You're cruisin' down the strip with your buddy, the music blaring, and life is good.
Suddenly, out of the corner of your eye a pulsating red light casts long tentacles over the vehicle.
A loudspeaker squawks into the dark night.
"Pull over."
How rude!
A surly State Trooper swaggers up to the driver's window and barks an order.
"License, please."
Your pal grumbles, "Oh,****."
Should you quickly exit and say - "Later" - to your best bud?
Too late, in minutes the cop's partner asks you step out of the vehicle - at which point he not only rummages through the car but your very own backpack.
You're ticked; after all, the officer gave no reason for the stop.
If the police find something incriminating in your possession, can you be charged under these circumstances?
What went down amounts to an illegal search and seizure, according to a Supreme Court ruling handed recently.
Citing a case with a similar scenario which was heard recently, Supreme Court Justice David H. Souter summed it up quite astutely.
"Any reasonable passenger of a car that is pulled over would understand he is under control of the police until given permission to leave."
And, based on the long-standing 4th Amendment, Souter wrote:
"We hold that a passenger is seized as well and so may challenge the constitutionality of the stop."
Civil Libertarians applauded the ruling.
It means that "police will no longer have a free pass" to stop a car and then search everyone in it," said Steven Shapiro, Legal Director for the American Civil Liberties Union.
"The decision properly deprives the police of what would otherwise be a virtual invitation to engage in racial profiling."
One for the rights' advocates!
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