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September 19, 2006
I'm Surprised
The state of California requires people who receive welfare benefits to submit to warrantless, unannounced searches of their homes to determine if they are indeed eligible to stay in the program. A Federal Appellate court just ruled that even though the consent is coerced by being conditional for receiving benefits, the search is a lawful search.
That's not what surprised me. What surprised me is that this ruling came out of the Ninth Circuit. They don't really have a reputation for calling these cases for the government. You can read it here.
Posted by Charles at September 19, 2006 06:58 PM
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Comments
that is AMAZING! it would seem that the Bush administration would have better luck with the 9th Circuit on its terrorist surveillance program than the Supreme Court!
Posted by: aaron at September 19, 2006 07:32 PM
The 9th circuit didn't even recognize the visitis as being searches because of their eligibility verification nature. Here is what the court held:
"The home visits ARE NOT SEARCHES under the fourth Amendment......In Wyman v James the Supreme Court held that home visits...were not searches because they were made for the purpose of verifying eligibility for benefits and not as part of a criminal investigation......Therefore, because we are bound by Wyman, we conclude that the....home visits do not qualify as searches under the fourth amendment"
Maybe the Bush administration can argue that they are screening terrorists for eligibilty to their exrtaordinary rendition/torure program.
Posted by: KeithS at September 21, 2006 11:57 AM
Keith, in Constitutional jargon, lawful search = not a search under the 4th Amendment. It's the same thing. This is because the 4th Amendment bars unreasonable searches by law enforcement. So I thank you for actually reading the document, but I don't know what your point is.
...And what does the Bush Administration have to do with this?
Posted by: Charles at September 21, 2006 10:00 PM