Supreme Court upholds warrantless search of apartment based on marijuana smell

[cory777]

Source: Raw Story

The smell of marijuana smoke and sound of evidence being destroyed is enough reason for police to knock down an apartment door and search the place without a warrant, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled Monday.

In an 8-1 decision , the nation's highest court said the warrantless search of an apartment in Lexington, Kentucky was legal because of "exigent circumstances," which permits law enforcement officers to conduct a warrantless search if there is a strong likelihood of destruction of evidence.

In the case Kentucky v. King, uniformed Lexington police officers pursued a suspected drug dealer to an apartment complex. The officers approached an apartment door where they believed the suspect had entered, knocked loudly and announced their presence.

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"The court today arms the police with a way routinely to dishonor the Fourth Amendment’s warrant requirement in drug cases," Justice Ruth B. Ginsburg wrote in her lone dissent. "In lieu of presenting their evidence to a neutral magistrate, police officers may now knock, listen, then break the door down, nevermind that they had ample time to obtain a warrant."

Read more: http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/05/16/supreme-court-upholds-warrantless-search-of-apartment-based-on-marijuana-smell/

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Breaking Activist News - http://activistnews.blogspot.com/

[Newest Reality]

1. Coming next,

Warrantless search of apartment due to vaginal order suggesting an illegal abortion.

Accept it? Reject it? What difference does that make when they are making it clear that they can knock down what you think, have, or protect yourself with based on ideas they throw out at you with puppet clowns disguised as people deemed to be in charge of your very reality based on nothing more than convention and personal morals?

Do you call that liberty and freedom at this stage in the game? Your answer and response is totally pertinent to the outcome, no matter how you transcribe it to the potential results in the people vs. the wealthy families conflict now going on for the endgame of humanity.

[Proletariatprincess]

2. Fourth Amendment: RIP

This has to be the last nail in the coffin for the 4th amendment. The so called war on drugs has created a police state in the USA. I am sickened by this ruling and harbor very bitter feelings about this country. I wish I had immigrated when I was younger and healthier...now it is too late. I urge my kids and grandkids to get out now or as soon as they can. There is no future for them here and I tremble for all of our safety in the future.

[Eddie Haskell]

24. The rich still have big fences, gates, and the 4th.

You can't smell the weed from the street.

[Rex]

3. Well duh! It is the SCOTUS...oh did they become all liberal now!?

Was it a rawstory reporter?

[iamthebandfanman]

5. how about those obama picks.. n/t

[kath]

28. Yikes! An EIGHT TO ONE decision?!

Jeebus H. Christ on a trailer hitch.

YAY for those Obama picks!! WOOT!!

The Fourth Amendment was real nice while it lasted...

[droidamus2]

4. Dangerous decision

Considering one of the favorite tricks of police officers when wanting to search a motor vehicle is to claim they 'smelled marijuana' this decision has dire consequences for our freedoms. Also, let me guess the sound of 'evidence being destroyed' is the toilet flushing like there is no other reason for that particular sound to be happening in somebodies home.

[Hawkowl]

6. S.C. justices not a reason to vote for Obama

What's the point if Obama can't even nominate liberal justices? Sotomayer apparently isn't a liberal. What is the fucking point? To simply continue the illusion that we don't live in the largest police state in the world?

[harun]

15. Doesn't matter who we elect, no Liberal SC nominee can make it through

the Senate. Not by a long shot.

[kath]

29. +100.

Yup. I no longer have any reason to vote for him.

[NBachers]

7. Cops smash into Wall Street firm 'cause it sounded like possible financial crimes being committed

[ThomCat]

13. Never happen. The perception that a crime might be happening

is only used to justify violating the rights of little people.

Those really big people all still have their rights, because they can afford them. Rights cost a lot of money now. Which really means they're actually expensive privileges.

[meow mix]

8. police state nt

[Vattel]

9. I miss Souter and Stevens

[Bluebear]

10. Yay Sotomayor and Kagan! Our "liberal" judges! nt

[Fly by night]

11. Reefer madness -- the biggest threat to our Constitution and Bill of Rights...

... and the biggest single contribution to our overcrowded jails and prisons, as well as making it difficult for people with serious alcohol and drug abuse problems to receive timely treatment ('cause the treatment slots are filled with otherwise functional tokers who pissed dirty somewhere.)

[kentuck]

12. The smell of marijuana smoke to cops is like a red flag to a bull...

They come charging. They knock down the doors and ram their horns thru your gut. Marijuana is the great evil in this world and anything to defeat it is OK by the courts and the law.

[arbusto_baboso]

25. Which is odd, since so many cops smoke reefer themselves.

Yup, they do. No less so than any other segment of the population.

But then the general population has a much smaller percentage of complete power-mad sociopaths...

[TheKentuckian]

14. 4th Amendment is only operative when a cop acting on his own authority decides it is operative

Now if he "thinks" he smells marijuana then all bets are off or if he "thinks" evidence is being destroyed, despite having no proof the evidence exists or that a crime is being perpetrated, then all bets are off.

People that defend this ratcheting up of the police state should consider that a right has become effectively inoperative. You are a stupid, visionless motherfucker if you are goofy enough to think that there has to be marijuana for a cop to "think" he smells it or to have a "belief" that evidence is potentially being destroyed.

Our rights end at the discretion of thugs working at the direction of captured governments to prey on citizens for revenue rather than to protect and serve them based on bullshit-hunches, thinking they smell something, being concerned that evidence may be at risk or just fucking randomly.

The Bill of Rights is fast becoming the List of Highly Conditional Suggestions.

[Proletariatprincess]

18. Bravo!

Very well put. Thank you.

[Upton]

16. Two of the main reasons I voted for Obama..

was SC nominations, and his promise to stop raiding medical marijuana dispensaries...both of those have now been thrown right out the window..

Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice?..well that ain't going to happen..

[buckrogers1965]

17. I think I smell marijuana smoke

now becomes what any police state thug says just before they illegally break down the door and perform a violent, often lethal home invasion. And if you defend their illegal entry into your home and survive the attempt you will be charged with a crime.

[scorpiogirl]

19. I wonder how this would work in MMJ states? n/t

[Romulox]

20. Isn't it bizarre how this humble weed has been used as the "thin wedge"

in order to tear down so much of our civil liberty framework? The right to be free from searches, except when a warrant supported by probable cause has issued is as fundamental a right as exists in American democracy.

"But he was smoking weed!" is all it takes to negate this so-called "inalienable" right? It defies comprehension.

[eppur_se_muova]

21. So a little MJ-scented air freshener should create no small amount of trouble ...

and who's to stop the cops from setting off MJ smoke bombs in an apt. building/housing project and using it as an excuse to search every single apartment?

[JoeyTrib]

22. You trying to give them ideas?

:shrug:

[jp11]

23. The scent of marijuana makes any noise 'sounds of evidence being destroyed'.

[Cronus Protagonist]

26. On the streets of downtown Los Angeles, everywhere smells like pot

Every building smells of pot in every hallway, many of the people passing by you are smoking pot, the group of guys on the street corner are passing each other a joint, the cars cruising by slowly give off clouds of pot smoke when the windows are rolled down.

Here, according to SCOTUS, the cops could just shoot everyone and be done with it.

[BzaDem]

27. Actually, that is nonsense. What matters is destruction of evidence, and even before this decision

police could search someone's home if they had good reason to believe evidence was in the process of being destroyed.

The only change here is that in this case, the destruction of evidence sounds were occurring after an officer knocked and announced his presence.