Kim Zetter reports: A federal judge in Iowa has ruled that evidence gathered through the warrantless use of covert GPS vehicle trackers can be used to prosecute a suspected drug trafficker, despite a Supreme Court decision this year that found such tracking unconstitutional without a warrant. U.S. District Judge Mark Bennett in Sioux City ruled last week (.pdf) that the…
Category: U.S.
What local cops learn, and carriers earn, from cellphone records
Bob Sullivan reports: The war on drugs has gone digital; but is it also a war on cellphone users? That’s just one of the questions raised by an msnbc.com investigation into use of cellphone tracking data by local police departments across the nation. Msnbc.com built a database of thousands of invoices issued by cell phone…
Fifth Circuit Considers Constitutionality of Cell Site Location Data
Susan Freiwald writes: Department of Justice litigators just filed a reply brief in an exciting but complex case in the Fifth Circuit that concerns law enforcement access to cell site location data. As amicus curiae, I hope to deepen readers’ understanding of the basic issues in the case and also to provide some insider’s insights. This blog…
Washington State Supreme Court imposes limits on vehicle searches
Mike Carter reports: The Washington Supreme Court has limited the ability of police to search someone’s car after they’ve been taken into custody, further extending a long tradition of affording state residents more privacy protections than are guaranteed under the Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. Read more in Seattle Times. How refreshing.