Yay for the 4th Amendment

SCOTUS has ruled, sticking a GPS transponder on a car without a warrant is bad. It was unanimous. The details of the case concerned a drug dealer, and the attempt by law enforcement to monitor the car for 28 days. Interesting though that the rationale for the option was divided 5-4 with Scalia writing for the majority and  Roberts Jr. Kennedy, Thomas and Sotomayor joining in on the majority opinion. They wrote,    "We hold that the government’s installation of a G.P.S. device on a target’s vehicle, and its use of that device to monitor the vehicle’s movements, constitutes a search."

So far so good. But the 4 concurring justices pointed out that  the majority just used  18th-century legal concepts on a  21st-century technology. They were looking for a contemporary argument on a reasonable expectation of privacy. Alito, Ginsburg, Breyer and Kagan joined the concurrence.

The murky gray areas of course abound. Licence Plate Reader technology springs to mind. Does a driveby by your local police give them right to hunt you down for unpaid parking tickets or outstanding violations and warrants? it would have been nice if SCOTUS started down that path of the 21st century realities.

  • Oldtimer

    A GPS tracking device on a car is a search and requires a warrant, but a team of cops  tracking a suspect’s every public move is not ?  What this decision has outlawed is the use of a labor saving device that can save thousands until some judge agrees there is probable cause to justify keeping track of a suspect’s movements  Obviously, the need for the use of such tools was not well argued in this case.  What did they have to say about Onstar, or observation from an aircraft  ?
    With GPS, one technician, at a desk, can keep track of numerous vehicles.  Without GPS, keeping track of one vehicle can occupy six officers and six unmarked cars.

    • Anonymous

      Why is it so hard to get a warrant to place a gps tracker, wire tap a mobile phone or search a person, place or thing? That’s the point.