There are some instances that a vehicle can be searched even without consent or PC.


Example 1: The Driver of the vehicle is unable to provide a driver's license or verifiable drivers license number. The officer may search those area's of the vehicle where a driver's license may reasonably be found. In some states its the same for registration cards too.

Example 2: Driver arrested. The officer may search the entire passanger compartment of the vehicle, but not the trunk. This falls under the "immediate control/arms reach" rules.

Example 3: Towing or Impound inventory inspection. Officer shall search the entire vehicle in order to protect the towing company and department from false theft calims. Courts have ruled any contraband found during an inventory inspection is admissable, as long as such inspections are policy for the department.

exactly why AR15fan wants johns info so bad...[:d]

The first one does not apply in NY. If the person can provide a name and DOB, thats enough.

Now if they start stuttering and can't come up with the name and DOB quickly, further investigations will ensue.

I won't be searching a car for a drivers
license..

2 and 3 are correct in NY, but for #3 you better be able to show that you do an inventory search for every impound you do, or it gets thrown out if the lawyer is any good.

(I am former NY LEO)

One other. I had an asshole cop (the minority %) search my truck while I was coming back from a funeral. I gave him my CCL & DL & he still searched it.

After I filed a complaint with the asst. chief, a female who's a real stickler for rules, she told me he/they could conduct a "safety search". Chances are anything found would be inadmissible under that criteria. Fortunately, I'm a good little boy.  >gg<

I think the chief's reply is B.S.  You probably could have caused them some real grief by retaining an attorney that advertises on TV.

"Safety Search?"  Well the only safety search that I'm aware of is when you search the immediate (and I mean immediate) area proximate to a subject to insure no weapons are immediately accessible to the subject.  I am not even certain, off hand if this is a valid exception.

Other exceptions: obvious is border searches, or administrative searches such as when you enter a security area or prison etc.

Does anyone else here think that AR15FAN
A) is running this into the ground.
B) can never be wrong
C) is never wrong when he has his badge on
D) spent the last few days looking like a JBT. [V]

The vehicle can also be searched if a drug dog "hits" on the vehicle, or if a contraband item is seen in plain view in the vehicle.

Washington state has informed us that any vehicle boarding a ferry is subject to random search.  You can refuse, but if you refuse, you can't take the ferry.  (Their reasoning is, you can always drive around the long way.)

Doesn't apply to the Vashon Island run, since there is no connection other than the ferry.  They didn't mention whether it applies to the San Juan Islands run (also no other connection) or not.

Of course, there's no telling whether a refusal would be treated with a speech like, "You must be hiding something -- you're under arrest until we can get a court to approve a search warrant."

And there are the times when instances go out the door and your car get's searched for no fvckn reason at all.

[b]Trunk included[/b]

I think what he meant was: Is unable to provide verifiable ID. Not that the actual ID/DL must be produced, but that a name and DOB that when checked come back listed as a valid ID/DL status from the DL guys.  

In other words if the person gives a name that will NOT VERIFY, somehow, the great likelyhood is that they just commited a crime by giving a false name to an officer, and/or they are drving a motor vehicle w/o a valid license.

No DL is usually a citation, but if you have no way of proving who you say you are it can be an arrestable offense, mainly so the police have pictures/prints on file with a name in case Juan Doe doesn't show up in Court for the no dl charge.

yep, #1 stinks, we verify DL number by name and DOB...if that comes back as "no record" then we move on to, "lying to the Sheriff" line...

..."Safety Search"...that's new to me, unless maybe on a boat when checking number of life jackets for passenger and then the boat owner just holds them up...our impound procedure has a special form for the inventory that goes with the report, owner gets a copy, also any search done at our department must be followed by a written report and the PC is noted in the first line...

Philadelphia, 1986

I was 19 years old, working second shift, and had just bought a 1981 Toyota Celica with expired registration and inspection. Pennyslvania law allows for ten days from date of purchase to get the vehicle reregistered and reinspected.

