is detained, and then a witness is brought to the suspect after being informed that the person being detained may or may not be the person the police are looking for, and care is taken to make sure that we don't say anything suggestive to the witness or talk them into making an identification that they aren't really sure of. Voila! Field identification. That isn't what happened in this case, though... the police never gave that kind of advisement, and they never asked the witness to look at Perry. They just asked her to describe the suspect and then she pointed him out on her own. The second point that stood out for me was that a month after the arrest the police showed the same witness a photo line-up which included Perry, and she couldn't pick him out. I'm not really sure why they did that, especially so late in the game.

Anyway, Perry wanted the eyewitness identification to be suppressed because it was unreliable. In previous cases, the court has held that eyewitness identifications will be suppressed when the police obtain that identification using procedures that are so unnecessarily suggestive that they create a substantial likelihood of irreparable misidentification. Even when procedures are unnecessarily suggestive, the identification might be allowed in court if there are sufficient indicia of reliability to mitigate the improper procedure. But that's the exact opposite of the instant case. In Perry, there was nothing suggestive about the police procedures. The identification was suggestive because of factors outside of police control, and unreliable because they had an unreliable witness to work with (and because eyewitness identifications are inherently unreliable).

The court held that the reason for suppressing unnecessarily suggestively obtained identifications is to discourage police conduct. More importantly, the court held that simple unreliability is not a reason to suppress evidence; it is the jury's role to weigh the evidence and decide what is reliable and what is not. The proper way for the defense to undermine unreliable evidence isn't to use the exclusionary rule, but to educate the jury on the unreliability of the evidence (which they did, and Perry was convicted anyway). So the field identification in this case was properly admitted into evidence.

So like I said, show up identifications aren't quite the issue in this case, after all. Although this case would still be on point for a show up... here's my take (not necessarily the court's): when we do a show up identification, the process is inherently suggestive. We do what we can to mitigate that (by telling the witness that the person detained may not be the suspect, and by being careful not to ask leading questions or reveal other evidence to the witness), but we're still taking a witness to see some guy who (hopefully) matches the suspect description and is surrounded by cops. That's okay because it's necessary, but also because we're relying on other indicia of reliability to make sure that the identification is solid (indicia like the level of certainty the witness expresses, the degree to which the suspect matches the descriptions that witnesses have already given, the suspect's proximity to the crime scene, and the level of familiarity between the suspect and the witness). We're leaning very heavily on all of that to overcome the necessary suggestiveness of the field ID procedure. This is why it kills me when cops bring every witness they can find for a show up... seems to me like it would be better practice to just bring one or two to establish PC (or not), and then let the other witnesses identify the suspect later through less suggestive means (like a photo array).