TSA makes an arrest for… outstanding warrants?
I know why Bruce prefers behavioural profiling over reliance on carry-on screening, but with or without profiling, why is nobody outraged about how the TSA’s writ has expanded?
Even if we assume for the moment that TSA checkpoints are constitutional for the purpose of keeping dangerous materials off of aircraft — a point that I do not concede — how have they been allowed to become catch-all checkpoints for any criminal activity? Why are drugs discovered during a carryon search admissible evidence? We lost that battle in the 1970s. But now the TSA are allowed to search for outstanding warrants?
We already have to show our papers. People are already being arrested at checkpoints for crimes unrelated to airplane security. Will it be long before passenger lists are routinely screened for outstanding criminal warrants, and people arrested when they arrive at the airport? It is hardly fantasy, given the trends of the last 15 years.
How are these checkpoints, no longer limited to the precise business of keeping aircraft safe, not a violation of the fourth amendment?
State or federal government would never be allowed to set up similar checkpoints in any other situation. Imagine such a checkpoint on a highway: stop cars at random, ask various questions of the occupants, and run a warrant check on anyone who seems suspicious.
Or stop every car on a road and perform a search for anything illegal: sawed-off shotguns, drugs, mattresses with their tags removed, &c.
Does anyone think that survives a Supreme Court challenge?
Sometimes I think about a United States in which the Supreme Court consults the constitution from time to time as the supreme law of the land, and then I have to have a little lie down and breathe into a paper bag.
Rob Gervais said,
January 5, 2008 @ 18:25
Unfortunately, your car-stopping scenario is a reality in San Diego because we are a border city that is frequented by our neighbors to the south.
Random Department of Homeland Security check-points are set-up throughout our freeways and I’ve been stopped on a couple of occasions because I fit one of DHS’s profiles. It’s very annoying and as an American citizen, it’s bordering on being outright un-constitutional when they’re running my background through their computers.
Luckily, I only have a couple of traffic tickets on my record. Otherwise, I’d be swimming with the fishes.
Rob Gervais said,
January 5, 2008 @ 18:27
Oh yeah - Let’s not forget the fact that DHS knows what books I’ve checked out of the public library. Way to go Patriot Act!
Brooks Imperial said,
February 2, 2008 @ 15:59
Hi Phil!
The 4th Am. to the Constitution prohibits unreasonable searches and seizures. The search must be unreasonable in a given context. Context and reason are concepts limited only by the imagination and persuasiveness of lawyers. Virtually every 4th Am. context has been tested in courts and the bar for what is unreasonable wanders all over the map. There is no bright line standard for 4th Am. rights, except between instances of similar contexts. Once a reasonable search/seizure standard for a given context is settled, however, law enforcement is usually pretty good about observing it because if they don’t, charges get promptly dismissed.
Hope all is well with you. Looks like we’ll be back to Asia end of March.
Keep in touch,
Brooks