As we celebrate this symbolic day in the land of the free, pay no attention to fact that the Raleigh Police set up a DWI checkpoint on Saturday night in which every single driver was stopped and interrogated by the long arm of your local government without suspicion of any wrongdoing. Twelve people were arrested for DWIs, despite, presumably,...
Continue ReadingJust four days after my blog post lamenting the use of presumptively unconstitutional roadblocks in Durham, Police Chief C.J. Davis announced that this intrusive and offensive tactic will no longer be used by the Durham police. According to Chief Davis, effective immediately as of March 5, 2017, “checkpoints in the city of Durham have been directed to cease and...
Continue ReadingLaw enforcement agencies in Durham County periodically set up “DWI Checking Stations,” at which every driver is stopped, detained, and investigated without suspicion of any crime. Sound unconstitutional? Sound like an excerpt from a dystopian novel? Well, the United States Supreme Court of the United States held in City of Indianapolis v. Edmond (2000) that DUI/DWI checkpoints are presumptively unconstitutional. The...
Continue ReadingIf you’re keeping tabs at home, there was yet another unconstitutional DWI checkpoint (roadblock) executed in Raleigh on January 31, 2014, at Glenwood Avenue and St. Marys Street. Forty-three of your tax-funded law enforcement officers were not fighting violent crimes that evening while they were arresting citizens on their way home from dinner. And, as they like to do,...
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