I personally don’t see any real constitutional problems with DUI checkpoints. As long as they are run reasonably (ie: quickly), and don’t require you to consent to a search or anything, it’s not a big deal. The minimal cost is offset by the (presumed) gain in enforcement.
As far as arresting people with warrants, I am not sure you have a right to anonymity. Privacy is a right in the US, but the right to be anonymous is a little different. Look at the Hiibel case. I’m sort of on the fence about the decision – I’m not sure I like the “papers please” aspect of being forced to provide ID, but at the same time, the intrusion is tiny and possible benefits are large.
DUI checkpoints are, of course, neither a gross violation of our civil rights nor are they a harmless abuse-free procedure. Neither extreme is really reasonable; most argument is slippery-slope what-ifs or libertarian “don’t tread on me” sort of hyperbole.
The difficult part is to get an accurate weighing of the costs and benefits. If it adds almost zero time to a stop to ask to see a valid DL and run a check, sure. If it takes an additional 5 minutes, maybe it’s problematic.
OK, I see where you were going now, but the analogy kinda breaks for me because I don’t quite feel that being stopped while driving a car and being asked to blow into a tube is particularly equivalent to letting police into my house to rummage through my socks. Maybe those two things are equivalent and I just don’t feel it, but … I just don’t feel it.
I thought it was obvious. 2a ("Are you currently too impaired to drive?") is directly concerned with my ability to operate the vehicle I am driving. 3b (“Do you sell illegal drugs?”) has no direct connection to my driving ability.
I understand the argument that some people are making that this is an effective means of catching criminals. But there’s lots of things we could be doing if our goal is to catch criminals. Get rid of the Fourth Amendment and let the police enter houses freely - I guarantee you they’ll catch a bunch of criminals as a result. But most people feel that’s too high a price.
The supposed reason for random stops is to catch people who are driving drunk. We should not let the government expand this into permission to conduct general investigations.
no you can’t drive away - he has lawfully stopped you. if he detains you beyond a “reasonable” amount of time so as to make your traffic stop into an arrest, you get to sue.
No, it doesn’t hold, because the constitutional analysis is completely different
in a sobriety checkpoint, the Supreme Court has stated that the infringing on your privacy (the stop and questioning) is so minor when compared to the objective of the intrusion (getting boozehounds off the roads) that they have permitted a limited exception to search-and-seizure procedures.
in a search-that-turns-up-other-criminal-stuff case, you have, by virtue of the issuance of the search warrant, been suspended of your “right to privacy” so whatever comes of this invasion is fair game (note that depending on how a search warrant is issued, this analysis doesn’t hold - if they have a search warrant for “kidnapped people” they can’t start opening your kitchen drawers and bust you for the baggie of pot) (well, until they argue that they were doing a DNA sweep of everything in your house, but you get the idea)
Indeed. As we all know, any curtailment of civil rights is acceptable when it is done in the name of locking up perverts. But this thread has been derailed enough. Let’s take it to PMs or a new thread if there are still questions.
i don’t believe you are required to blow into a breathalizer in a sobriety checkpoint. this varies from state to state though, so it’s not gospel truth.
these checkpoints are, in all seriousness, fishing expeditions. they are looking for probable cause to detain you and investigate further.
the most annoying part, for me, in the entire corpus of 4th amendment jurisprudence is that the supreme court is perfectly okay with cops exploiting the asymmetries between their comprehension of constitutional limitations and Joe the Plumber’s. There is just some (to me, stupid) assumption that a cop “asking” you to take a field sobriety test is really, truly a request by the cop that most people a) feel free to turn down and b) are aware is nothing more than a request.
I understand that changing this completely the other way around would basically make policework impossible, but I would like some middle ground to be taken.
I don’t know how DUI checkpoints are run in the US.
In NEW ZEALAND, the police block a road and the relevant exit points (so people can’t see the check and turn around)
Every driver going down the road must wind down window, the officer will be holding an “alcohol sniffer” that merely detects the presence of alcohol on the breat, he will “shoot the shit” for 10 to 15 seconds, this may be asking the driver to count to 10 or a relatively innocous question such as where you have been or where you are going (there is no real significance attached to this, but rather obvioulsy if you have come from a bar or similiar may be asked if you have been drinking) you can answer whatever you like - I would normally say “out with friends” or “on the way home” and no more information has ever been requested.