A coworker had his car in the shop and asked me to pick him up for work, and provided an address only in an unfamiliar neighborhood. I found myself driving around in a Puerto Rican drug neighborhood at four in the afternoon looking for his house number on a one lane, one way street with cars parked on both sides of me when a police car pulled in behind me and turned on the lights. At the same time I noticed a police car pull in [b]in front[/b] of me with his light bar on.

I stopped, turned off the ignition, put the keys on the dash and put both hands on the top of the wheel. The first officer rapped on the window and I rolled it down. He didn't ask for license and registration; he asked me what the hell I was doing there. I told him exactly what I was doing there. He told me to get out of the vehicle, and I did.

He stood me in front of the front bumper and had me spread my legs and interlace my fingers behind my head, while he gripped around the interlaced fingers, exerting pressure on my knuckles. He frisked me while his two henchmen ripped through my car. They dumped a bag of dirty laundry in the street behind my trunk (I lived in the upper floor of a house and did my wash at a laundromat) and dumped my toolbox out as well. He pulled my wallet out of my pocket and rifled through it. He kept asking what I was doing there and I kept telling him that I was picking Carlos up to go to work on second shift at GE at the address on the paper on the passenger seat, but he just kept asking where the drugs were and where the money was.

One of the scumbags searching my car found a small spot on the driver's seat where the stitching had come undone, stuck his finger in and ripped it all the way across the seat. A big crowd gathered on both sides of the street, enjoying watching a white boy get fucked with by three white cops. The cop searching me told me to clean my shit up, get in my car and never come back to that neighborhood again if I didn't want my ass kicked and arrested. He also wrote me for the expired registration and inspection, even though I told him that the bill of sale and title with the date were in the glove compartment. "Tell it to the judge," he said. I had to take a day off work to go to traffic court to get fuckstick's tickets thrown out, which they were as soon as I showed the judge the same things I offered to show the asshole cop. Which one of your three reasons make this a good search, AR15fan?

I'm not trying to paint all cops with the same brush as these three dicks, but some people can get a sour taste in their mouth that lasts for [b]years[/b] after being treated like I was. Those bastards even lost a couple of Snap-On sockets when they dumped my toolbox.

A K9 alert on a vehicle is a Probable Cause search.

Example 1 is skimpy and probably won't be allowed by many appeals courts, especially since almost every officer in the country has instant access, via computer or radio, to motor vehicle and driver's license records.

Example 2 is a search incident to lawful arrest, and is an exception to the warrant requirement. It generally does not count for fine only misdemeanors that a person was going to receive a citation for and only applies to custody arrests. I say "generally" because there are exceptions: lets say that an officer finds out that a minor is in possession of alcohol, but is only giving the kid a ticket. The officer may conduct a search to find more alcohol or the fake ID (although this could probably also be articulated as a PC search).

Example 3 is not a "search" but is taken to safegaurd the arrested person's property and protect the Department from false claims of property damage. Be detailed, and always remember to note the vehicle keys on your inventory (went to IA over that; exonerated when they turned up at the wrecker yard).

An officer may "frisk" a vehicle for weapons (that is probably the safety search) if they meet all of the requirements of a Terry frisk for a person, but the frisk is limited in scope to a check for weapons (even legally carried ones) and the officer must be able to articulate that they feared for their safety, and they they had good reason, based on some articulable facts, to believe that the driver or passenger was armed. This is an area where evidence is frequently supressed.

There are numerous other exceptions or variations, often changing with state law; if you charge for cups at a kegger in my state, you open the whole premises up to "inspection" by law enforcement the same as if you had a license to serve alcohol. There are all kinds of wierd variations, and it would take a genius to keep track of all of them. The officers on the street have to make these decision under pressure and quickly, and have to be right every time. It isn't easy. Heck, by reading the responses to this and other topics, I can tell that the general public is woefully misinformed about what their 4th Amendment Rights actually are. Officers have lots of training in this, but it is so arcane that they can't get it right all of the time.

Search and seizure law is extremely complex, and there is a huge body of often contradictory case law governing it. Cut the officers a little slack; they haven't been to law school, and many lessons on search and seizure are learned the hard way, when a judge supresses evidence you thought was siezed lawfully. For the most part, officers are just trying to do their job within the law. I have personally found that most folks who are upset about a search can be reasoned with; five minutes spent explaining to them why you did something can save you five weeks of hassles from IA down the road.

