Uh, what?

I know, it seems unbelievable. and Gant wasn't supposed to enhance police authority, it should restrict it. WA's Art 1 Sec. 7 enhanced

constitutional privacy would probably prevent this from happening here, but it still seems like an incorrect result. If I have time, I'll

read the opinion to see how they got there.

just not be a criminal instead.

My guess on how they reached that ruling is copious amounts of controlled substances.

Or "Well, if we violate civil rights 100 times and find 1 real criminal, it's totally worth it!"

Shteevie, bad news: they can rough you up and ransack your stuff even if you're not a criminal

EvilCouch, I think the controlled substance is called "power."

if the article would mention whether or not the suspect in the story had any priors? They don't mention roughing him up.

Shteevie: They searched his vehicle and person for traffic infractions. The fact that he turned out to be a serious criminal is immaterial.

it sounds like they pulled him over for speeding, searched his car and found an illegally stored gun, and assumed there may be more to find

in the circumstances, I may have thought the same thing. Plus the request to just leave the car by the side of the road rather than

following impound procedure reeks of 'don't look in the car and find my stuff.'

Since when is speeding probable cause for a search?

And, another explanation is "I don't want to have to deal with paying a towing bill and a bunch of crappy paperwork to get my car back.

Not wanting to deal with bureaucracy is also not probable cause.

speeding with an expired license and being tipped by the driver sounds like a good lead.

and again, if this guy had any priors, I have no problem with him not getting the benefit of the doubt.

It also reeks of "I don't want to pay ~$200 to get my car out of impound."

the court's reasoning was that the guy was apparently under the influence of drugs and that the police could thus look in his cellphone to

find evidence of this

Shteevie, this part of the law has nothing to do with whether the guy has priors. Throw that idea right out.

it is strictly and only a question of whether there was probably evidence on his cell phone re: his being currently under the influence

of drugs.

and I think that's a far reach.

I don't buy a cell-phone counting as a 'container' at all. that sounds really weak0linked to me

s/weakly linked

anisoptera is on the right track legally; it is a speeding stop which morphed into an expired license stop which morphed into a drug stop.

and Shteevie I think the cell phone as container is a really interesting argument which is not yet resolved.

so the real question is whether or not any of those should allow for the search of the cell phone?

the real questions then are two: is the cell phone a container within traditional 4th Amendmt parlance and was it reasonable to believe that

from one perspective, a cell phone is a huge file folder full of correspondence and connections

there would be evidence of his crime -the charged crime, of being under influence of illegal drugs -- on the cell.

right, which is why I can't dismiss that argument out of hand.

yet it also has lots of very private material on it; your personal photos, etc. Perhaps HYPPA protected medical info, etc.

I don't think it's a far reach to think that if the dude was high at the moment, he could have obtained the stuff recently,

and a message or email on his phone would be from the source.

Seems intoxicated is not the same thing as actually intoxicated. If I'm really tired and get pulled over because being tired resembles

intoxication, does that give the officer the right to search my person and my vehicle?

I've been pulled over for driving while exhausted before. The article doesn't even try to say how the officer arrived at the conclusion.

it seems you are worried more about the possibility of the discovery of things the police don't have any business searching for.

hasn't this been an issue in every kind of search authority conversation in the past?

searchers could find prescriptions, med records, etc. in searches of homes and computers, which we have been okay with in the past.

to hear them described by their creators, our phones are far more sophisticated, all-inclusive, and central to our lives than our

computers ever have been.

the classic quote attributed to Cardinal Richelieu applies:

"If you give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest of men, I will find something in them which will hang him."

if there's precedent for the law to make certain limited demands of the person. "who have you called in the last 24 hours?" instead of

searching the entire phone.

If you assume the police are your friends, are on your side, are only interested in "bad guys", or believe that you couldn't possibly be

perceived as a "bad guy", there is a distinct probability that you will have your perceptions shattered in a very unfriendly way.

If you think this is tin foil hattery, feel free to ask Jacob Applebaum his opinion on such things.

I know your general opinion, and it doesn't seem specific to the discussion.

It's specific to your comment about "just not being a criminal" and the general fantasy about how police use their search powers.

Nearly all of the precedents being set around cell phones and digital privacy are overwhelmingly in favor of the officer being allowed

complete access to whatever you have on your electronics.

This includes compelling you to give up your password because the password, specifically, has no incriminating value

regardless of the incriminating properties of the stuff that password protects.

Shteevie - There is no obligation for a person to answer such questions. Fifth Amendment.

