A federal appeals court in Portland, Ore., Monday upheld the conviction of a suspected marijuana grower who had his car tracked by a GPS device installed without a search warrant, but declined to address broader privacy issues arising from an earlier Supreme Court ruling. The high court in January threw out another conviction authorities obtained through warrantless GPS tracking, in a case widely noted for its implications about privacy in a digital age. At the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, the Obama administration had argued that contrary to appearances, the Supreme Court's unanimous decision actually didn't require police to obtain warrants before installing global positioning system tracking devices. [continues 219 words]
WASHINGTON--The Supreme Court ruled Monday that police violated the Constitution when they attached a Global Positioning System tracker to a suspect's vehicle without a valid search warrant, voting unanimously in one of the first major cases to test privacy rights in the digital era. The decision offered a glimpse of how the court may address the flood of privacy cases expected in coming years over issues such as cellphones, email and online documents. But the justices split 5-4 over the reasoning, suggesting that differences remain over how to apply age-old principles prohibiting "unreasonable searches." [continues 1013 words]
WASHINGTON--Supreme Court justices wrestled with the bounds of personal privacy in the digital world Tuesday at arguments over whether police needed a warrant before secretly attaching a GPS tracking device to a suspect's car. The suspect's lawyer argued the police technique represented a classic violation of a person's constitutional right against unreasonable searches and seizures. The government said the device was simply a more efficient way to follow a suspicious person's movements in public places, which normally doesn't require a warrant. [continues 714 words]
WASHINGTON - California could be forced to release tens of thousands of felons early after the Supreme Court ordered it Monday to reduce overcrowding, in a warning to states that efforts to get tough on crime must be accompanied by adequate prison funding. In a 52-page opinion illustrated with photos of teeming prison facilities and cages where mentally ill inmates are held, Justice Anthony Kennedy cited lower-court findings that preventable suicide and medical neglect "needlessly" cause the death of at least one inmate a week in California's prisons. The state system was designed for 80,000 inmates but holds nearly twice that many. [continues 977 words]
WASHINGTON -- Every year, police agencies seize more than $1 billion of cars, cash and other goods linked to drug crimes. The Supreme Court will hear arguments Wednesday on how hard it should be for owners to try to recover that property. Police typically get to keep much of what they seize, although owners can fight forfeiture in court. On Wednesday, the central issue will be whether owners are entitled to a prompt, informal hearing to argue that they should get their property back while waiting for a formal forfeiture proceeding that could be scheduled months or years in the future. At present, some states impound the property during that lag time and provide owners no recourse. Critics say many innocent owners just give up during that period, and states then are free to sell their cars and other items. [continues 833 words]
WASHINGTON--The U.S. Supreme Court rapped school officials for strip-searching a 13-year-old girl in a fruitless hunt for ibuprofen, ruling that an overzealous investigation based on scant evidence violated the Fourth Amendment ban on "unreasonable searches and seizures." The 8-1 vote provided a victory for student rights. In 2007, the justices went in the opposite direction, ruling that a school campaign to discourage drug abuse outweighed a teenager's First Amendment right to mock such efforts. [continues 862 words]
WASHINGTON--The Supreme Court ruled that police couldn't search the car of a person arrested unless the officer's safety was threatened or there was reason to think the car contained evidence of a crime, reviving a constitutional protection against unreasonable searches. The court effectively closed a loophole opened in a 1981 opinion that has been widely interpreted to allow police, without a warrant, to search cars--as well as bags or containers within them -- when they arrest a driver or passenger. [continues 556 words]
Rulings May Bring an End To Era of Rigid Formulas, Open Door to Rehearings WASHINGTON -- In a pair of rulings, the Supreme Court emphatically declared that trial judges have wide discretion over criminal sentencing, effectively ending the federal law's 20-year experiment with rigid formulas for punishing individual defendants. Taken together, the rulings will broaden the discretion of federal district-court judges in handing out sentences. They could also lead to thousands of defendants seeking a rehearing. The rulings are potentially more expansive than the Supreme Court's last word on such guidelines in 2005. After that, the court sent back more than 400 cases to lower courts for rehearings. [continues 673 words]
