Police can search cellphones without warrant during arrest: court (Canada)

[Judi Lynn]

December 11, 2014 6:57 pm Updated: December 11, 2014 8:07 pm

Police can search cellphones without warrant during arrest: court

By Mike Blanchfield The Canadian Press

WATCH: The Supreme Court of Canada has upheld what the police can do with your cellphone during criminal investigations, allowing officers to conduct searches of a suspect’s phone without a warrant. Mike Le Couteur explains.


OTTAWA – A divided Supreme Court of Canada has ruled that police can conduct a limited search of suspect’s cellphone without getting a search warrant, but they must follow strict rules.

By a 4-3 margin, the court said in a precedent-setting ruling that the search must be directly related to the circumstances of a person's arrest and the police must keep detailed records of the search.

Three dissenting justices said the police must get a search warrant in all cases except in rare instances where there is a danger to the public or the police, or if evidence could be destroyed.

It is the first Supreme Court ruling on cellphone privacy, an issue that has spawned a series of divergent lower court rulings.

More:
http://globalnews.ca/news/1721144/police-can-search-cellphones-without-warrant-during-arrest-court/

[blkmusclmachine]

1. The United States of Canada is following right behind big brother's steps from across the border.

Yuck!

[GGJohn]

2. Except that's not true at all

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/26/us/supreme-court-cellphones-search-privacy.html?_r=0

Major Ruling Shields Privacy of Cellphones

Supreme Court Says Phones Can’t Be Searched Without a Warrant

WASHINGTON — In a sweeping victory for privacy rights in the digital age, the Supreme Court on Wednesday unanimously ruled that the police need warrants to search the cellphones of people they arrest.

While the decision will offer protection to the 12 million people arrested every year, many for minor crimes, its impact will most likely be much broader. The ruling almost certainly also applies to searches of tablet and laptop computers, and its reasoning may apply to searches of homes and businesses and of information held by third parties like phone companies.

“This is a bold opinion,” said Orin S. Kerr, a law professor at George Washington University. “It is the first computer-search case, and it says we are in a new digital age. You can’t apply the old rules anymore.

Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., writing for the court, was keenly alert to the central role that cellphones play in contemporary life. They are, he said, “such a pervasive and insistent part of daily life that the proverbial visitor from Mars might conclude they were an important feature of human anatomy.”

Canada's Supreme Court ruled opposite of what the US Supreme Court ruled.