Just curious about First Amendment rights in Warertown...

[WCGreen]

They have been searching homes ll afternoon and I wonder if the Authorities respected 1st Amendment Rights of those people who are having their homes searched.

Or are they using this criminal act as an excuse to do what ever they have to do in order to capture the bombing suspect.

[KamaAina]

1. I think you mean 4th Amendment rights

and in a case of hot pursuit like this, I doubt this would be considered "illegal search and seizure". Especially since the cops are after White Hat, not the residents.

[WCGreen]

8. I was of the understanding that it was the First Amendment that had the

protection of private property.

This is a murky situation since the homes of the people are not being searched to determine if the home owner is a suspect but rather they are searching private property to see if a person of interest is on that property.

I'm not a lawyer I was just wondering if the law enforcement officers had to respect the private property that were not considered a suspect.

[Trekologer]

2. I think you mean the 4th amendment

Unless you're referring to telling the authorities to go Cheney themselves.

[Gravitycollapse]

3. 4th amendment. And it's protection against unreasonable search and seizure.

Obviously this was reasonable.

[Spider Jerusalem]

4. 4th amendment

"unreasonable search and seizure"

not 100% on supporting case law but in the case of a clear and present danger to public safety with an armed and dangerous terror suspect at large one would suspect that it would not be considered "unreasonable"

[jeff47]

5. Fourth amendment means you can say "no". Not that you have to say "no". (nt)

[Gravitycollapse]

7. I do not believe citizens have authority to deny a search of this nature.

[jeff47]

9. In the immediate area, probably not. But the entire dragnet isn't the immediate area

That being said, I do not expect a lot of people to say "no".

[gcomeau]

10. They don't.

Anyone says no in these circumstances could have a terrorist with a gun pointed at their head behind the door, cops are coming in and clearing the house. Period.

[gcomeau]

6. As others said, 4th. And...

...this falls rather clearly under the category of a hot pursuit/emergency situation. Law enforcement is completely permitted to engage in these searches under these conditions.

[jberryhill]

11. Exigent circumstances

Fourth, not First.