New law review article: Suspicionless DNA Collection from Arrestees Violates the Fourth Amendment, But Easier Expunction of DNA Records Can Help Mitigate the Harm by Catherine A. Burke on SSRN. Abstract:

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Volokh: District Judges Divide on Long-Term Cell Phone Tracking Under the Fourth Amendment by Orin Kerr:

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CNET: DOJ: We don’t need warrants for e-mail, Facebook chats by Declan McCullagh:

An FBI investigation manual updated last year, obtained by the ACLU, says it’s possible to warrantlessly obtain Americans’ e-mail “without running afoul” of the Fourth Amendment.

The U.S. Department of Justice and the FBI believe they don’t need a search warrant to review Americans’ e-mails, Facebook chats, Twitter direct messages, and other private files, internal documents reveal.

Government documents obtained by the American Civil Liberties Union and provided to CNET show a split over electronic privacy rights within the Obama administration, with Justice Department prosecutors and investigators privately insisting they’re not legally required to obtain search warrants for e-mail. The IRS, on the other hand, publicly said last month that it would abandon a controversial policy that claimed it could get warrantless access to e-mail correspondence.

NYTimes: U.S. Is Weighing Wide Overhaul of Wiretap Laws by Charlie Savage:

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration, resolving years of internal debate, is on the verge of backing a Federal Bureau of Investigation plan for a sweeping overhaul of surveillance laws that would make it easier to wiretap people who communicate using the Internet rather than by traditional phone services, according to officials familiar with the deliberations.

Atlantic: What the Framing of a Terror Suspect Says About GOP Attacks on Due Process by Conor Friedersdorf.

Paul Kevin Curtis was falsely accused in the ricin plot — and the legal requirement to bring him before a judge helped set him free.

On the requirement that the government show its probable cause, which the GOP wants to end for terrorism suspects, apparently not accounting for the framed ones.

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After a dog alert, the probable cause for a search of the vehicle does not necessarily become stale by delay. Here, the time between the sniff and the search was relatively short and the vehicle had been moved for the search. State v. Bounyalath, 2013 Iowa App. LEXIS 454 (April 24, 2013).

Old information was redundant to new information, so it was not stale. On appellate review of denial of a motion to suppress, the trial evidence may be considered, too. State v. Newsome, 2013 Iowa App. LEXIS 455 (April 24, 2013).*

In a knock-and-talk, defendant’s backing away from the door is an implied offer to the police to enter. State v. Hunt, 2013 Iowa App. LEXIS 483 (April 24, 2013)

Defendant began his flight as officers got out of their car. They pursued him to an apartment door where he assaulted the first officer with his hands on defendant. That gave justification to enter the apartment in hot pursuit for the misdemeanor battery on an officer. United States v. Chambers, 2012 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 187893 (D. Nev. November 21, 2012).

There is no Fourth Amendment requirement in child pornography cases for the issuing magistrate to actually see the material to determine probable cause. Four circuits are in accord. United States v. Wilson, 2012 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 187876 (N.D. Ga. November 28, 2012).*

Defendant was placed in a patrol car because he was arrested, not to thwart veto of consent under Randolph v. Georgia. United States v. Espinoza, 2012 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 187875 (N.D. Ga. May 8, 2012).*

The frisk was justified during this traffic stop because of excessive nervousness of the driver and passenger. No claim is made that the patdown was too intrusive, and it turned up baggies of meth. United States v. Brooks, 2013 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 61414 (E.D. Ky. April 30, 2013).*

A protective sweep is based on reasonable suspicion, and a person who came out of the building they were looking for suspects in said that there was another inside. That’s all it takes. The defendant’s arrest outside the apartment didn’t nullify the ability to perform the protective sweep. United States v. Troy, 2013 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 62299 (D. Minn. April 11, 2013):

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Officers’ invalid parole search of apartment attributed to defendant made the consent void. The officers had no bona fide reason to believe that the place searched was defendant’s place where he was registered with parole elsewhere. Just being seen there isn’t probable cause to believe he’s living there. United States v. Alexander, 2013 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 61812 (N.D. Cal. April 30, 2013):

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BLT: Man in Landmark Supreme Court GPS Case Pleads Guilty:

Facing his fourth trial, the man at the center of a landmark U.S. Supreme Court ruling on GPS tracking pled guilty today to a drug conspiracy charge and was sentenced to serve 15 years in prison.

Antoine Jones was arrested in 2005 and charged with participating in a drug trafficking ring in the Washington area. Jones will receive credit for time already served, meaning he’ll spend an additional seven years in jail. After he is released, U.S. District Judge Ellen Segal Huvelle sentenced him to five years of supervised release and 200 hours of community service.

