Crackseat Driver: The Supreme Court takes on collective punishment.

[ForestsBeatBushes]

You would think the following scene occurs every day: Cops pull over a speeding vehicle and search for drugs. Crack is found. All three passengers insist the drugs are not theirs. So the cops arrest them all. The constitutional dispute today is whether the cops had probable cause to arrest everybody, or just the driver, or just the guy next to the wad of bills in the glove compartment, or just the guy in the back seat with the crack. All of which is interesting. But even more interesting is that this is a case of "first impression" for the high court—meaning no one has brought this kind of challenge before. Apparently, in every other car ever stopped, someone has cheerfully admitted to owning the drugs.

continue this 'interesting' report at:

http://slate.msn.com/id/2090675/

[ForestsBeatBushes]

1. Please check out the link - this is very important - thanks.

[jayfish]

2. Amazing Quote.

-SNIP-
"O'Connor, who's already done the driving-innocent-grandmother-to-church hypo, now grinds out the corollary: "What if there's a young child in the car, and it's the middle of the day, and he's dropping the child off at school?" Should the child be dragged off to juvenile hall? This drug dealer's got a helluva "to do" list: "Take mom to grocery store. Drop Billy off at school. Trade drugs for sex at party. Pick up dry cleaning."

Ginsburg points out that there are "two innocent people locked up in jail" using Srinivasan's inference of guilt rule. To which he replies that this is the cost of enforcing the law."
-SNIP-

This is way adversarial justice is unjust. At no point will the state ever admit that it might be wrong.

Jay

-Edited Because I'm Tired-

[MrPrax]

3. Good read...highly recommend

gave me a chuckle an a scare.

"Justice John Paul Stevens has a hypo, too. What if there were four passengers in the car instead of three? No different says Bair. "What if there were six?" asks Stevens. Same. Stevens, undaunted: "What if it's a minivan and there are eight people?" he asks. Lock 'em up. Stevens takes a breather while Ginsburg takes over: "What if it had been a bus?"

DOH...heh
The folks on SCOTUS are the best legal minds a country of 230 million can scrap up...

[booksenkatz]

4. Good point

What if someone were busted on a packed airliner? Do I have to go to jail because some stranger on my flight had illegal narcotics in his possession?

This drug thing is so out of control.

[jonoboy]

5. "To which he replies that this is the cost of enforcing the law."

I thought this absolutely outrageous as well.

What if Rush's wife and a couple of 'dittoheads'were in the car and he was stopped with all those pills rattling around in his pockets.

[Brian Sweat]

9. If he had any hope of receiving a favorable ruling,

that statement right there probably destroyed it. I guarantee you that even Thomas immediately came to the conclusion that if that is the cost, then the price is too high.

[rman]

12. yeah nice: "the price of justice is injustice"

seems they are overdoing it.

[ForestsBeatBushes]

13. Isn't that a quote from '1984'?

the price of justice is injustice

WOW

[NashVegas]

6. Talk about your "Nanny" laws

Arresting all occupants because 1 refuses to fess up is such a mom thing, or something you see first grade teachers do.

We really are infantilized, aren't we?

[TahitiNut]

7. Fascinating article (imho) but, unfortunately, not LBN

"Posted Monday, November 3, 2003, at 3:34 PM" -- thus, it's more than 12 hours old.

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TahitiNut - DU moderator

[October]

8. The question to ask is...

What if a Supreme Court Justice were in the car....???

[Brian Sweat]

10. No, the question is, what if you were in the car.

How would you feel if you were riding with someone who had drugs in the car that you didn't know about and you were arrested and charged with possession.

[trof]

11. Experienced a similar situation.

Was alternate juror (unfortunately, I would have deadlocked what came in as a guilty verdict) on a possession case.

One baggy of pot was found in a home. Three people in the home at the time (not residents) were arrested for possession. The homeowner was not there. She was arrested when she returned home. Four people were indicted for "possession" of one baggy of pot.

I don't pretend to know the legalities, but common sense tells me that all four can't "own" a single baggy. If ownership cannot be established, everybody walks IMHO.

[Hammie]

14. Not collective punishment

It is a reasonable cause case. When you are arrested on suspicion of a crime, you are not being "punished". Actually you are but legally you're not. The question is whether simply being in the same vehicle as contraband constitutes reasonable cause to suspect one of possession.

Collective punishent would be if every one in the car were convicted and sentenced regardless of whether they were actually in possession of contraband.

They might both be wrong, but they are not the same.

[dfong63]

15. isn't this just a form of "guilt by association"???