Police State?

A recent Supreme Court ruling has allowed police officers to use evidence discovered during illegal stops in court.  The decision was 5 to 3, and the 3 dissenters are getting up in arms over it.  They suggest that with this single ruling the Supreme Court has made the U.S. a police state, by allowing police to make illegal stops and then collect and use evidence against the people they stopped in court.  I believe this was the right ruling, and further, I believe that any illegally obtained evidence should be admissible in court (though, it should be verified as genuine).  The Constitution makes warrantless searches and unjustified stops illegal, but it does not explicitly make the use of evidence of crime collected during those activities illegal.  Further though, allowing the police to use illegally obtained evidence does not make the U.S. a police state either.

The problem we have here is one of accountability.  When a police officer breaks the highest law of the land by violating the Constitutional protections provided to citizens, the typical enforcement is to merely declare the evidence collected inadmissible in court (with perhaps a private reprimand for the officer).  This does two very bad things: First, it allows a police officer to break higher-than-Federal law without any personal accountability, aside, perhaps, for a chewing out for invalidating evidence.  Second, it allows a criminal to go free, despite the evidence.  Both of these things are horribly bad for protecting society, which is what The Constitution and law enforcement exist for.  The Supreme Court ruling is a good step in the right direction, but it is missing a crucial element.

The crucial element is police accountability.  Police officers should be expected to know the law, especially as it pertains to their responsibilities and limitations.  No police officer who thinks that it is appropriate to break Constitutional law should be a police officer.  In fact, I would argue that a law enforcer breaking Constitutional law on that level should be charged with worse than a Federal crime.  Honestly, I would argue that this actually borders on treason.  In the best case, the officer should be fired and barred from any government position (including local and hired positions, like law enforcement; as well as appointed and elected positions) at any level for life.  I would argue that this is not enough though.  This kind of abuse of power, especially when it is explicitly forbidden by our highest laws, should at least be a felony.  A police officer who will not honor and respect those he or she is sworn to serve and protect should not be a police officer and further, merely exposing society to such a depraved and unprincipled individual is completely wrong.  (Might I point out that our nation was founded with the killing of people who wanted to act like that toward us.)

I would like to call the Supreme Court to take a close look at the Fourth Amendment.  The text reads, "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."  Notice that this says nothing about the validity of evidence obtained during a violation of this high law.  When the law forbids murder, the murderer is charged and punished.  When the law forbids theft, the thief is charged and punished.  This law forbids specific behavior, and as with every other law, the person who violates it should be charged and punished.  Aside from applications of this law specifically, there is no legal precedent for punishing society by letting criminals go free, instead of punishing the offender and thus protecting society.

As it is, the U.S. has become more like a police state, with this Supreme Court ruling allowing illegally obtained evidence in court.  The reason is not that it is now legal for police to collect evidence in this fashion though.  While it may have always been illegal, police have been collecting evidence illegally for quite a long time now, with absolutely no accountability.  The difference is that the evidence that was originally not admissible in court, allowing known criminals to escape punishment, is now admissible, providing better protection for the society.  The problem is, the police state that has already existed, due to lack of accountability, now has more motivation to abuse those it is legally obligated to protect from abuse.

The violation of the Fourth Amendment should be at least a felony, if not outright treason.  Law enforcement personnel that violate this law should be barred from public office, as well as any and all government positions, hired or otherwise (including law enforcement) for life.  Those who attempt to hide evidence or otherwise prevent a just trial should be tried as accessories to the crime (as this has consistently been a problem with police forces, which sometimes act more like organize crime rings when it comes to "protecting their own").  And cases of law enforcement personnel allegedly violating this law should go straight to Federal investigation, without internal investigations, or any other control by those who might be tempted to try to protect them from punishment for their crimes.  To be clear on this last part, police departments are not judicial bodies with the authority to judge and sentence their own people, and they should never be allowed any power that could be abused to exempt their own members from the full weight of the law.

If the U.S. becomes a police state, it is not because criminals can now be tried with evidence against them that was previously not legally admissible in court.  It is because police officers are not held accountable for violating the most fundamental rights of the people.