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>destroy evidence Who said it was evidence? Did a judge authorize or issue a warrant to collect said evidence? Absent that, it's just your property, and you ca
by bubblethink 2mo ago
>destroy evidence
Who said it was evidence? Did a judge authorize or issue a warrant to collect said evidence? Absent that, it's just your property, and you can do with it as you please.
- theturtletalks 2mo agoYes this is different than when law enforcement serve a warrant and the defendant wipes his computer before the agents can get a hold of it. In that case the warrant covers what you destroyed as evidence. Though during traffic stops, if a defendant disposes of his drugs while on the run, that can also carry a charge of destroying evidence even though no warrant was issued. IANAL
- stemlord 2mo agoHm but the drugs are only evidence because they're illegal? So the phone owner only destroyed evidence if the phone contained something illegal, but innocent until proben guilty?
- kube-system 2mo agoNo, destroying evidence is a crime even if possession of that evidence is legal.
- amrit3128 2mo agoWho decided that it's evidence?
- __MatrixMan__ 2mo agoLaw enforcement. That's like, their job.
- bubblethink 2mo agoAfter they get it when they are authorized to get it. You cannot point at random things and call them evidence. For instance, I can take a dump and flush it, despite law enforcement's assertion that my stool is evidence in some imaginary crime.
- deleted 2mo ago[deleted]
- kube-system 2mo agoIt doesn’t have to be something the police have already collected. It could be something that they have yet to collect. The textbook tampering with evidence example is: drug dealer tries to flush the drugs when the police knock on the door.
- bubblethink 2mo agoYes, when they are authorized to make a drug bust. And that's assuming they catch him before he flushes, i.e., get the drugs. Otherwise, what are they going to say? He is a drug dealer because we heard the flush? Or let's say they are doing a missing person's search and hear the flush. What now? We came looking for a missing person, but heard the flush, so there were drugs whose evidence he destroyed?
- kube-system 2mo agoOf course, tampering with evidence is — itself - a crime. And you need evidence to prove that crime. But yeah, people tamper with evidence because they think they can get away with it. That doesn’t mean they always succeed in cleanly doing it without creating evidence of the tampering itself.
- navigate8310 2mo agoWithout even looking if it's worthy of evidence or not?
- kube-system 2mo agoEvidence is simply a word to describe the artifacts that one wishes to use to support their case. There’s not some gate-kept process to “become evidence”.
- jibal 2mo agoDestroying evidence is a crime, regardless of any warrant. https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1519 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1519
- bitmasher9 2mo agoYou’re way off about when it’s illegal to start destroying your property that the police want to seize during an investigation.
- GolfPopper 2mo ago"Investigation" is a pretty generous way to label "some thugs working for an authoritarian state want to look for incriminating stuff - including criticism or mockery of them or their leader - on your communications device". Whatever the American legal system may say, a couple of thugs with no warrant conducting searches and seizures of data is a blatant violation of the Constitution's intent. This is the sort of behavior Americans used to rightfully condemn.
- samtheprogram 2mo agoCalling border patrol "thugs" doesn't really bolster your argument to anyone except people who already agree with you.
- RunSet 2mo agoI find that choice of words more likely to cause people who already disagree with them to fixate on it rather than the substance of their comment.
- r_lee 2mo agoit just makes those people dismiss it. doesn't really do any good. I'm all for privacy and find this seizure stuff really wrong but to me it just looks like another form of "orange man bad"
- GolfPopper 2mo agoThe Border Patrol have been a violent and abusive branch of government since their inception. Their abuses under Republican and Democratic Presidents alike have been reported across the spectrum of America's media for many years. 'Thug' with it's roots in groups of violent organized criminals who preyed on travelers - is an accurate description for them.
- treetalker 2mo agoTo me it’s all quite analogous to walking up to, but not crossing, a border with, say, a fruit that’s legal to possess on the side you’re on, but not on the other side, and either eating or throwing away that fruit before crossing. “Hey! I saw you holding that Mexican pepper in Mexico, and then you threw it in that Mexican trash can before crossing into Texas!” “Yeah, so?”
- nazgul17 2mo agoBut that's not what happened here. Here, you were trying to bring the pepper over, got inspected and somehow got rid of it because you were able to be found out.
- dyauspitr 2mo agoThis is more like bringing the pepper across and then quickly swallowing it when they ask you to look at it.
- deleted 2mo ago[deleted]
- xdennis 2mo ago> Who said it was evidence? Did a judge authorize or issue a warrant to collect said evidence? Absent that, it's just your property, and you can do with it as you please. Why do people go sovereign citizen when reality doesn't work their way? Stop imagining that the way you want things to be is the way things really are. Cops do not need a judge to authorize the seizing of evidence. Cops do not need judges to decide what evidence is. Tell me, why did you just pretend like these are real requirements? I can understand why you'd want it to be that, but you wanting it to be that doesn't change reality. It's as if you've just learned about the Fourth Amendment but know nothing about the nuance behind it. Your system wouldn't even work at all. Let's imagine the cops get a tip that a bald man with a blue tshirt shot a man. They patrol the streets and find a match. By your logic they should not have the ability to search the man and seize his gun as evidence until a judge issues a warrant.
- SubiculumCode 2mo agoHow about, is there reasonable suspicion that a crime has occurred?
- ytoawwhra92 2mo agoNot required at an airport, for whatever reason.
- inigyou 2mo agoThe reason is anti-immigration
- 3form 2mo agoI enjoy the funny implication it creates, that then perhaps if you're entering US in 2026 it means there's something wrong with you.
- bubblethink 2mo agoThe constitution doesn't disappear at the airport. The man is a US citizen. He could have remained silent, and they would eventually have let him in.
- kube-system 2mo ago"Evidence" has never been limited to the subject of a warrant. Destruction of evidence statutes typically include material that is subject to a police investigation.
- SubiculumCode 2mo agoBut are not investigations typically under some reasonable suspicion that a crime had occurred?
- kube-system 2mo agoReasonable suspicion is required for a terry stop but that does not apply at a border crossing. Everyone can be stopped and questioned and searched at a border crossing. An ”investigation” is just a fancy word that broadly describes the type of information collection that law enforcement does. Yes, it is typically about things they think are crimes. Because that’s their job. But there’s not some legal hurdle they have to pass here, the word describes their work.
- 8note 2mo agothey of course arent police and arent investigating anything instead they are harassing
- kube-system 2mo agoIt is illegal to destroy evidence even if you weren’t guilty of the crime that was allegedly being investigated. If someone accuses you of a crime, committing a different crime is probably not a good move, in any situation.