Judicial Benchmarks: Cell Phones Can Be Searched at Arrest
Coming from the left wing California courts as expected….
On Monday the Supreme Court of California whittled away some of the Fourth Amendment when they ruled that the police may search an arrestee’s cell phone without a warrant. The 5-2 majority, led by Justice Ming Chin, claimed that under precedent set by the U.S. Supreme Court in the 1970s, defendants lose their right to privacy regarding objects in their possession at the time of arrest. Chin cited cases that, among other things, allowed law enforcement to seize and search a pack of cigarettes. But there’s a far cry between a pack of smokes (which could conceivably contain drugs or a razor blade) and a cell phone that, first, is clearly not a weapon, and second, contains a massive quantity of personal information.
The legal system has not yet caught up to our ever-changing technology, and there are some judges who are using the opportunity to erode our personal freedom. This is not the first time the issue has come up, either. In 2007 and 2009, courts in California and Ohio respectively found that the defendants’ rights were violated, leading experts to believe that the Supreme Court will eventually weigh in on warrantless cell phone searches.
