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作者：和合 在 罕见奇谈 发贴, 来自 http://www.hjclub.org
Supreme Court Backs Emergency Police Entry
By GINA HOLLAND, Associated Press Writer 1 hour, 42 minutes ago
WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court ruled unanimously Monday that police do not need a warrant to go into a home to break up a bloody fight.
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Justices said that a "melee" that Brigham City, Utah, police officers saw through a window early one morning in 2000 justified rushing in without knocking first.
"The role of a peace officer includes preventing violence and restoring order, not simply rendering first aid to casualties; an officer is not like a boxing (or hockey)
referee, poised to stop a bout only if it becomes too one-sided," Chief Justice John Roberts wrote.
The ruling overturned findings by three Utah courts that the officers violated the Fourth Amendment's prohibition against unreasonable searches when they entered
the house without getting permission.
It was the Supreme Court's eighth straight unanimous ruling, and it came one day after Roberts told law school graduates at Georgetown University that he is seeking
greater consensus among the justices when deciding cases.
Roberts said that officers did everything right when they arrived about 3 a.m. after getting a complaint about a loud party. They saw juveniles drinking beer in the
backyard.
After seeing a scuffle through back windows, including someone punched in the mouth and spitting blood, an officer opened a screen door and tried to announce the
arrival of police but could not be heard over the noise.
Roberts said the officers "were free to enter; it would serve no purpose to require them to stand dumbly at the door awaiting a response while those within brawled
on, oblivious to their presence."
Some partygoers were charged with disorderly conduct, intoxication and contributing to the delinquency of a minor 鈥?all misdemeanors. The charges have been on
hold during the court dispute.
In a separate opinion, Justice
John Paul Stevens said that Utah courts could still find that the police entry was unreasonable under Utah's Constitution. He called it "an odd flyspeck of a case," and
said he was unsure why courts had spent so much time on a matter involving minor offenses.
"I would hope they just let it go," said Michael Studebaker, who represented the defendants at the court. Utah already spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on the
case and appeals, and Studebaker said it wasn't worth it.
Assistant Utah Attorney General Jeffrey Gray said the case was about officer flexibility in responding to violence, not the individual misdemeanor charges.
The Supreme Court has devoted a surprising amount of attention this year to the rights of people whose homes were searched over their objections.
In March, the court said that police cannot search a home when one resident invites them in but another tells them to go away. Last week, justices heard arguments a
second time in another case about whether police armed with a search warrant can rush into a home without knocking and seize evidence for use at a trial.
The case is Brigham City v. Stuart, 05-502.
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Associated Press writer Paul Foy in Salt Lake City contributed to this report.
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作者：和合 在 罕见奇谈 发贴, 来自 http://www.hjclub.org |
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