If you do feel that the Police have treated you wrongly, call IA and file a complaint. I always hated citizen complaints against me, but it is a check and balance against police misconduct, and if you don't use it, you are part of the problem.

All you have to remeber is that you are a nigger to the JBT's of the world.  
Once you have that down, then you will always know the po-po are not your friends.  

c-rock

   I appreciate your intelligent insights on a search. It was well thought out and helpful information to me. I would like to comment on one part of this post. Being an unwilling party in a vehicle search. I would like to point out the unwilling parties view on a search. Again, your view from the LEO side was helpful.
    I realize you are only doing your job in this situation. However, you have to realize the only reason someone is getting upset by your search is the fact they know they are innocent and dont appreciate having their intergrity insulted. Not to mention the consequent mess left by a search.
    In other words, you are basically calling me a criminal by doing a search. Do not expect someone (who has any backbone) to stand by and smile while you tear into their personal property because you think something might be there.
     I am not saying LEO's should not do searches. What I am saying is don't expect someone to accept a search with a smile and helpful attitude. It is nothing but an insult to an innocent man. After all you are looking for something to arrest me for, right? You don't do searches for the person's own safety do you?
     Just so no one READS anything into this. My views are from the public's side of this. The above view by Natez was insightful and helpful to me. I only hope my views will open an LEO's eyes to the public's take on situation like this.

Thanks for the kind words.

Communications skills, including the ability to read people, are the most important skills for a peace officer to have, far more than sexy stuff like shooting, CQB, high-speed driving and the like, although those are important, too.

As far as innocent folks getting upset about what they perceive to be an unwarranted or unnecessary search, that goes a couple of ways. Reading body language, you can sometimes tell when someone is upset and indignant and hasn't done anything wrong, but a lot of those mannerisms are awfully close to the ones exhibited by the bad guy as you get closer and closer to his stashed contraband. It ain't easy, and we do screw up, although it usually is not willful.

A lot of it comes back to the institutional culture of the law enforcement agency and their general relationship with the community that they serve. An adversarial relationship leads to rudeness, which leads to anger, which leads to suffering (which leads to the Dark Side). If an agency stresses communications, politeness and professionalism, which can often calm down even the most crazed and truly dangerous bad guys, then these kinds of problems diminish, although even the best agency may have bad apples, the best officer can have a bad day, and even good officers doing what is right get complaints.

Accountability is also key. As much as I hate IA investigations, they are needed and an agency that aggressively investigates complaints of misconduct (and I consider rudeness to be misconduct) will generally be a better agency, as long as the IA investigations don't turn into witch hunts, which can happen, and may have an even worse effect than a lack of proper investigation.

Like I said, though, you can avoid the IA issue completely if you explain things to folks. One of my best approaches is to lay out things from my viewpoint to an upset citizen. I give them the facts, as they would appear to me. Then I ask them what they would have done in my place. The answer, about 95% of the time, is that they would have done the same thing that I did, and they now understand why we did what we did. This goes along ways towards dispelling ill will. This even works with folks I have arrested, believe it or not.

I sure like this whole polite discussion thing more than the flamefests. I might drop in a little more often...

Nice, isn't it?

Thanks for the reasoned discussion. I am generally on the Leo's side, but I too do not want to get pulled over by someone who has attitude or is just having a bad day and then see my car and possessions trashed just for the hell of it.

These discussions have made me reason out how I will handle the situation should it occur. For one thing, I may get a disposible camera for the glove box.

Thanks again.

Question:  Cop stops you.  No suspicious activity, you have proper papers etc.  Cop says can I search.  Knowing your constitutional rights you refuse.  Cop threatens to bring drug sniffing dog out.  

How long can the cop detain you while they find a dog?  An hour?  30 minutes?  A day?

