SCOTUS Should Limit Cops’ Dangerously Broad Power to Stop and Search Your Car

Two cases before
the Supreme Court deal with the justification and consequences of
traffic stops by police. In my lates Forbes column, I
argue that the Court should take this opportunity to impose limits
on cops’ broad discretion to detain motorists and search their
vehicles. Here is how the piece begins:

On the morning of April 15, 2013, two California poker
players were traveling west on Interstate 80 in Iowa, on the way
back from a tournament in Joliet, Illinois, when a state trooper
pulled them over. By the time the traffic stop was over, police
had seized $100,000 in poker winnings from the two men,
on the assumption that the cash must be connected to drug
trafficking or some other illegal activity.

In addition to the legalized theft that is civil asset
forfeiture, the case illustrates the broad discretion that police
have to hassle innocent people, a power magnified by loose rules
concerning traffic stops and car searches. Two cases before the
Supreme Court could help rein in that power.

Read the whole thing.