SUPREME COURT'S FOURTH AMENDMENT RULING GIVES POLICE TOO MUCH DISCRETION

The U.S. Supreme Court confirmed last week police officers who smell
drugs, knock loudly and listen may find the exigent circumstances to
enter a home before obtaining a warrant. This is too much discretion
in the hands of law enforcement.

A U.S. Supreme Court ruling fragments the force of the Fourth
Amendment. The ruling leaves the Constitution's protection against
warrantless searches as a symbolic right, easily sidestepped in
practice by police.

Two Kentucky police officers sparked the case when, in search of a
suspect, they broke into an apartment smelling of marijuana for fear
of evidence being destroyed. They got the wrong place but still found
illegal drugs.

The Fourth Amendment once emphasized the right to the security of
one's home. The U.S. Supreme Court now confirms that police who smell
drugs, knock loudly and listen may find the circumstances necessary
to enter a home before obtaining a warrant.

This leaves the law too open to the interpretation of law-enforcement
personnel.

Rather than placing more pressure on police to stay in line with the
Constitution, the court places the weight of proving constitutional
rights on citizens.

That does not translate well for poorer communities, where mistrust
of police is high. People in these communities may not find the sound
of the police knocking on their door to be the inviting call the
Supreme Court majority described.

The ruling falls among a patchwork of exceptions to the Fourth
Amendment that the courts, unwilling to inquire into the subjective
intent of law enforcement, have created. Yet, giving law enforcement
such discretion in claiming exigent circumstances allows even more
subjective intent between police and constitutional protections.

In a solo dissent, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg rightly recognized the
danger of allowing the Fourth Amendment to crumble to police
discretion. Requiring police to acquire a warrant should be the rule,
not the exception.