[Edited to correct my atrocious spelling]

That really depends. A dog sniff is considered access to "open air" and is not a search. Generally, the officer has to have some articulable facts (reasonable suspicion) that you have drugs to detain you beyond the length of their normal stop to wait for a dog to respond to the scene. They do not, however, need any reasonable suspicion to run the dog. The courts have held that 45 minutes was not too long, but that case had some fairly strong reasonable suspicion (If memory serves, it was an interdiction stop and there were a large number of indicators that the folks were carrying narcotics). Probably not more than a handful of minutes in most cases, and none based on a pure hunch or guesswork with no supporting facts.

A good personal example is a speeding stop I made. The guy, who I had arrested for Cocaine before, refused to stop for a couple of blocks and pulled into his driveway. He then tried to run into his house. He locked his truck and kept trying to physically get in my way to keep me from looking inside it. He was very nervous, was shaking, and kept making "target glances," looking for an escape route or looking at my holstered sidearm. He kept reaching into his waistband and pockets. He initially refused to be frisked for weapons. He also refused us permission to search his truck, and claimed the truck wasn't his and that he wasn't responsible for what might be inside of it, even though the vehicle registration record returned to him. In this case, based on his various behaviors, I  had reasonable suspicion to detain him for narcotics investigation above and beyond my traffic stop, called a K9 and we waited about 10 minutes. We probably could have "reasonably" (in the eye of the court) waited much longer. In this case, the dog wasn't feeling well and refused to search. So, I let the guy go, even though I knew (not in the legal, court-approved sense, but in the one that counts) that he had drugs. You don't always win. Sometimes the laws that protect all of us let bad guys go. It is unfortunate, but I vastly prefer things that way than the alternative.

And for the record, I would personally refuse to grant consent to search to my vehicle as well.

Very well said, Nate!  Phil, absent any evidence you actually had contraband in your car, the officer can detain you only long enough to investigate the original reason for the stop and issue you a citation.  Most states won't allow him to detain you just to wait for the dog unless he has some articulable reason to do so.  Your refusal to grant consent is NOT a justification to detain you further- merely asserting your right to say NO doesn't give the officer PC or even reasonable suspicion to believe you actually do have contraband in your car.

Natez.....You sir are a professional. Thank you for choosing the career you did. Hope ya make chief, or sheriff which ever.....

Forgot to say "Be Careful Out There". We need your kind to stick around...

A few things I have never understood are:

1. If the cops do search your vehicle or home, why do they basically destroy stuff trying to find something? I've never heard of anyone doing a "nice" search and actually respecting the owners of the property. They all seem like they want to tear everything apart for "fun."

and

2. If they don't find anything, but they did trash your stuff, why don't they help clean it up or pay for the cost for cleaning things up?


Its just always seemed like theres never any restitution for the victims of searches that uncover nothing.

I've never understood how the action of an animal can convert a person from being legally protected under the Bill of Rights to an assumed criminal without rights.  The two times I've been in a car that was searched, the animals barked on the way out of the SUV and while searching.  The second time, I had a sausage biscuit in a bag in the car that the animal attacked.  Why would we trust it with controlling the ideals we and our families fought for?

AR15fan, thanks for the post.  It's nice to see facts.  Sorry about my last reply to you in a different thread.  Usually, when writing a reply to something I'm heated about, I write the reply, delete it, get it out of my system, then compose my real reply.  I didn't do that yesterday since I was in a hurry to get to a job interview.  Next time, I just won't hit submit.

Well I'm off to host a birthday party for my 6 year-old (as of today) twin great-nephews.  I don't know if I can keep-up with about 15 of them, grill hamburgers, and later keep up with all of them in the pool.  I hope some of their parents will stay.  Their parents are out of town for three months for work, and I promised to make sure they had fun.  I'm too old for this...z

[size=4]Responses below reflect Florida Law[/size=4]



Ehhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, no. No PC = unconstitutional search.




Not in Fl.



Trudat. Unless driver gives consent...



Eh, sort of. An inventory does not = search. inventory just catalogs property, no lifting of floormats or pulling on doorpanels...

P3[pyro][^][heavy]

Nate stole all of my thunder - nothing to add... [:(]

P3[pyro][^][heavy]

No longer than it takes him to fill out the traffic citation for the original offense. figure 5 to 10 mins for a traffic geek, 15-25 for a patrolman.  

