Generally not. The Bill of Rights protections that matter most during police encounters are mandated by the U.S. Constitution as interpreted by the U.S. Supreme Court, and all states are required to follow them. States can offer more protection of these rights, but not less. There are some variations regarding...
No. The courts have made it clear that police officers do not have to tell people that they can refuse to consent to a warrantless search. Also, contrary to the belief perpetuated by popular police television shows, a person will not be read their rights subsequent to being taken into custody. A person only needs to be Mirandized when...
Yes. Minors generally have the same rights as adults. For example, minors can refuse searches and decline to answer questions without an attorney present. Nevertheless, minors face unique challenges when attempting to exercise these rights...
Simply put, the number of arrests an officer makes is a major factor used to determine his job performance. Police officers know that the easiest way to make arrests is to find people in possession of illegal drugs, so they want to search everyone they can find...
Unfortunately, many people get fooled by some version of this commonly used police officer's line: "Everything will be easier if you just cooperate". That's true to some extent -- it will make things much easier for the police officer who's trying to arrest you! -- but when it comes to you consenting to searches and answering incriminating questions, it couldn't be further from the truth...
During a legitimate traffic stop, police may order the driver and any passengers out of the vehicle. This rule is intended to protect officers' safety, but it's often used for investigatory purposes...
College students suffer from an unfortunate lack of privacy rights in many situations. The university owns the dorm, so school officials can often search rooms at their own discretion. College students still have 4th Amendment rights that apply in other situations...
No. We teach people that they have rights, and that these rights are secured by the principal documents that guarantee our civil liberties -- the U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights. An informed individual who invokes his constitutional protections is doing exactly what our nation's founders intended. They created these documents to...
Your rights do not disappear if the officer threatens to call in the dogs, so don't let this all-too-common tactic intimidate you into consenting to a search. You have several options...
This is one of those "it depends on the circumstances" questions. Police can obtain consent to search from anyone with control over the property; however any occupant of a residence can refuse consent, even if other occupants agree to a search. Unfortunately, you must be present in order to assert your refusal. The Supreme Court has ruled that...
The sad fact is that most people believe that they are under some kind of obligation to acquiesce when an officer contacts them and asks permission to search them or their belongings. The truth is exactly the opposite...
As a general rule, searches conducted without a valid search warrant signed by a judge violate the Fourth Amendment, but like most rules of law, there are a number of explicit exceptions. In fact, most searches occur without warrants because police take advantage of these exceptions to the Fourth Amendment...
This is a tricky issue. The simple answer is that citizens who are minding their own business are not obligated to "show their papers" to police. In fact, there is no law requiring citizens to carry identification of any kind. Once you get passed the surface, however, things get much more complicated...
Videotaping or photographing police in public places is usually legal, so long as you don't interfere with their activities. Nonetheless, doing so will often get you arrested...
The strangest thing happened to me the other day. I was sitting on a park bench with my girlfriend enjoying some marijuana. While I knew she disapproved, I went ahead and smoked a joint anyway.
Next thing I knew, a flying saucer descended from the sky and we were visited by a space alien! Not wanting to seem ungracious, I offered our new friend a puff of my joint. He declined.
My girlfriend, sick of my pot smoking and enamored by the alien's courage, immediately fell in love with our new little green friend. Before I knew it, she was boarding his flying saucer to fly away together to a far away galaxy where they would live happily ever after, leaving me heartbroken with only my joint to console me...
Does this scenario sound ridiculous to you? Believe it or not, this is an actual an advertisement designed by our government to keep young people from smoking marijuana!
Since 1998 the federal government has spent over $1.5 billion on anti-drug ads targeted at youth that are nothing more than mindless propaganda, mocked by young people as this generation's version of Reefer Madness. Independent studies conducted by the National Institute on Drug Abuse, Westat, and Texas State University have all found that these ads actually cause more drug use among teens who view them!
President Obama has pledged to cut wasteful government spending by eliminating programs that are ineffective, and the Youth Anti-Drug Media Campaign is an ineffective as government programs get.
While the program will receive $70 million this year, the administration is already developing its spending priorities for 2010. Please join me in sending a letter to Congress, telling them to "Just Say No" to wasteful and counterproductive propaganda: http://www.ssdp.org/justsayno
Thanks to lobbying efforts by SSDP, our friends at the Marijuana Policy Project and Drug Policy Alliance, and you, the ad campaign budget has been cut by 66% since 2002. With your help, we can eliminate the program altogether next year!
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