Analysis of SCOTUS's 4th Amendment Satelline Monitoring Opinion

This wikilog article is a draft, it was not published yet.

by: Ryan • April 2, 2015 • no comments

Orin Kerr attempts to reconcile the recent US Supreme Court decision on whether satellite monitoring of a probationer is a search (yes!) with past 4th Amendment cases. What really matters? Physical intrusion by the government or trespass?

The case is Grady v. North Carolina. Held: Forcing someone to wear an ankle bracelet to monitor location is a Fourth Amendment search. The new decision extends the Jones search doctrine to searches of persons, and it provides more opportunity to ponder what the Jones test means. I’ll start with the history, then discuss the new decision, and then offer some thoughts on the new case.