28. U.S. v. Jones (10-1259)

• Information as Evidence example:

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Antoine_Jones

  • Case decided by the Supreme Court of the United States on January 23, 2012

  • "a signal event in Fourth Amendment history" - Walter E. Dellinger III, the defendant attorney

  • Police did not obtain an extended search warrant before attaching a tracking device to a drug suspect's car.

  • A joint FBI-D.C. police team covertly attached a GPS device to his Jeep outside the terms of a warrant.

  • Supreme Court Justices rule against police, say GPS surveillance requires search warrant.

  • Secretly placing the device and monitoring the man's movements for several weeks constituted a government "search," and therefore, the man's constitutional rights were violated.

  • In addition, 4 justices concluded that the search was improper because the month-long monitoring violated the suspect's expectation of privacy.