9th Circuit Appeals Court OKs Warrantless
GPS Tracking By Feds
Federal panel upholds lower court decision that federal
DEA agents
can enter private property sans warrant to plant GPS devices
Secret FBI GPS tracking ignites legal firestorm
By Jaikumar Vijayan
August 27, 2010 03:37 PM ET
Computerworld - A
California federal court's decision not to call an en banc hearing on whether
government agents can attach GPS tracking devices to vehicles parked in
private driveways is likely to be appealed in the U.S. Supreme Court.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit earlier this month declined
to schedule an en banc hearing, or a hearing before all judges in the ninth
circuit, as requested by the defendant in a drug-related case. The defendant
was seeking to suppress evidence gathered against him by federal agents who
attached a GPS device to his vehicle without first obtaining a warrant.
The defendant, Juan Pineda-Moreno of Oregon, claims that U.S. Drug
Enforcement Agency agents violated his Fourth Amendment rights against
unreasonable search by planting, without a warrant, a tracking device on a
vehicle parked in his driveway in 2007. The agents were tracking Pineda-Moreno
on suspicion that he belonged to a marijuana growing operation.
A three-judge panel of the appellate court in January rejected
Pineda-Moreno's claims and ruled that his constitutional rights were not
violated. The court this month rejected a petition by Pineda-Moreno for a
rehearing of his case by the full Ninth Circuit panel of judges.
The appellate court's ruling essentially gives law enforcement agencies in
the nine Western states under the Ninth Circuit's jurisdiction the legal
authority to surreptitiously enter personal property and attach a GPS tracking
device on vehicles parked there without first obtaining a warrant.
Over a four month period, DEA agents repeatedly monitored Pineda-Moreno's
movements using different GPS tracking devices without obtaining a warrant. On
two occasions, agents sneaked into his driveway before dawn to affix the
tracking devices to the undercarriage of his Jeep.
Information gathered from the tracking led to Pineda-Moreno's subsequent
arrest and indictment.
Pineda-Moreno pleaded guilty to the charges in an Oregon district court on
the condition that he would be allowed to appeal the ruling to the Ninth
Circuit court. The district court had rejected his request that the evidence
obtained from the GPS devices be suppressed.
A three-judge Ninth Circuit panel of judges upheld the district court's
ruling.
The decision was not unanimous. In a strongly worded dissent, Chief Judge
Alex Kozinski said that because of the ruling, "1984 may have come a bit
later than predicted, but it's here at last."
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