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An interesting Fourth Amendment case
The Supreme Court today handed down Heien v. North Carolina. An officer stopped a car that had a brake light burned out, and in the course of the stop discovered cocaine. It turns out that the North Carolina traffic statutes say that a vehicle must have a working stop "lamp," singular. The State court of appeals ruled that this meant the stop was not supported by probable cause: no reason to believe a law was being violated. The State supreme court ruled that the stop was valid, because the officer's misunderstanding of the law was reasonable. A reasonable mistake of fact does not eliminate probable cause; does a reasonable mistake of law do so?
The Supreme Court ruled 8-1 that the stop was valid. Justice Kagan and Ginsburg concurred, writing to stress that (1) the question of reasonableness is an objective one, not one linked to the officer's personal thoughts or training, and (2) the test is stricter than the one used for qualified immunity (which is loose indeed). Justice Sotomayor dissented, arguing that a mistake of law, reasonable or not, means there is no probable cause.
UPDATE: I quite agree that it is incongruous to have government actors protected by a "reasonable mistake" defense, and have citizens often covered by "ignorance of the law is no excuse." It's particularly so in the area of qualified immunity where, as Sotomayor's dissent points out, civil suit is not allowed unless "anyone but a complete incompetent would have known this was illegal and unconstitutional." And that's when a government actor's pocketbook, not his liberty, is at stake.
With a private citizen, ignorance of the law is no excuse, and even when intent is required the prosecution can ask for a "willful ignorance" instruction, that essentially even if defendant didn't know, if you think he sorta shut his eyes to it, you can find him guilty.
I haven't researched it, but I wonder how this plays out in the setting of a criminal prosecution of a government actor for deprivation of civil rights. Is ignorance of the Constitution no defense, because it's a criminal case, or is reasonable failure to appreciate there was a constitutional right being violated a defense because of qualified immunity? Bear in mind that all of this is judicially created. The statutes say nothing about qualified immunity, or about willful ignorance.
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Indiana appeals courts have ruled directly opposite of this.
I might be willing to go along with this if ordinary private persons could successfully defend against criminal charges by arguing that they had made "reasonable, good-faith" efforts to comply with the law.
But then again I might not, either. Why should a traffic stop justify the sort of fishing expedition and interrogation that seems to have occurred here? How many people suffer this sort of petty harassment during traffic stops and then keep silent when nothing comes of it - because they have no reason to pay the costs and risk the official hostility that would come with making a complaint?
Sure, it's easy to excuse one "minor" violation of the 4th amendment when it results in catching a felon, but if catching the felon actually requires a dozen, or a hundred, of these violations, of which only one pans out, then is it really so excusable?
I'm with Deep Lurker, if "I didn't know" is not a valid defense* then it shouldn't be valid to overcome my rights.
*Given a reasonable person would not know that particular law or regulation which would put our federal and state governments in jeopardy as there are so many niggly laws and regulations that most juries would vote to acquit on just about everything but murder, rape, and assault.
Finally, I leave you with this:
https://www.victoriaadvocate.com/news/2014/dec/13/victoria-police-officer-investigated-for-tasing-dr/
Talk about ignorance of the law leading to a loss of rights.
I think the real lesson from this case is to never, ever consent to a search. Make them get a warrant. Without the defendant's consent, there would have been no case and no lame Supreme Court decision.
I don't expect a LEO to know all the laws, but he/she certainly better know the one he/she is detaining/arresting me for.
Even a traffic stop requires probable cause. no violation of law, no probable cause, then no legal reason for the traffic stop.
Why is the trained law officer given a pass for ignorance of the law is no excuse. As others have stated, why does the law apply to one civilian one way and another civilian another way, merely because he is sworn to enforce the laws?
They wished to give leeway to police. they did. How ever the ruling directly conflicts with our federal Constitution concept of limited government, and the English Common Law. the government is not above or superior to the laws. Nor are the enforcers of the laws above the law.
More bias from the court, government 1st.
Its a game. A contest. Dirt bags who run around with drugs in their car get caught and cry the blues while the cop did his job.
Its a step by step procedure to build probable cause. This guy had to have given his permission for the search. For some reason that I can't for the life of me understand, idiots with drugs in their car almost always submit to a search. At least those drugs will NOT kill some kid junkie, maybe even a kid you know and care about. Cop did a good job and so did the court.
You are wrong, you do not understand our Constitution and the court acted from a law enforcement viewpoint.
No breaking law, no legal stop. It is the fruit of the tree, if the cop had done his job no stop would have been done.
Police are civilians, with a duty to enforce laws. As this is a constitutional republic based on the concepts of limited government subject to the people, police are not superior to citizens.
Your point of view on police being able to enforce non law is flawed.
As for the cocaine laws, most of the drug laws are racist in plan and application. The purpose is to keep certain groups in their place. This was a free country, were failing to bother some one else was enough reason to be left alone.
What other laws are the officers going to be allowed to not understand? Where and how do you draw the line? In truth, the officers should not be given an inch. They should be trained on regular intervals about the law to the point every officer knows the laws they are enforcing inside and out. If not, they should not have the job.
As occurs in 99.99% of all cases, the supreme court gets it wrong again. When they split hairs they usually screw up the hair cut.
As an aside:
Years ago, I brought up the fact that persons who are members of he bar cannot legitimately hold a legislative or executive position because so long at the membership continues the person is a member of the judicial branch. Holding positions in two branches would violate separation of powers. Another legal blogger first said to me, "We can't split hairs that finely." That was and is still BS. The legal community splits hairs down to the atomic level as can be seen in this case.