Submitted by sue_me_please t3_119evw1 in news
Socialistpiggy t1_j9mylvf wrote
Reply to comment by hurrrrrmione in Supreme Court rejects man’s bid to sue police over arrest for Facebook parody by sue_me_please
That specific case was even a bit more nuanced than that. People like to dumb it down and say, "Cops don't even have to know the law!" It wasn't quite that simple.
The law in North Carolina had even been enforced by judges and prosecutors up until that point. If I recall, for many years. Then, an attorney looked closely at the law and realized, due to unclear wording, it's not explicitly clear that it's illegal to drive with only one tail light. They argued, and won.
People don't realize how specific laws have to be, and how often they can be on the books for YEARS before someone makes an argument that something is in fact, not illegal. In my state years ago a criminal case came up where one of the reasons for the initial stop was driving down the shoulder of the road. I think everyone agrees, it's illegal to drive down the shoulder. Well.....it kinda wasn't. The law that referenced improper usage of lanes referenced another section of the code, but that section didn't mention the shoulder, but kind of did lay out the areas of the roadway are between the fog line and center divider. So it was vague, and it didn't EXPLICITLY say you couldn't operate on the shoulder.
I always wondered how many citations got issued, over many many years, before an attorney finally realized the discrepancy and successfully argued it?
MiaowaraShiro t1_j9oxwqq wrote
I mean sure, but that doesn't really change the underlying facts.
They were operating on false information, but the fact that operating without a taillight is legal was confirmed so why would any evidence found during a follow up search not be fruit of a poisonous tree?
It shouldn't matter what the officer thinks, it should matter what the law is. If you prove that the probable cause is bunk, then the search wasn't legal despite being done with "best intentions".
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