The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals is well known for being stocked with leftist whackos, exactly the sort of judges that rightwing whackos scream about. Well, there’s something new to scream about: the 9th Circuit has determined that the police may track you at all times without a warrant.
http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,2013150,00.html
Government agents can sneak onto your property in the middle of the night, put a GPS device on the bottom of your car and keep track of everywhere you go. This doesn’t violate your Fourth Amendment rights, because you do not have any reasonable expectation of privacy in your own driveway — and no reasonable expectation that the government isn’t tracking your movements.
Awesome.
Now the questions is… if you discover a GPS tracking device on your car, what are you legally allowed to do with it? Obvious suggestions include:
1) Remove and destroy
2) Leave it alone, and drive only where you want the authorities to know you’re going
3) Remove and place in garbage
4) Remove and place on random civilian vehicle
5) Remove and place on long-haul freight truck
6) Remove and mail to Hong Kong
7) Remove and mail to cops
8 ) Remove and send to FBI via strip-o-gram
9) Remove and sell on ebay
10) Remove, disassemble and use as part of an autonomous aircraft guidance system. post videos to Youtube, be sure to thank authorities for the free donation of the electronics that made it all possible
11) Remove and place on police car (slightly risky)
12) Remove and attach to helium-filled weather balloon
13) Remove and attach to sewer rat
14) Remove and “clone” so that there are, say, fifty of you running around
No one has the right to place surveillance devices on your vehicle, unless they have obtained a warrant. Period. And yes, you can remove it and do anything you wish with it, and yes, you have the right to use lethal force upon any person you find placing an unknown device on your vehicle, home or any other part of your property. Check the Constitution, kids, you have the right of self defense from ALL threats, no matter who they claim to be.
In several firearms related sites, there has been talk of what could happen to a federal agent doing this in a castle law state. It is quite possible that people would be legally shooting federal agents. If someone is messing with your car at 3 AM, you are likely going to assume they are trying to steal it.
There’s always the Internet Tough Guy approach of how “I’d shoot anyone placing a tracker on my car,” and of course the questions of legality. But we have had cases of SWAT-type cops breaking into the *wrong* house and meeting armed resistance… and the homeowner, if he survives, often looks forward to facing legal problems. The thing is, sure, they may be yelling “police” and may have “police” in great big yellow letters on their body armor, but if you’re a decent enough person at home in bed minding your own business and all of a sudden there are explosions, armed people are pouring into your home and a whole lot of screaming… how rational are you going to be about *instantly* analyzing the situation?
In any event, I think the ruling is restricted to allowing someone to sneak a tracker onto you car if it’s in the driveway, but not if it’s in the garage, because “you have no expectation of privacy” if it’s in the driveway. Odd, that, because people keep getting arrested and charged with wire tapping violations for videotaping a cop behaving badly in public.
There was a similar gadget for sale in the mid 90s that attached magnetically to the car. It was a recorder that had to be recovered. I almost bought one, to play with it.
No reasonable expectation of privacy? We also have, at least in the city in which I live, no reasonable expectation of security: the cops don’t even take reports on vandalism of cars or houses unless there’s been “significant damage.”
Why would I have a “reasonable expectation” that the government IS following me?
If I found one, I think I’d put it on my neighbor’s boat.
Sorry, Scott, I have the full legal authority of self defense. And yes, I have killed human beings, so killing anti-American cocksuckers is no problem at all.
“no reasonable expectation that the government isn’t tracking your movements.”
Errr… yes I do have the right to reasonably conclude that the government isn’t tracking my movements. Unless 9th circuit wants to argue the legality of putting chips in my body?
I hate the 9th circuit. Their rulings are horrible, and not just this one.
April Fools is in April. Isn’t it?
Jim
15. remove, attach to buoyancy device, and pitch overboard into the Gulf Stream.
I love the suggestions of what to do with one of these gizmos if found on your car. Let me add another: Place it on the car of a Ninth Circuit Court judge.
Hazardous, but very rewarding….
“If someone is messing with your car at 3 AM, you are likely going to assume they are trying to steal it.”
If someone is messing around *under* my car at 3 AM, I’m going to assume they are trying to sabotage it (e.g., cut the brake lines) or plant a bomb on it. How would you respond to what you have every reason to believe is an act of attempted murder?
[…] this post from a month and a half ago, where I discussed what to do if you found a GPS tracker on your car? […]