Motorcyclist Wins Taping Case Against State Police 485
stevegee58 writes "Slashdot readers may recall the case of a Maryland motorcyclist (Anthony Graber) arrested and charged with wiretapping violations (a felony) when he recorded his interaction with a Maryland State Trooper. Today, Judge Emory A. Pitt threw out the wiretapping charges against Graber, leaving only his traffic violations to be decided on his October 12 trial date. 'The judge ruled that Maryland's wire tap law allows recording of both voice and sound in areas where privacy cannot be expected. He ruled that a police officer on a traffic stop has no expectation of privacy.' A happy day for freedom-loving Marylanders and Americans in general."
Re:I can possibly see the future (Score:3, Informative)
You obviously don't know anything about Antonin Scalia apart from what Moveon.org and the DailKos tell you to "think". Go read the wikipedia page for Kyllo v. U.S. [wikipedia.org] Then go read the full opinion [cornell.edu] and come back when you know a tiny sliver about the law instead of the Pavlovian emotional responses that are bred into you by your blogging "friends".
Re:Of course the big irony here is... (Score:5, Informative)
No, there's no expectation of privacy in a courtroom (in the US) except in certain circumstances, usually involving a minor. The proceedings are open, anyone may attend, and transcripts are public record. The ban on cameras in most circumstances has more to do with maintaining decorum -- so people aren't playing to the cameras -- than with preserving non-existent expectations of privacy.
Re:Of course the big irony here is... (Score:5, Informative)
there is an expectation of privacy in a courtroom.
No, there isn't.
Exactly the opposite, in fact.
Everything that transpires in a courtroom is public knowledge. It's against the law for the public to be excluded completely*. Reporters, sketch artists, and members of the general public can all sit in the gallery during a trial.
Technological means of recording are a tiny fraction of the age of the legal system, so the legal system does not yet (and probably never will) consider them necessary implements to be used in informing the public, so the use of them is at the court's discretion.
* - there are exceptions where there are statutory claims of privacy, such as when the evidence is classified or the defendant is a minor.
Re:I can possibly see the future (Score:1, Informative)
The irony of this post is fucking STAGGERING.
Really? Really, this is what you want to go with, with that asinine flourish?
Okay, son, try this the fuck on for size: the reason we have no-knock warrants in this country is BECAUSE OF Tony Scalia. Who wrote the god damned opinion. And guess what, this didn't come out of a blog [cornell.edu]. Just in case you're so busy fantasizing that Tony is the Great White Knight Defender of the Fourth Amendment to read it, here's the Wiki link [wikipedia.org].
You're the one who needs to be even passingly familiar with the decisions of the justices you defend, kid. Stop being a Pavlovian defender of the indefensible and wake the fuck up.
Incredible. Just incredible.
Re:Alright! (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Of course the big irony here is... (Score:3, Informative)
Not only that, it should be pointed out that the public nature of a criminal trial is enshrined in Sixth Amendment.
Re:I can possibly see the future (Score:5, Informative)
Re:No, probalby not (Score:4, Informative)
I hear conspiracy theories like this but I've never seen any evidence of it happening. Reason is that the cops would get in trouble.
Uh, no. I was born and raised in a small town in central Kentucky. My mother was the city attorney. One police officer failed to get an oil change or routine maintenance on his cruiser for 20,000 miles (they are allowed to take their cruisers home, but get free maintenance at the city garage). The engine on his cruiser then failed and had to be replaced. As a result, my mom set in motion the proceedings to have the officer fired. The city was unable to fire him, and from there on out he would, whenever he saw me driving around town, follow me and pull me over for minor offenses such as speeding less than 5 mph over the posted limits. Eventually, his wife got a job in another city and they moved.
The fact of the matter is that it is VERY difficult to have police fired. It used to be commonplace for mayors to come in and fire most of the police department and repopulate it with his cronies, now there are all sorts of laws protecting police officers.
Re:Alright! (Score:3, Informative)
It's not likely, but maybe the town got all it's revenue from tickets because many people were speeding there.
If large numbers of people are breaking a speed limit, it nearly always means the limit is wrong.
