MIM Notes 186 May 15 1999

Amerikan legal system protects warrantless searches 
While Amerikan cops single out oppressed nationals

by MC44
The Supreme Court ruled in early April to expand warrantless 
search in traffic stops - against the backdrop of widespread 
'racial profiling' by kops. The ruling means that passengers and 
their property can be subject to warrantless searches in routine 
traffic stops, if the police find probable cause to search the car 
based on suspicion of the driver. Even with the extensive powers 
previously available to police to search a driver's car without a 
warrant, the Supreme Court "had never [before] permitted the 
search of personal items of a passenger who was suspected of no 
wrongdoing."(1)

This decision pounds one more nail in the coffin of the 4th 
Amendment, which is supposed to protect against unreasonable 
searches and seizures.

In January, the Supreme Court upheld the trial court conviction in 
WYOMING v HOUGHTON. This was a conviction of a womyn whose purse 
was searched in a traffic stop, based on police suspicion that the 
driver of the car had drugs. The Wyoming Supreme Court had earlier 
reversed that conviction.

In its 6-3 decision, the US Supreme Court wrote, "Passengers, no 
less than drivers, possess a reduced expectation of privacy with 
regard to the property they transport in cars. ... In contrast to 
the passenger's reduced privacy expectations, the governmental 
interest in effective law enforcement would be appreciably 
impaired without the ability to search the passenger's belongings, 
since an automobile's ready mobility creates the risk that 
evidence or contraband will be permanently lost while a warrant is 
obtained ... since a passenger may have an interest in concealing 
evidence of wrongdoing in a common enterprise with the driver, ... 
and since a criminal might be able to hide contraband in a 
passenger's belongings as readily as in other containers in the 
car."(2)

The dissenting judges pointed out that by this ruling, "police 
apparently could search a taxi passenger's briefcase if the 
officer had reason to believe the driver had hidden a syringe 
somewhere."(1) The dissenting judges argued the decision was an 
erosion of a so-called "privacy right" previously enjoyed by 
passengers in these situations.

But it is not the erosion of privacy that should have 
revolutionaries concerned. Several states are now facing class 
action law suits challenging racial profiling in traffic stops. 
This practice -- discrimination against oppressed nation members -
- is rampant at every stage of the criminal injustice system. That 
it is being recognized in court as a particular problem in traffic 
stops is reason enough to oppose the expansion of police power in 
these situations.

New Jersey is among the states facing these law suits. Kevin 
Keenan of the New Jersey ACLU said, "These are black 
professionals, these are black middle-class people, they are 
stopped when they are going five miles over the speed limit or 
have other minor infractions, or they are stopped for no reason at 
all, and repeatedly."(3) MIM knows that police stops are not 
restricted to the Black petit-bourgeoisie. Oppressed nation 
working class, lumpen and youth are pulled over disproportionately 
and for no reason, and they'd be less likely to be able to find 
adequate legal representation.

In February and April of this year, studies showed that "for 
separate two-month periods in 1997, three of every four drivers 
arrested on the New Jersey Turnpike were black or Hispanic."(4)

And in a classic good cop bad cop maneuver, as the High Court 
expands the power of the state to search passengers, the other 
branches of government make noise about investigating the problem 
of 'racial profiling' in traffic and transit. But as the Governor 
of New Jersey recently showed in a press conference acknowledging 
the use of 'racial profiling' -- the investigations will focus on 
the individual bad cops that make the rest of the force look bad.

The Department of Justice's Civil Rights Division is now 
investigating cases of racial profiling in New Jersey, Michigan 
and Florida; Attorney General Janet Reno is calling for more data 
about whether such practices exist, and the U.$. Customs Service 
has announced an "independent commission [to] review how its 
agents at international airports process passengers, and whether 
they have singled out a disproportionate number of racial 
minorities for searches."(5)

MIM organizes against the injustice system as it is one of the 
most ferocious tools of national oppression. We build increasing 
opposition to the prison system in particular because of its 
severity in Amerika. But we recognize that prisons exists as one 
stage in a thoroughly rigged process of national oppression. We 
call on progressive forces to oppose this latest expansion of 
police powers as MIM continues to build revolution forces to take 
down the entire Amerikan system of injustice.



Notes:
1. "High Court Expands Car Search Authority: Passenger Property 
May Be Examined, Joan Biskupic, April 6, 1999; Washington Post, 
Page A01.
2..Wyoming v. Houghton, 
http://supct.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/98- 184.ZS.html
3. Associated Press, 10 April 1999.
4. "Racial profiling controversy heats into a political pressure-
cooker" Associated Press. 10 April 1999.
5. The Detroit Free Press, 9 April 1999.