Posted on November 2nd, 2008 by Kip
The District of Columbia's subway bureaucracy has announced that it will commence warrantless, suspicionless searches at subway entrances: The program is modeled after one begun three years ago in New York that has withstood legal challenges. However, experts said it is difficult to measure the effectiveness of such searches, beyond assuring the public that police [...]
Filed under: Fourth Amendment, Law Enforcement Abuses, New York City & State, Privacy Issues, Terror v. Civil Liberties, Updates | Comments Off
Posted on August 14th, 2008 by Kip
To review: There is a First Amendment right not only to free speech, but also to anonymous speech, and especially to anonymous political speech. That has never been seriously doubted in our history, and is deeply entrenched in Supreme Court precedent. See, e.g., McIntyre v. Ohio Elections Commission, 514 U.S. 334 (1995) ("Under our Constitution, [...]
Filed under: First Amendment - Speech, Law Enforcement Abuses, Metablogging, Privacy Issues | 1 Comment »
Posted on August 11th, 2008 by Kip
To review: A strange alliance of libertarians and theocrats emerged upon news that an intermediate California court had concluded that California law in fact barred homeschooling unless the parents employed or were themselves properly credentialed educators. The theocrats were aghast because they are increasingly turning to (uncredentialed) homeschooling to ensure that their children are in [...]
Filed under: Children v. Parents; Homeschooling, Law, Privacy Issues | Comments Off
Posted on August 7th, 2008 by Kip
"…it is constitutional, because the courts say it is constitutional…" –Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, on the federal government's policy regarding search and seizure of electronic devices at border points. Introduction For some time now there has been a growing agitation, especially in the blawgosphere, over the increasing incidence of searches of laptops and other [...]
Filed under: Fourth Amendment, Law Enforcement Abuses, Privacy Issues | 3 Comments »
Posted on July 31st, 2008 by Kip
Reason laments the use by law enforcement of consent searches to evade the Fourth Amendment's requirement of probable cause to search or seize: The other day, the American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois issued a report on "consent searches" that sometimes accompany traffic stops. Relying on data provided by local and state law enforcement agencies, [...]
Filed under: Fourth Amendment, Law Enforcement Abuses, Privacy Issues | Comments Off
Posted on July 30th, 2008 by Kip
There's been some panic-mongering in the blogs over a supposed provision in the housing bill requiring credit card processors to report (or be able to report) all, absolutely all, transactions to the IRS. That is not correct. The bill includes a de minimis exception for transactions of $10,000 or less and 200 transactions or less [...]
Filed under: Law, Privacy Issues, Updates | 1 Comment »
Posted on July 14th, 2008 by Kip
Unfortunately, he was the dissenter: History tells us that it is not the fact that a constitutional right is at issue that portends the outcome of a case, but rather what specific right we are talking about. If it is free speech, freedom of religion, or the right to bear arms, we are quick to [...]
Filed under: Fourth Amendment, Law Enforcement Abuses, Privacy Issues | Comments Off
Posted on July 11th, 2008 by Kip
Guess who wants your data records kept secret — very secret: The New York Police Department is appealing an order to release an internal database of hundreds of thousands of street stops of pedestrians to civil rights advocates who want to analyze it for evidence of racial bias. … In a decision in May on [...]
Filed under: Fourth Amendment, Law Enforcement Abuses, New York City & State, Privacy Issues | 2 Comments »
Posted on July 3rd, 2008 by Kip
The rules of discovery are not among my areas of expertise. I learned the basics of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure's Rule 34 as a 1L, and promptly forgot them all. The libertarian rules of civil procedure, however, are most certainly within my ambit, and I can spot a violation a mile away. Google [...]
Filed under: Law, Privacy Issues | 1 Comment »
Posted on March 1st, 2008 by Kip
The twin canards of "sue the deep pockets" and "it's never the parents' fault" strike again: In the lawsuit, the parents allege that Texas resident Kiley Ryan Bowers, now serving a nine-year prison term in California, "utilized the site to contact, seduce, meet, assault and then harass and torment" their 15-year-old daughter, Kristin Helms. Bowers [...]
Filed under: Constitutional Issues, Frivolous Lawsuits, Privacy Issues | 2 Comments »