After reading about the latest local meth bust on WRAL, a coworker sent me the link to the following rueters article about parallel construction, SOD and DICE. I don't know where I stand on it, since I'm not a criminal, but it definitely seems unconstitutional at the very least, and a nightmare for defense lawyers, since apparently they aren't even supposed to know this is going on.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/08/05/us-dea-sod-idUSBRE97409R20130805

I apologize if this is old.

9/18/2013 12:07:25 PM

I expected a thread about grammar: http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/623/1/

9/18/2013 12:23:08 PM

Its pretty much the idea that the DEA feeds local authorities information to start "investigations" and then they tell local authorities to look out for a certain car at a certain time in a certain place, and find a reason to pull them over.

9/18/2013 12:33:00 PM

i don't see what the problem is. if you aren't making/dealing drugs you have nothing to worry about. it's stupid they have to jump through so many hoops as it is.

9/18/2013 12:46:45 PM

^haha, and you call yourself a conservativiv

[Edited on September 18, 2013 at 12:49 PM. Reason : ]

9/18/2013 12:49:43 PM

A is only a troll, you can completely ignore him or make fun of him

9/18/2013 1:11:13 PM

Yea I've never bought the whole "if you're innocent, you shouldn't worry" argument. There are just some rules the government should follow. Warrantless searches based off of a "random" traffic stop should be illegal.

9/18/2013 1:13:15 PM

I used to be on a federal grand jury (12 months) that met 2-3 days every month for federal indictments within the southern part of the Eastern District.

A lot of drug cases the investigators suspected person A was dealing/distributing. They were never able to act due to lack of evidence to search their vehicles or homes. "Fortunately" they would at some point receive an "Anonymous" tip that person A was going to CVS and had meth/heroin/etc in their vehicle. They would then use this tip to justify detaining the individual and searching the vehicle.

I wonder how often the "anonymous" individual was Office Bobby's squad mate Big Jim down at the pay phone calling in the station to report a "suspected" criminal via anonymous call. According to the DA such call is probable cause to get a judge to sign a warrant.

Quote :

"Warrantless searches based off of a "random" traffic stop should be illegal."

They are in NC, this was passed down from the NC supreme court a few years ago I believe. From what I understand an officer pulling you for say running a red light, can not use this as justification to search your vehicle for drugs/firearms/etc. Unless of course they fear for their safety or have a reasonable suspicious that you may have contraband (i.e. your car smelling like you just smoked up).


[Edited on September 19, 2013 at 5:01 PM. Reason : a]

9/19/2013 4:59:07 PM

Quote :

"^haha, and you call yourself a conservativiv"

the "if you did nothing wrong you have nothing to worry about" canard is a classic conservative line

9/20/2013 7:27:13 PM

This sort-of highlights the conundrum the government has, doesn't it?

If the premise is that we shouldn't be doing broad signal intercept, but presumably wire tapping a single suspected person is okay, how then does the government determine who to intercept? If they start having to cherry pick people, they will inevitably be accused of using some bias in choosing who to intercept (whether this be people of a certain color, race, profession, geographic location, etc.) which is also wrong of the government to do.

To avoid this, they can just intercept everything they can, then have a computer filter out suspected terrorist.

But, what then is the moral obligation of using this data, if it contains information about people committing other heinous crimes? If you presume it's okay to also have the computer start filtering for pedophiles, rapists, and murderers, why not also let them filter for drug dealers...?

The only way to avoid problems is for no signal intercept of any kind, but this doesn't seem like something "people" want either.

9/20/2013 8:18:16 PM