United States v. Jones, 132 S.Ct. 945, 181 L.Ed.2d 911 (Jan. 23, 2012)

CNN/Time Poll: Cutback civil liberties to fight terror?

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A protective sweep can extend to looking under a mattress because it is a common hiding place. United States v. Snard, 497 Fed. Appx. 228 (3d Cir. 2012).

Officers had sufficient reason to believe that defendant was at his house and it was his based on the address in the arrest warrant confirmed by another officer. Although it was 12:30 am, there were lights on and cars in the driveway and people could be heard inside. The arrest was thus reasonable. Carpenter v. State, 974 N.E.2d 569 (Ind. App. 2012).*

Officers had a description of man fleeing from a shooting and defendant met that description, so that was reasonable suspicion. State v. Hodge, 2012 Ohio 4306, 2012 Ohio App. LEXIS 3777 (10th Dist. September 20, 2012).*

The mere presence of an alleged live grenade, without more, did not justify exigency for a police entry into defendant’s house. In fact, it turned out that the grenade was last seen by defendant’s wife, the reporter to them, two years earlier, although the police didn’t know that at the time. See United States v. Bonitz, 826 F.2d 954, 957 (10th Cir. 1987) (concluding no exigency existed where officers found cans of gun powder because “[s]tanding undisturbed, cans of gun powder are inert”). United States v. Yengel, 711 F.3d 392 (4th Cir. 2013):

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Defendant accepted a California suspicionless search condition for parole, and he was bound by it. The suspicionless search of his place was valid. Samson v. California, 547 U.S. 843, 850 (2006) (“parolees have fewer expectations of privacy than probationers, because parole is more akin to imprisonment than probation is to imprisonment.”). United States v. King, 711 F.3d 986 (9th Cir. 2013).*

The officer wasn’t reckless under the Franks doctrine; the search was also by consent; two defendants lack standing to contest the search of a vehicle; the search of the vehicle was by consent. United States v. Sexton, 2013 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 32389 (W.D. Wash. March 7, 2013).*

On remand from United States v. Beals, 698 F.3d 248 (6th Cir. 2012), the court finds the search was by consent and limited in scope “once again.” United States v. Ambrose, 2013 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 31885 (E.D. Tenn. January 23, 2013).

Defendant was known by his victims, and he committed a home invasion robbery where he threatened to kill his victims if they called police. When they quickly found him, a warrantless entry was justified. United States v. Daws, 711 F.3d 725 (6th Cir. 2013):

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The district court’s finding of reasonable suspicion is supported by the evidence, albeit thin, but the government discredits itself by arguing for the stop on information not known at the time presented as a fact. United States v. Abney, 496 Fed. Appx. 248 (3d Cir. 2012)*:

We find that the government’s conduct is, at the very least, troubling. We expressly disapprove of its attempt in its appellate brief to put forth a justification for the stop based on information that it knew was actually unknown to the police at the time of the stop itself. It likewise can take little refuge in the fact that the Assistant United States Attorney who presented its case at oral argument was not the author of its own appellate brief. The government’s obligation, especially in a criminal proceeding, is one of frankness, fairness, and doing justice to all. Although it ultimately prevails in this matter, we give the government little credit here for the integrity that we expect and usually receive.

A GPS was planted in a UPS package found to contain marijuana during a lawful opening of the damaged box by UPS. This did not offend Jones because the box was not in defendant’s possession at the time. Monitoring it to tail the box did not violate any expectation of privacy, and it was not monitored when it was inside his house. A parcel wire, however, violated Karo because it told the police when the package was opened inside the house. The warrantless entry into defendant’s home to secure the package was invalid because of police created exigent circumstances. State v. Lagrone, 985 N.E.2d 66 (Ind. App. 2013):

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County Treasurers issue LPNs in Nebraska, and their error that led to defendant’s stop is not chargeable to law enforcement, and the exclusionary rule would not be applied. State v. Bromm, 285 Neb. 193, 826 N.W.2d 270 (2013).*

The Michigan Supreme Court denies review of a cell phone search incident case because of the apparent likelihood of the judgment being affirmed by harmless error. People v. Crowell, 493 Mich. 937, 825 N.W.2d 585 (2013)* (per curiam).

Maine interprets its invasion of privacy statute involving the alleged recording of sex acts between a prostitute and her customers in the Kennebunk Zumba Studio prostitution case holding that there is no expectation of privacy when one is with a prostitute since it’s a crime. The state argued for a Fourth Amendment reasonable expectation of privacy analysis which the court did not find appropriate. State v. Strong, 2013 ME 21, 60 A.3d 1286 (2013)*:

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