Your castle
Court says the cops can come into your house even if it’s unlawful:
Overturning a common law dating back to the English Magna Carta of 1215, the Indiana Supreme Court ruled Thursday that Hoosiers have no right to resist unlawful police entry into their homes.
In a 3-2 decision, Justice Steven David writing for the court said if a police officer wants to enter a home for any reason or no reason at all, a homeowner cannot do anything to block the officer’s entry.
“We believe … a right to resist an unlawful police entry into a home is against public policy and is incompatible with modern Fourth Amendment jurisprudence,” David said. “We also find that allowing resistance unnecessarily escalates the level of violence and therefore the risk of injuries to all parties involved without preventing the arrest.”
David said a person arrested following an unlawful entry by police still can be released on bail and has plenty of opportunities to protest the illegal entry through the court system.
This is patently wrong and an affront to liberty. I would defend my home from unlawful entry not matter what the court says.
Via Alan, who says it’s time for tar and feathers.
Update: More from Orin Kerr
May 13th, 2011 at 11:44 am
“modern Fourth Amendment jurisprudence”
Otherwise known as “living Constitution jurisprudence.”
Alex Kozinski was right, it’s a bit late but 1984 has finally arrived.
May 13th, 2011 at 11:48 am
I have never liked the no knock warrant system or the police mistakenly entering your home being acceptable. If you jump out of bed and shoot one of them you immediately put yourself in situation that you cannot escape from alive unless you kill them all. Try to surrender to a swat team after shooting one of them.. Not going to happen. If you keep shooting though the problem turns to where you are knowingly killing police officers to save yourself… It is a no win situation. If you respond with a weapon you will either be killed or spend the rest of your life in prison. This has always been my only caveat as to having a gun for self defense…. No I not saying I could wipe out a swat team merely that waking up to a no knock and grabbing your gun is not going to end well regardless of whether you are in the right or not.
May 13th, 2011 at 11:58 am
Until Americans start dealing out “justice” to these treasonous judges, this will continue.
May 13th, 2011 at 12:15 pm
“This is patently wrong and an affront to liberty. I would defend my home from unlawful entry not matter what the court says.”
There comes a time to take a stand; and here we stand.
May 13th, 2011 at 12:23 pm
Here‘s the text of the decision and the two dissenting opinions.
May 13th, 2011 at 12:23 pm
Tar and feather time was long ago, it seems the “greatest generation” allowed liberty to be pulled out form under them, without a wimper in most cases.
May 13th, 2011 at 12:39 pm
It’s not clear from the decision why unlawful entry by Police is any different than unlawful entry. If the police officer is breaking the law, then the actions of the officer are by definition not authorized by law. Thus, he’s not acting as an officer of the law, and resistance is authorized. The majority seems to assert supralegal authorization of deadly force.
It seems to me that Indiana residents remain so at their peril.
May 13th, 2011 at 12:53 pm
How in hell are we supposed to “know” it’s a police officer? Any schmuck can bust in, yelling “police”, even dress the part. Hellz, I have the frag jacket & pasgt helmet, the whole thing. I can spraypaint CPD or FBI or ICE or whatever on them. If the cop is too chickenshit and busts in like a home invader, he’s far more likely to be ventilated than if he approaches peaceably and presents identification. This is frustrating; I’m on the side of law, but we can’t have a constructive adversarial relationship.
May 13th, 2011 at 12:55 pm
Interesting quote from the opinion:
Seriously? The physical security of a police officer who is acting outside the scope of his legal authority should trump individual liberty?
May 13th, 2011 at 1:06 pm
Must. Control. Blood pressure…
May 13th, 2011 at 1:21 pm
“David said a person arrested following an unlawful entry by police still can be released on bail and has plenty of opportunities to protest the illegal entry through the court system.”
So it’s guilty until proven innocent now…
May 13th, 2011 at 1:42 pm
this is insane!
May 13th, 2011 at 2:00 pm
Holy Chewbacca, this place is infected with Wookies. What gun for Wookie infestation? Maybe a Star Trek phaser?
1. Did anyone read the opinion? The woman told the cops come in, the guy tried to block the cop and pushed the cop into the wall. The cops did not just waltz in because there was nothing else he felt like doing in Evansville.
2. The opinion is overbroad, I believe in part because it is written by the Court’s newest justice but I think they will be forced to scale it back.
May 13th, 2011 at 2:01 pm
We no longer have rule of law in this country. We need to fix that.
May 13th, 2011 at 2:01 pm
@ Shootin’ Buddy
It doesn’t matter what actually happened in the case. What matters is what the constitutional finding was.
May 13th, 2011 at 2:40 pm
@ Name Redacted
Actually the only thing that does matter is what happened in the case. Constitutional violations are on an as-applied basis. Meaning unique to the situation at trial.
If you give consent to search your car, then it is not a violation of the constitution if the officer finds something illegal in the car during the search and arrests you for it. If you did not give consent and the officer has no RAS and nothing illegal is in plain view, then a search is unconstitutional and any arrest is invalid.
A ruling that the constitution is not violated if someone in charge of the property grants entry to police does not mean that police entry without consent (other than warrant or exigent circumstances) is also constitutional.
If this ruling tells us anything it is to make sure your spouse (or roommate or girlfriend or whomever is cohabiting with you) knows to never let the police in the house to “talk” or do a search.
By removing consent, you have removed the application of this ruling to your situation.
May 13th, 2011 at 2:44 pm
The judge should be strung up. Anyone who defends this judge should get the same.