WASHINGTON -- The Supreme Court handed conservatives victories in a raft of 5-to-4 rulings, demonstrating the far-ranging influence of President Bush's two appointees. But the opinions, including closely watched cases involving campaign-finance regulation and student free speech, revealed fissures among the five conservative justices even as the court's rightward tilt drove the four liberals together in unified dissents. Coming near the close of the first full term since the retirement of Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, the decisions showed how the court is pulling back on liberal precedents long disliked by conservatives, but hasn't yet formed a consensus among the majority bloc on how, and how far, to proceed. [continues 939 words]
WASHINGTON -- Prosecutors can use evidence taken in violation of the Fourth Amendment requirement that police knock and announce themselves before entering a home, the Supreme Court ruled. The 5-4 opinion, by Justice Antonin Scalia, acknowledged that such entries are unconstitutional, but not serious enough to invoke the traditional sanction for unlawful searches: exclusion of the evidence they yield. The price of applying the so-called exclusionary rule sometimes includes "setting the guilty free and the dangerous at large," Justice Scalia wrote. Other remedies, such as civil damages or internal discipline by a police department, were adequate for violations of "the right not to be intruded upon in one's nightclothes." [continues 477 words]
Objection by One Resident Precludes Warrantless Entry Despite Another's Permission WASHINGTON -- Strengthening Fourth Amendment protections against warrantless searches, the Supreme Court ruled that police can't enter a house over a resident's objection simply because a second occupant invites them in. Chief Justice John Roberts led the three dissenters, reflecting his longstanding deference to police. The opinions recalled debates that have marked the court since the 1950s, when, under Chief Justice Earl Warren, it began imposing rules to deter police misconduct. Justice Samuel Alito sat out because the case was argued before his confirmation, but he has written elsewhere of his disagreement with Warren Court criminal-procedure cases. [continues 401 words]
WASHINGTON -- Federal narcotics laws don't trump the religious-expression rights of a Brazilian-based sect that uses a hallucinogenic tea in a sacrament, the Supreme Court ruled. The decision was one of a host of actions the court took upon returning from a monthlong recess after the 58-42 Senate confirmation of Justice Samuel Alito. The justices also heard arguments on the scope of the Clean Water Act; declined the Bush administration's request to dismiss a challenge to special military courts it set up in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, to try suspected foreign terrorists; and affirmed the power of contractual-arbitration clauses. [continues 507 words]
WASHINGTON -- Reigniting a national debate over right-to-die issues, the Supreme Court barred the Justice Department from interfering with Oregon's law allowing physicians to help terminally ill patients end their lives. Voting 6-3, with Chief Justice John Roberts joining conservative Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas in dissent, the court ruled that the administration exceeded its authority under the 1970 Controlled Substances Act when it threatened to penalize doctors who prescribed life-ending drugs under the Oregon law, the only one of its kind in the country. The Justice Department said it was "disappointed" with the ruling. Advocates of the law said they expect the ruling to set off responses both in Congress and in states, such as California and Vermont, where similar measures are pending. [continues 625 words]
Justices Reject Petition Based On January Ruling; Not Chasing 'Squabbles' The Supreme Court turned down a petition to clarify its January decision that invalidated U.S. mandatory sentencing guidelines, leaving federal circuit courts to make their own rules on the matter. The high court's move means federal inmates in some states will continue to have an easier time challenging their sentences than prisoners in others. The January decision in U.S. v. Booker limited federal judges in punishing convicted defendants for aggravating factors that weren't proven to a jury or admitted by the defendant. That threw into turmoil sentences for thousands of inmates, many of whom petitioned for earlier release dates. The Supreme Court didn't specify how its opinion should be applied, leaving it up to the federal circuit courts of appeal, which supervise different groups of states. [continues 344 words]
