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S.D.Tex.: Removing the logical person to consent to ask another violated Fourth Amendment and Randolph

By John Wesley Hall, Jr.

Removing the person who should be asked for consent violates Randolph. Asking a least plausible person violated the Fourth Amendment. United States v. Butler, 2011 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 28871 (S.D. Tex. March 21, 2011): Despite the legal nuances that are used to justify eroding the Fourth Amendment, a stop is an arrest. The word itself comes from un arrêt — the French word for stop. Once an officer turns on his car’s blue lights behind your car, you are not free to leave. This is obvious. If you do not stop and submit to the officer’s direction, he chases you and charges you with evading arrest — not evading a conversation. Once the officers arrived at his house, Hornbeak had come to a stop. With more than ten armed men in his house and helicopters above, he was not free to leave...continue to full post

Full post as published by Fourth Amendment on March 23, 2011 (boomark / email).