Also, I'm totally glad my phone wipes itself after 5 wrong passcode attempts. "Oops, sorry, typo. Let me.. no, was that it? Oh… it's gone…"

anisoptera - That's a nice idea, but I've already commented on how they're working around the 5th amendment.

Failure to provide something that doesn't have adequate 5th amendment protection allows them to hold you in contempt of court and detain you

until you're ready to give up the password.

I was responding to the "can't they just ask you who you've talked to" question.

as for my password, well. It's not incriminating? Unfortunately I have a very spotty memory. So sorry I gave you the wrong third number,

Ah... sorry. Looks like I misread your response.

transposed the second two, forgot something else and oh whoops phone wiped itself. Well, guess you don't need my password anymore!

The difficulty with those "mistakes" is that you're putting yourself at the judge's mercy on whether you can convince them it truly was

accidental.

yeah, I'm aware that it's a very gray area.

More on being compelled to give up your password.

It's not just grey, it's a very serious risk to your continued freedom.

Well, I mean. I do have a diagnosed medical condition, one of the symptoms of which is "selective memory"...

You win!

It's so handy!

this is also a good reason to store everything on your phone in the cloud so you can delete it in the cloud & sync the phone to the cloud.

while obstruction of justice charges are possible, such charges would be a real political risk for the prosecutor.

Shteevie, remember that if your privacy is violated and you are "innocent" there is no criminal case in which to defend the invasion of

your privacy. The only way to defend it is with a civil lawsuit, for which you pay an attorney big bucks UPFRONT. So the only time that

these principles will really be dealt with is when the person is "guilty."

infinitekitty - curious, where's the line on that? I can remote wipe my device rather than just deleting a few things and syncing...

the truth is there is no well understood line in this area.

my phone has a security policy that allows me to wipe it in less than 30 seconds

about 22 probably...

I wonder how a cop would react if I had a phone rebuilding from a saved image when he walked up

Five wrong entries would take about 10s if you're hammering 1 the whole time. Which you could totally do without even looking at the screen.

Plus now I don't even have to wait till I get home to restore backups.

New security policy established

probably true. Mango has a "one more will wipe the phone" warning that would add a second or so

iOS might have that too. It definitely tells you how many are left

makes sense

so, when asked questions like

"where did you get your drugs" or "who were you going to meet at 2AM", there are ways to answer those questions that don't give the officer

cause to search the phone. Those answers probably don't sound much like 'please don't search my phone' or 'I don't have to say anything that

incriminate me" or "let me wipe my phone and thereby hide its contents from you."

warrants for call records or for cell-tower logs that give approximate location have existed for a while, and fulfill the officer's needs

for related data without opening up possibilities for unrelated emails to be read.

there's no part of the 5th, far as I know, that requires an officer to be less suspect of you simply when you refuse to give him details.

The 5th only matters once you hit the court room. While being detained by an officer, what matters is if he can establish probable cause.

One of the things that provides probable cause is circumstantial evidence such as being evasive and not

directly answering questions.

Once he has probable cause, he can search your shit and hold you for additional questioning. This is especially true of things in your car

or if the cop pulls the "exigent circumstances" justification, which applies to cell phone data.

right. A fun new thing cops are doing in court is describing demeanor, i.e., "when I asked him about cocaine, he broke eye contact and then

looked at his feet and mumbled." This supports PC to search your stuff. This is how thin it is.

Shteevie, if you are accosted by a cop who is asking you those kinds of questions, there is only ONE safe response. Please memorize it:

"OFFICER, AM I FREE TO LEAVE NOW?"

it is the one question that they cannot lie about without creating serious problems for themselves. If they admit you're not free to leave,

then you are likely under arrest and they should be Mirandizing you, plus they should by that time have probable cause.

a lot of their street trickery depends on fooling you into thinking you must stay and answer their questions when you do not have to.

so if they say you are free to leave, do so immediately with no further comment.

if they say "NO" then tell them you want your attorney present and you will say nothing without your attorney present.

then they will start intimidating you and telling you about either (a) the great things they'll do for you once you've re-opened your mouth,

and/or ( the terrible things they'll do to you if you stick to your guns. State v. Athan says in WA police are allowed to lie to us.

so their promises are worthless, and you will hear them denied in court. Got it? Politely ask, officer am I free to go? Thank you, bye.

and seriously, do this even if you have "nothing to hide". the more often innocent people stand up for their rights, the weaker the

"They denied my search and that made me suspicious because the only reason you'd refuse a search..." argument becomes.

remember, they are in as much of a hurry to get on with it as you are, despite their claims of being able to "do this all day".

Also, the whole "nothing to hide" rationale is total crap.