Matthew T. Mangino
GateHouse Media
January 19, 2018
The United States Supreme Court will soon decide if driving
a rental vehicle without being on the rental agreement means the driver
surrenders his right to be free from unreasonable search and seizures. The high
Court is being asked to decide if the police need a warrant to search a rental
car.
In 2014, the Pennsylvania State Police pulled over Terrence
Byrd. He was driving a vehicle rented by his fiancée, who also happened to be
the mother of his children. The police said Byrd was nervous during the stop
and told officers he had some marijuana in the car. The police searched the car
without Byrd’s consent.
They told him they didn’t need his consent because the
rental agreement did not list Byrd as the renter or as an authorized driver.
The police found heroin in the trunk. Byrd was ultimately
sentenced to 10 years in prison.
Byrd’s case made its way to the U.S. Supreme Court when the
court of appeals noted that there was a difference of opinion among the various
circuit courts concerning the propriety of a warrantless search of a rental
vehicle.
Byrd’s written argument submitted to the Supreme Court
started like this, “When a person’s fiancée hands him the keys to her car and
tells him he may use it, he reasonably expects privacy in the car. She has
given him both possession and control over the car, and he reasonably believes
that he can exclude strangers and the government from intruding upon his
private personal and family possessions stored in the car.”
The Fourth Amendment protects individuals from warrantless
searches of homes, businesses, vehicles and persons where there is a reasonable
expectation of privacy. The Fourth Amendment is one of the first 10 amendments
to the United States Constitution known as the Bill of Rights. In early
America, the Fourth Amendment applied only to federal prosecutions. The
Fourteenth Amendment, ratified in 1868, made the Bill of Rights applicable to
state prosecutions as well.
Attorneys for Byrd argued that his expectation of privacy
did not derive from the rental car agreement. Byrd urged the court to consider
that he had actual physical control of the vehicle.
If Byrd were carrying a duffle bag over his shoulder, would
it matter if his fiancée purchased the bag? Could the police go into the bag if
Byrd couldn’t produce a receipt?
The government argued in its brief “The consent of
petitioner’s girlfriend could not validly authorize petitioner to drive the car
because the rental agreement did not grant her the power to let others drive
the vehicle. In fact, the contract expressly advised that ‘permitting an
unauthorized driver to operate the vehicle is a violation of the rental
agreement.’”
Justice Sonia Sotomayor suggested in response to the
government’s argument, “If we rule that someone has no expectation of privacy
even when the renter has given it to them, then what we’re authorizing is the
police to stop every rental car and search every rental car, without probable
cause, that might be on the road.”
According to Adam Liptak of the New York Times, the
government argued that criminals often use cars rented by others to transport
drugs, victims of human trafficking and unauthorized immigrants.
Liptak acknowledged that allowing the police to search
rental cars whenever they pull over an unlisted driver would yield evidence of
crimes. Byrd’s lawyers wrote, “But what is expedient for law enforcement is not
the test.”
The test is probable cause. Do the police believe the
vehicle is involved in some illegality and is there is a threat the vehicle
will be moved before the contraband be can be confiscated? This country’s
Constitution, and courts, do not permit random searches based on a “hunch.”
Matthew T. Mangino is of counsel with Luxenberg, Garbett,
Kelly & George P.C. His book The Executioner’s Toll, 2010 was released by
McFarland Publishing. You can reach him at www.mattmangino.com and follow him
on Twitter @MatthewTMangino.
To visit the column CLICK HERE
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment