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Tuesday, August 09, 2011
Courts - Federal Court Rules That Police Cannot Use Warrants to Obtain Cell Phone Location of Person Who is Subject of Arrest Warrant
Prof. Orin Kerr writes at length about the 60-page, August 3rd, D.Md. opinion by Magistrate Judge Susan K. Gauvey today in The Volokh Conspirary. He begins:
Imagine the police have an arrest warrant for a crime suspect, and they want to find the suspect to arrest him. They happen to know the suspect’s cell phone number, so they want to go to the phone company and have the phone company tell the police the location of the suspect’s phone. The phone company refuses to let the police get that information without a warrant, so the police police go to a judge and apply for a search warrant based on the probable cause to believe that the location of the phone will help them execute the arrest warrant. Here’s the interesting question: Should the judge sign the warrant application and issue the warrant? Or should the judge deny the warrant application?
Posted by Marcia Oddi on August 9, 2011 09:57 AM
Posted to Courts in general