Re:Alright! (Score:4, Informative)
Any first year law student can tell you that Rule 11 is a civil rule, not a criminal one.
I don't know why I waste my time . . .
One of his bailiffs (Score:4, Informative)
Something you find out if you look in to it is that there are a lot of different police forces in the US. Cities have their own, counties have their, states have theirs, the federal government has multiple ones.
So if a city police force refused to arrest and turn over a police officer for a lawful warrant, well then another police force would be called in to intervene. It isn't as though everyone would just sit back and say "Oh, well I guess they can just ignore us and do what they want." In that case it would be more than just the officer they were originally after who'd get arrested.
Re:Alright! (Score:3, Informative)
it's not the speeding ticket(the reason he was pulled over in the first place) that was dismissed. It was the wire tapping charge, for wearing a head mounted camera that was. If you remember this was the plain clothes off duty cop that cut the motorcyclist off, then got out of his car with is firearm drawn, and shouted "hand up and get of the motorcycle slowly" a few times and then finally said "get off the bike state police" all while having his badge mostly covered by his shirt. The motorcyclist admitted to speeding/reckless operation of a motor vehicle. Anyways, no it wasn't a "ticket" that was overturned.
Re:Sucks to be him, though (Score:2, Informative)
When the cop stopped him ...
What cop ??? I see a civilian coming out of a car (not a police car), drawing a gun and waving it around. This civilian does not produce a badge or other form of id, confirming that he is what he says he claims to be.
Re:Alright! (Score:5, Informative)
I hate to pick on Sonia Sotomayor, but she's the first example that springs to mind. Some firefighters took a test in order to achieve a higher-level promotion. Some of the white guys passed, but none of the black guys so the black guys sued, claiming the test was racist.
That's not what happened. The city decided on its own to discard the test because they feared that it was culturally biased, since many of the minorities who failed that test had easily passed similar tests previously. It was the "white guys" who sued to get the existing test results to stand.
Current Law says the test must be demonstrated to have a bias, due to its content. Mrs. Sotomayor decided to ignore that law and made her own determination that "because no black guys passed" that must prove the test is racist, despite no evidence in the written pages.
Again, that's not what happened. It was actually a lower court that determined that the city was within its rights to not certify the test. Sotomayor and two other judges merely upheld that ruling through a Summary Order, which essentially means that they simply agreed that the lower court did not make any legal errors in reaching their conclusion, and they had no further opinion to contribute to the case. Of course, ultimately, the Supreme Court disagreed, and the lower court ruling was overturned.
Re:Alright! (Score:4, Informative)
What? No. All speed limits are set locally. In Michigan, they're set by the county and sometimes by the city, as in the case of home-rule cities (like Grand Rapids and Detroit). Elsewhere it's either the state, county, city, township, etc., depending on state law. It's never set by the fed, and never has been. Even during the 55 MPH national maximum speed limit days, the most the fed could do was take away a state's federal funding for roadwork if the state didn't comply.
Re:Alright! (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Alright! (Score:4, Informative)
I know lots of such small towns. One near me (Jamestown, SC) has a population of less than 100 people and much like the OP's stated town, only about a quarter mile of highway going through it. Over 2/3's of their budget comes from traffic infractions. I doubt anybody in the "town" would care if the "town" lost all their revenue. It's not as if it's really providing them social services. It employs a mayor, judge, and 2 cops (for a while it was just one) whose basic sole purpose is the issuance of traffic tickets, which pay their salary so that they can write more tickets. It's basically like the town incorporated just to setup a circular loop for these couple of clowns to have a job. Nothing they do couldn't be handled just as easily (and likely better) by the county sheriff's office, who is patrolling the whole area around their little 1/4 mile stretch anyways. It doesn't work as is. Heck when they're not getting enough revenue they appear to just make up charges. My sister was actually pull there for not stopping at a stop sign for "long enough". The cop acknowledged that she had come to a complete stop, but that it wasn't for "long enough". Even their judge had to throw that one out, but it was still a day wasted going to the court to plead the case. Not to mention it seems like going through that town with an out-of-state license plate is a ticketable offense. They know out-of-state travelers aren't going to come back to dispute it, so they're far more likely to write them tickets.