The Supreme Court said the federal government can prosecute sick patients who grow and use marijuana to alleviate their symptoms, despite state laws allowing its use. In a 6-3 opinion by Justice John Paul Stevens, the court said federal laws outlawing marijuana and finding it without any accepted medical use took precedence over laws in California and nine other states authorizing seriously ill patients to use the drug under a physician's supervision. Justice Stevens questioned the scientific basis and wisdom of the federal government's policy, and offered sympathy for the severely ill patients who say the plant is their only effective treatment for debilitating pain, but he said their remedy was to petition Congress to change the law. He was joined by Justices Anthony Kennedy, David Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer, while Antonin Scalia filed a concurrence. [continues 315 words]
When Congress set up the federal court system in 1789, it gave aliens the right to sue for "violation of the law of nations or a treaty of the United States." Tomorrow, 215 years after the law was passed, the U.S. Supreme Court will consider what that sentence means. The ruling could have a major impact on how human-rights cases, and even lawsuits against terrorists, are pursued in the future. The law, known as the Alien Tort Claims Act, was rarely cited and all but forgotten by the 19th century. But since 1980, human-rights groups and victims of atrocities have filed about 100 lawsuits under the statute, according to lawyer Eric Biel of Human Rights First, an advocacy group. Defendants have included former Philippines President Ferdinand Marcos and Radovan Karadzic, the Bosnian Serb leader and indicted war criminal. Some plaintiffs have targeted overseas operations of U.S. corporations such as Exxon Mobil Corp. and Unocal Corp., which face lawsuits for allegedly colluding with repressive governments in Indonesia and Myanmar to smooth the way for oil projects. Both companies deny the charges. Another current case seeks compensation from companies that supplied the apartheid regime of South Africa. [continues 985 words]
Minnesota Jurist's Records Expected to be Subpoenaed In a rare showdown between Congress and the judiciary, House Republicans are planning to subpoena records of a federal judge they say broke the law by letting drug offenders off too lightly and then misleading lawmakers about it. Wednesday, the House Judiciary Committee is expected to authorize Chairman F. James Sensenbrenner Jr. (R., Wis.) to subpoena records from Chief Judge James M. Rosenbaum of Minnesota's federal district court. The move comes a month after the committee asked the General Accounting Office to review sentencing decisions among all federal judges in Minnesota. [continues 705 words]
SIOUX FALLS, S.D. -- Matthew Ducheneaux goes on trial here Tuesday for marijuana possession, but the jury's verdict could do more than decide whether the 38-year-old quadriplegic is fined or sent to jail. Win or lose, his trial will showcase a ballot initiative that could spark a revolution in South Dakota's criminal laws -- something far beyond measures authorizing the medical use of marijuana adopted by nine states since 1996. [continues 1122 words]
SIOUX FALLS, S.D. - Matthew Ducheneaux goes on trial here Tuesday for marijuana possession, but the jury's verdict could do more than decide whether the 38-year-old quadriplegic is fined or sent to jail. Win or lose, his trial will showcase a ballot initiative that could spark a revolution in South Dakota's criminal laws -- something far beyond measures authorizing the medical use of marijuana adopted by nine states since 1996. South Dakota courts barred Mr. Ducheneaux from arguing that his medical condition, which he says is helped by smoking marijuana , justified breaking the law. That has made him, supporters say, the "poster child" for Constitutional Amendment A, a voter initiative on the Nov. 5 ballot that would authorize every criminal defendant in the state to challenge "the merits, validity and applicability of the law, including the sentencing laws." [continues 1054 words]
WASHINGTON -- The Justice Department is looking to step up monitoring of political and religious groups within the U.S. and to further ease the restrictions on electronic surveillance of those it believes are linked to terrorism. Meanwhile, Bush administration officials, acknowledging they were taken aback by the criticism leveled at the president's plan to try foreign terrorism suspects in military courts, said legal and other questions raised by lawmakers and academics are being considered as work is done to implement the plan. [continues 639 words]
