Birdsong's Law Blog

Volume 83 Number 17 Wednesday, July 30, 2008	Page 667
ISSN 1525-2213
Court Decisions
Search and Seizure Arresting Everyone in Vehicle on Basis Of Pot Aroma Violates State Constitution

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    The Washington Supreme Court July 17 relied on the privacy guarantee in its state constitution to hold that a police officer’s detection of the odor of marijuana emanating from a vehicle with multiple occupants does not provide probable cause to arrest all of them. The court, which has frequently found the state constitution more protective than the Fourth Amendment, declined to embrace what it called the “‘common criminal enterprise’ inference” endorsed by the U.S. Supreme Court in Maryland v. Pringle, 540 U.S. 366, 74 CrL 183 (2003). (State v. Grande, Wash., No. 81068-1, 7/17/08)In this case, a police officer noticed a car with very darkly tinted windows and pulled it over. On smelling the scent of marijuana coming from the vehicle, the officer placed both the driver and her passenger–the defendant–under arrest and searched their persons. He found a pipe with a small amount of marijuana on the defendant.

Here’s Dee Dee, Birdsong’s girlfriend, on more exporting of  American jobs, this time too close for comfort.

We have a duty to stop the hemorrhaging of jobs out of the U.S.  And, during this week of the Democratic convention, If the Democratic party wants the winning ticket,  it must vociferously commit to keeping work here at home for Americans and must milk it for all its worth.  Some of you will remember the 1992 Democratic campaign slogan, It’s The Economy, Stupid that catapulted President Clinton into the White House.   This time, the party will win on, ”IT’S KEEPING LOCAL JOBS LOCAL STUPID!!!”

Manufacturing jobs have dried up, so Americans are told to get retrained in another skill-one that requires the employee to provide front-line service. 

Like Lawyers or Paralegals, for instance, right?  Wrong!!! Just last month,  the Florida Bar Association’s Board of Governors affirmed Proposed Advisory Opinion 07-2. 

On her 88th birthday Birdsong’s granny told him, “Sonny boy I am still around and kicking — just not very high.”  Do some of us feel like that even though we’re much younger than granny was at the time?

…Think about it.

–Birdsong

This Post is for students in Prof. Birdsong’s Refugee Law Seminar.

CONVENTION AGAINST TORTURE
and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading
Treatment or Punishment

The States Parties to this Convention,

Considering that, in accordance with the principles proclaimed in the Charter of the United Nations, recognition of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world,

http://www2.ohchr.org/english/law/refugees.htm

http://www1.umn.edu/humanrts/instree/v2prsr.htm