Period.
May 13th, 2011 at 3:16 pm
@ Gunstar1:
Nope, Name Redacted is correct. Re-read the actual opinion. It completely removes the right to resist an unlawful police entry into a home in any and all circumstances.
This ruling is not restricted to the facts of this particular case – instead it says the right does not exist at all. In fact, they specifically note that whether the entry was lawful or not is irrelevant:
Under this ruling, even if there is no RAS, and even if you deny permission to search, you still have no right to prevent them from conducting a warrantless search. Your only recourse is to hope that you win in court later (after paying thousands of dollars in legal fees).
May 13th, 2011 at 3:37 pm
Ah, well, ’twas a good ride while it lasted.
We’ve come full circle, back to the colonial-era Writs of Assistance…except that, this time, they’re not even bothering with the paper or the thin veneer of legality.
By the by, if you resist such an entry, chances are pretty good the cops will shoot you full of holes, and then let you die so only their side of the story gets told. Just Google “Jose Guerena arizona swat”, and you’ll get all the nasty details.
And even if you survive, the odds are loooong that you will avoid jail time. Between the cop groupies (i.e., the majority of the population), a DA out to make his bones, and a sensationalist media out to paint you as a “cop killer”, you’ll be lucky not to get the chair.
Just remember: the terrorists hate us because we’re “free”….
May 13th, 2011 at 3:54 pm
“This is patently wrong and an affront to liberty.”
True. I certainly hope no one is surprised though. We long ago did away with liberty as the ideal. What did y’all expect? Flying unicorns farting rainbows?
May 13th, 2011 at 4:06 pm
Could have sworn the constitution talked about your safe in body and personal effects.
But I guess that only applies to politicians.
That is what a warrent signed by a judge is supposed to protect.
But in Japan, or even the U.K. now, there is no such protections. Getting real close to the Nazi era.
May 13th, 2011 at 4:34 pm
Funny, there’s nothing from Instapundit on this.
May 13th, 2011 at 8:05 pm
Directive 10-289; point nine: The right to resist an unlawful police entry into a home is against public policy.
May 13th, 2011 at 8:28 pm
Both Ryan Frederick and Cory Maye shot and killed cops that were doing no-knock raids. They didn’t get shot in return but are probably the lucky ones. In Cory Maye’s case the cops actually broke into the wrong house. Both are in prison but May is due a retrial soon.
May 13th, 2011 at 9:30 pm
Patently wrong, no matter how narrowly it is construed — and the State-worshiping holster-sniffer (More of a Cop-S—–r, really) who wrote it should be impeached.
I wonder if this is something that can be corrected by appropriate legislation?
May 13th, 2011 at 9:30 pm
“A law repugnant to the Constitution is null and void.” Does that apply to legal rulings, too?
May 13th, 2011 at 10:14 pm
Robert X, Yes, that applies to legal rulings too, because “judges SHALL be bound thereby” that is to the Constitution and Laws pursuant to it (Article VI, Section 2).
May 13th, 2011 at 10:20 pm
Amendment IV
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
May 14th, 2011 at 6:16 am
I note with interest that the discussion talks about “unlawful” entry by police officers – as though a discussion about whether or not it’s okay for police officers to act “unlawfully” is anywhere near this side of reality.
I suspect the tone of the discussion would change if those erudite theoretical scholars would change the word “unlawful” to what it really is: “illegal.”
Illegal entry is illegal entry. Just because I have, along with the rest of you, delegated much of the authority for law enforcement to a professional police force, doesn’t mean I no longer retain any of that authority. If someone wants in, I need to see some ID. The default position is “no.”
May 14th, 2011 at 9:24 am
Unfortunately this is another step in the direction that ends in either revolution or subjugation. I support the police in maintaining the peace, but I also worry that the “standing army” the founders feared is the modern police with “qualified immunity” and all the other weighting of the scale in their favor. One thing is clear though; when a court says “modern jurisprudence”, that means “we have struck out the parts of the constitution we don’t like”. The 4A clearly says “the right to be secure…shall not be violated”.
May 14th, 2011 at 2:43 pm
Shootin’ Buddy Says: “1. Did anyone read the opinion? The woman told the cops come in, the guy tried to block the cop and pushed the cop into the wall. The cops did not just waltz in because there was nothing else he felt like doing in Evansville.”
That’s some funny sh*t right there. Apparently Shootin’ Buddy didn’t read the opinion. If he had he might have noticed that in the third paragraph of “Facts and Procedural History” the opinion explicitly states: “Mary did not explicitly invite the officers in,…”
Remedial reading classes might be in order.
May 16th, 2011 at 4:33 pm
“Remedial reading classes might be in order.”
Yes, for Wookies who cannot read because of Star Trek watching has melted their tiny, Paulian brains.
Read the next sentence, Bobby Lee, “[m]ary did not explicitly invite the officers in, but she told Barnes several times, ―don‘t do this and ―just let them in”.
May 16th, 2011 at 6:25 pm
U.S. Supreme Court just released Kentucky v. King today:
http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/10pdf/09-1272.pdf
Looks we ARE on a rapid descent to the Writs of Assistance. Great.
May 17th, 2011 at 4:11 am
It’s not “the next sentence”, it is the _same_ sentence.
What’s your point? Besides juvenile attempts at insult.
You, Shootin’ Buddy, chastised people for about reading the opinion and then stated “The woman told the cops come in, …” which, as you just noted DID NOT HAPPEN.