Virginia v. Moore

The Supreme Court just issued a new search and seizure opinion yesterday. The case deals with the conviction of a defendant for possession of crack cocaine. Moore was pulled over, and officers discovered that his license was suspended. In Virginia, driving on a suspended license (dosl) is a misdemeanor pushishable by up to 1 year in jail. Although a crime, Virginia state law forbids officers from making arrests for dosl; they are required to write citations and release suspects.

Regardless, the officers arrested Moore in violation of the law. A search incident to arrest revealed the crack, which led to a conviction. The Virginia Supreme reversed the probation on the grounds that a search incident to an illegal arrest is an illegal search that requires suppression of the evidence. The US Supreme Court has now reverse the state supreme court and held that the search was reasonable under the Fourth Amendment because the arrest would have been reasonable under federal law regardless of the state law restrictions.

Here is the problem that I have with the opinion: A police officer employed by a state agency only has those arrest powers specifically granted by that state. If the state tells the officer, you can only do A, B, and C, he has no authority to do D. This is particularly true when the state tells the officer, "We specifically forbid you from doing D." So if the officer actually does "D," he does so without lawful authority--he does so illegally. The state employed officer cannot borrow his actual authority from federal law. The Supreme Court has essentially said, "Since a federal agent would be allowed to do it, the state agent can exceed his lawful authority to arrest and subsequently search a suspect."

It just doesn't make a lot of sense to me. The Supreme Court has justified the decision by saying it won't let state law, which may restrict state action more than the federal constitution, dictate federal constututional standards. That is a true, important policy. But in applying that rule, the Supreme Court has authorized state officers to exceed the limited authority given to them by their employers. It ignores the fact that the arrest was illegal at its inception.

I feel as if Pandora's box has been opened allowing for great erosion of civil liberties in criminal court.

Poe

If I ever get to go back to school to do graduate work in English, I think I'll become a Poe expert. I am not aware of anybody who was more talented in creating mood and emotion than Poe. I say this because Poe doesn't create emotion by describing it or by describing scenes in great detail; he creates the mood through the sounds of the words themselves. These lines from "The Raven" exemplify this quality perfectly with its groaning "o-r" sounds:

Eagerly I wished the morrow; - vainly I had sought to borrow
From my books surcease of sorrow - sorrow for the lost Lenore -
For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels named Lenore -
Nameless here for evermore.

I recently rediscovered the poem "To M.L.S._" It reaches me for reasons I can't explain. This poem comes from a deeply depressed and troubled man, as you can tell from the picture above, who no doubt struggled constantly to unearth his "deep-buried faith." I especially enjoy his thoughts that his "grattitude Nearest resembles worship," where his worship in the traditional sense succombed to his drug addiction and depression.

Of all who hail thy presence as the morning-
Of all to whom thine absence is the night-
The blotting utterly from out high heaven
The sacred sun–of all who, weeping, bless thee
Hourly for hope–for life–ah! above all,
For the resurrection of deep-buried faith
In Truth–in Virtue–in Humanity-
Of all who, on Despair's unhallowed bed
Lying down to die, have suddenly arisen
At thy soft-murmured words, "Let there be light!"
At the soft-murmured words that were fulfilled
In the seraphic glancing of thine eyes-
Of all who owe thee most–whose gratitude
Nearest resembles worship–oh, remember
The truest–the most fervently devoted,
And think that these weak lines are written by him-
By him who, as he pens them, thrills to think
His spirit is communing with an angel's.

1847.

So glass chards from a 9 x 13 pan make a pile about yay big...

Colin has reached a new level of active boyhood. I put him in his high chair so he could watch me make dinner. I was sure to move his chair to a safe place not too close to the oven. Apparently I need to add "not to close to any counters" to my critera of safe places, because while I was gathering ingredients, Colin reached over and pulled my only surviving 9 x 13 pan onto the floor. Dave's only concern was whether we lost any coffee cake in the tragedy; you will be happy to hear that I had the last piece for lunch earlier that day. Crisis averted.

Pictures of Colin from February