This Is A Scary Development

[lizbud]

The Indiana Supreme Court issued this ruling last Thursday. So much
for your home being your castle.

http://www.nwitimes.com/news/local/g...3df229697.html

[Karen]

Do they at least have to have probable cause?

[Freedom]

Not surprising at all.

Just because a domestic argument moves inside is no reason to think both parties are safe.

Yes, Karen, they must have probably cause, or in the 2d case discussed at the bottom, justifiable circs.

You can "try" telling them they are at the wrong address as well (that happens sometimes) but still, they can enter.

[Asiel]

Our police don't enter even if they've been callled for a domestic violence issue, they do try to talk the people into letting them come in and talk things over but that's it. The only time they would enter forcibly is if they heard signs of violence, screaming and so forth, then it's obvious someone needs help so they do just bust in.

[Lady's Human]

Don't worry, the police are your friends, and would never, ever enter a home without a warrant or probable cause, and like the good justice said, there's plenty of time to straighten it out after the arrest.

Unless, of course, you're an elderly preacher who has a heart attack when the police break down your door during a drug raid on teh wrong address (Milford, MA, IIRC)...he had plenty of time after the fact to deal with the wrongful entry.

Big Brother knows best.

[Bonny]

Our police don't enter even if they've been callled for a domestic violence issue, they do try to talk the people into letting them come in and talk things over but that's it. The only time they would enter forcibly is if they heard signs of violence, screaming and so forth, then it's obvious someone needs help so they do just bust in.

In our area the police run & hide so they don't have to deal with a volatile situation.

[wombat2u2004]

In our area the police run & hide so they don't have to deal with a volatile situation.

Ahhh...such a lawless land Iowa is.

[momoffuzzyfaces]

Ahhh...such a lawless land Iowa is.

Kansas isn't much better!!! About a year ago two police officers came a knocking on my door. Seems they had a complaint about a domestic distrubance. ( I find this totally side splitting funny since I can't even get them to make people stop playing loud music until after 11 pm).

No one here but me and my cats. Ok, I probably did yell and Chip and Chuck for swinging on the blinds but that was it.

Still they wanted to come in for a look see. So I let them. No one home except me and the cats just like I told them.

I ran into the lady officer at the post office a few days later and asked if they ever found out who they were looking for. Seems someone gave them the wrong address. The person who called in actually lived several blocks over and told them she was new to town and got the street name wrong. She was calling in about her neighbors.

Oh, come on!!! If you don't even know the name of the street you live on, give up and move back in with your parents. You need a keeper!!!! sheesh

[Edwina's Secretary]

Liz - what is going on with Indiana??? Is it trying to become the Arizona of the Upper Midwest???

Indianapolis has long been on the short list of places to which my husband and I would consider relocation.

But there have been a few "turns to the right" that have been concerning - -- between this and the decision to stop any funding of Planned Parenthood (I have an idea to reduce the welfare rolls - significantly diminish the abililty of poor women and teenagers to get family planning and reproductive healthcare!!!) maybe we need to rethink our home state.

[lizbud]

Liz - what is going on with Indiana??? Is it trying to become the Arizona of the Upper Midwest???

Indianapolis has long been on the short list of places to which my husband and I would consider relocation.

But there have been a few "turns to the right" that have been concerning - -- between this and the decision to stop any funding of Planned Parenthood (I have an idea to reduce the welfare rolls - significantly diminish the abililty of poor women and teenagers to get family planning and reproductive healthcare!!!) maybe we need to rethink our home state.

I don't know what those three Justices were smoking, but I'm pretty
sure this judgement won't stand. The Federal Appeals Court would strike
it down. This goes directly against the 4th Amendment.

Why shoud the burden fall on the innocent citizen to hire a lawyer
and take his case to court to seek redress for an illigal entry? Sounds like
the beginnings of a police state to me.

[lizbud]

The court is receiving threats so they've beefed up security.
No surprise here.


http://www.theindychannel.com/news/27922917/detail.html

[wombat2u2004]

I can hear the jackboots coming

[mrspunkysmom]

Of course, you could move to Texas. There you can shoot anyone on your front lawn, if you say you were in fear of your life.

On the other hand, days like today, make me glad that teachers cannot carry weapons. It's not the students that would have to worry though.

[Grace]

Linda Greenhouse writes about The Supreme Court for the NY Times. Her latest piece is in this same vein -

http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com...-in-dreamland/

[lizbud]

There has been a idea floating around about term limits for the
Supreme Court as well as every other State & Federal elective office.
I think it's just about time for it now. Most folks I know would vote for it.


Here in Indy quite a uproar over our Indiana SC ruling of last thursday.
Our AJ has said said if asked by the plaintiff, he would be more than happy
to ask the Court to revisit it's ruling. It is much to broad in its scope &
should confine it's ruling to only the case at hand.

The Indianapolis Star ( right leaning paper) published a Editorial opinion.

Court ruling breaches the 'castle'
Indianapolis Star - Indianapolis, Ind.
Date: May 19, 2011
Start Page: A.18
Section: Editorial
Text Word Count: 388


A majority of justices on the Indiana Supreme Court arrived at a troubling conclusion in a recent ruling that centers on police officers' authority to enter people's homes without their permission and without a search warrant.

The ruling centers on a Vanderburgh County case in which Richard Barnes was convicted of three misdemeanor charges after he shoved a police officer who tried to enter his apartment without permission. Two officers had arrived at the apartment in response to a domestic violence call placed by Barnes' wife, Mary, in November 2007.

Barnes obviously was wrong to use physical force against a police officer. The facts of the case also indicate that the officers had adequate reason to be concerned about Mary Barnes' safety.

But the 3-2 ruling goes beyond this particular case to assert that, "We hold that there is no right to reasonably resist unlawful entry by police officers."

The majority's use of the phrase "no right to reasonably resist unlawful entry" is disturbing. Let's agree that shoving, or otherwise trying to harm or threaten, a police officer is unreasonable (and unlawful) behavior.

But shouldn't a citizen have the legal right to stand in a doorway, thus blocking entry by his physical presence, in resistance to an officer's attempt to enter his home without a search warrant?

In a strong dissent to the majority ruling, Justice Robert Rucker noted that a citizen's right to resist unlawful entry is rooted not only in the common law but also the Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. As Rucker pointed out, a 1980 U.S. Supreme Court ruling, Payton vs. New York, found that "the physical entry of the home is the chief evil against which the wording of the Fourth Amendment is directed."

The high court held that "the Fourth Amendment, made applicable to the States by the Fourteenth Amendment, prohibits the police from making a warrantless and nonconsensual entry into a suspect's home in order to make a routine felony arrest."

In a separate dissent to last week's ruling, Justice Brent Dickson wrote that "the wholesale abrogation of the historic right of a person to reasonably resist unlawful entry into his dwelling is unwarranted and unnecessarily broad."

We would add that the decision also was unsound. And with it, a piece of Hoosiers' protection against excessive police powers was erased.



Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction or distribution is prohibited without permission.
Abstract (Document Summary)
A majority of justices on the Indiana Supreme Court arrived at a troubling conclusion in a recent ruling that centers on police officers' authority to enter people's homes without their permission and without a search warrant.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction or distribution is prohibited without permission.