If alcohol is detected you will be asked to blow into the bag which gives an accurate reading of alcohol level.
If the car reeks of mary jane, or other obvious signs of crime are present the police will act on them, but they are not actively looking for it. License is NEVER requested unless must blow into bag.
The only problem people have with these checkpoints in NZ is that they catch drunk drivers - there is no complaints about “wrong” or “not fair” or anything of that sort.
Personally I really have a very big problem seeing how being asked “have you been drinking tonight sir?” is an infringement of my rights fi I am driving down the road at night. Its just a minor inconvenience, such as an accident or a non functioning stop light.
In most of the EU, the police can stop anyone they like and perform a breath test - this isn’t the case in the UK - but it might as well be - because they can perform a breath test on anyone they stop for any other legitimate reason, such as driving at 33mph in a 30 limit.
And that, I suppose is my reason for ambivalence in this thread. The slippery slope doesn’t seem to have turned out all that slippery - people get stopped and tested for drink driving - innocent people are mildly inconvenienced, guilty people are caught and in the midst of all this, remarkably few people seem to get their doors kicked down in the middle of the night, to be dragged away and never seen again.
In other words, the system works reasonably well, certainly better than not having it at all, and the cost appears to have been acceptable.
The question I am more interested in knowing the answer to is whether they can compel you to do so at a DUI checkpoint. On the street if they pull you over and you refuse you run afoul of implied consent laws. I wonder if they can use the threat of that to compel you to cooperate, because that opens up some other possibilities, such as using that as a lever to be able to search cars based on “refusal”.
Lets do the math, a road block is put up and you are detained in a line of 30 cars, at 15 seconds each, allowing another 10 seconds to pull up and stop, that’s 12 minutes you’ve been detained and the key word here is detained. You were on your way to work and are now late. You were on your way home to tape your favorite movie. You were doing an infinite number of other things that a free person could be doing. You might as well have smoked 12 cigarettes and shortened your life by that amount because you don’t get it back.
You don’t see any problem with a government agency randomly detaining you to see if you’ve committed a crime? Really? You want to project that down the road and see where it leads? "Sir/Madame would you please step over here, as a matter of public safety we’re checking for: _____________.
Sobriety checkpoints have been around for over 20 years. And I haven’t noticed these random stoppages because sobriety checkpoints were upheld by the Supreme Court.
Time is not your friend. It just means it cements a bad law into place. It literally creates a bad precedent that can them be combined with other laws.
Aside for the dangers of this there is no logic behind the process of checkpoints. If you take 6 officers and task them with watching 6 roads looking for impaired drivers you will multiply the probability of finding them by a factor of 5.
Again, you and others in this thread have consistently raised the slippery slope argument. I am merely asking if, in the over 20 years that sobriety checkpoints have been used, have you seen this slope?
Again, we’re talking Constitutional rights and impending police states, not the intelligence of the checkpoints.
We’re already sliding down it. The Fourth Amendment prohibits unreasonable searchs but we’ve now established a precedent that a search can be reasonable even in the absence of any prior evidence of a crime having been committed. The police are now able to investigate random citizens in order to look for evidence of crimes.
And as the OP noted, this procedure was established for the supposed purpose of arresting DUI violators but most of the actual arrests that have been made were not for DUI violations. So again, we’ve slid beyond the original intent of this procedure. Which is no surprise - the government usually expands its police powers by asking for extraordinary powers to enforce one particular law (DUI, drug use, child molesting, communism, terrorism) but then uses that new power to enforce whatever laws it wishs.
In my prior post, I tried to suggest the basis for my impression that there has been a progressive increase in police powers WRT stops and searches, probable cause and consent regarding persons, structures, vehicles, communications and records. I’m sure the ACLU and a number of other organizations could provide lists of citations they (and I) consider indicative of such a trend.
WRT consent, my personal opinion is that I think much of this caselaw grossly misrepresents the coercion involved in action by uniformed, armed police. And if I feel that way as a white male attorney, I can only imagine how “voluntary” a less educated person of color might consider their aquiescence.
I’m a little brain addled at the moment but I seems to me there are always stories of police interpreting and using laws beyond their originally intended purpose. One that comes to mind are drug laws that allow seizure of assets regardless of whether or not it was proved that such assets were purchased with drug money.