The problem with K-9 searchs is that when an officer who is the handler of the K-9 goes around tapping your vehicle to instruct the animal were to sniff. Reson being is that K-9 handlers usually have drug residue on there hands because they carry small amounts of drugs in there pockets for training there dogs.

So if a dog hits on your vehicle, your screwed wheter you have no drugs, or you have drugs If ever presented with a time when you have a k-9 sniff your vehicle, request that the handler not go around tapping your vehicle. Because once the dog hits on your vehicle, probable cause is in effect and they can search.

This was brought up in another thread a few days ago.

By the way we have not seen John post back with his information to AR15FAN were his "supposed" harrassment happened in Orange County. Funny when you fabricate a story then a real "Law Enforcement Officer", calls you on the carpet.

John were are you?

Oh grow up. Officers are people like you.You be a decent person and officers will treat you decent. Be a jerk, and you'll be treated accordingly....

AR15fan: no response?

Please read my post on page one of this thread, and explain to me how well your golden rule worked, or what I could have done differently to be treated decently.

Thanks, but I am an office pogue since last year, and all of my current searches (and there seem to be a lot of them, lately) are with a warrant issued by a judge, which is generally the best way to go. I am blessed to work for an extremely professional agency with good leadership, wide community support (which can be tough, these days) a positive internal culture, great equipment, good pay and benefits, strict hiring and disciplinary standards, and free ammo, as much as you can shoot. We have lots of die-hard shooters in the Department, and we get cool stuff to shoot. I mostly have to shoot at normal ranges because our facility is still being built (I do get reimbursed), and I have also found that nothing makes friends or gets support from our fellow gun-owning citizens than a couple of free magazines through a full-auto weapon and a business card.

It is a good job, and I also get the satisfaction of knowing that I am making where I live a better place to live, which effects MY quality of life as well. Like I used to tell our citizens when I worked the streets, "I live here, too, and I have a vested interest in keeping this a nice place to live." Dang. I need to get out of the office and work a couple of night shifts...

My comment was in reaction to the post  I responded to only. The attitude that you displayed in THAT post is probably obvious to the officers you come into contact with on a regular basis and explains the types of contacts that you have with officers.

I'm sorry, but you don't know anything about the contacts I have "on a regular basis" with officers. What attitude did I display? Regardless of any notional attitude, did I deserve an illegal search of my person and vehicle?

I suppose you define jerk as anyone who doesn't submit to the officer's every command.

PPP,
Check New York Vs. Belton. The US supreme court has already ruled on this, and they supersede Florida courts in both search & seizure and presidential elections.

[shock]Wow. I'm not aware of this ruling. Link, please? [:D]

P3[pyro][^][heavy]

So they teach you to search a guy with a bad attitude as opposed to a guy without one?

I thought everyone was equal under the law.

Is that legal?

I am a decent person.
I am not a crimial, nor have I ever been arrested.

Yet, as a youth, and as a young adult, I was harrassed many times by the local police.  That is when I learned about my "rights" which ain't much around the "brotherhood of the sheild"

Being around the city of Chicago can make you a little leary of the police.
They can drive down the highway, shooting at people, while off-duty, getting drunk, and the judge will still let them off.  

Why? cause one is a cousin of the local sheriff.

I am not a cop hater.  

I have learned from past experience in my life, that the police can do whatever they want.  When I meet them in a "offical" way, they are the agent of the state, and I am the serf.

Only way to beat it is with a lawyer, and in the courthouse. Other than that, shut up.


c-rock

I will say this again,
I do not hate/dislike cops.  

I do not wish any harm.  

I dont want them in my life either.



Still,
when you meet one in a offical manner, its a different story.  

One,
you see the cop as a potenial JBT.   Always.  If you dont, you will/can get screwed. Police are not your friends, they will never be your friend when you see them on the job.


Two,
the agent of the state always sees you as some type of the following

1) quota/revenue shakedown (ticket)
2) crimial
3) now a potential "terrorist"  

You notice I left out citizen.

c-rock