BARRE CITY, Vt. – On a cold, sunny Thursday afternoon, Deputy Jean Miguel Bariteau of the Orange County Sheriff’s Department spots the driver of a red hatchback using his cell phone. When Bariteau pulls him over, it’s a straightforward call to write a ticket. He saw the driver use his phone, and the young man behind the wheel admits it.
If the man behind the wheel had denied violating Vermont’s distracted driver law, checking the phone records would have helped the deputy make his case. But a search like that requires a warrant.
Lawmakers want to make it easier for officers like Bariteau to enforce Vermont’s 2014 ban on using hand-held devices while on highways. They’re asking Vermonters to give up some of their privacy in exchange for safer roads. But even the chief sponsor of the bill said he hasn’t “really thought about” what, exactly, would be fair game for a warrantless search under his bill.
Go ahead and turn it off.
Headlines would read:
MILLIONS UPON MILLIONS WEENED FROM CRACK OVERNIGHT.
Good! Goofs on their cell phones while driving are more dangerous than drunks, teenagers and old people combined.
Did I see this headline somewhere?
Maybe I just imagined it – but that sure would be satisfying!
“It is the humble petition of the camel, who only asks that he may put his nose into the traveler’s tent. It is so pitiful, so modest, that we must needs relent and grant it.”
🙂
Uh. . .No! A warrantless search is in direct violation of the Constitution.
They have CAMERAS…let them produce VISUAL PROOF.
Sorry…a boring solution.
Drriff for the win!
Good luck with Blackberry encryption…hehe
And NO…I don’t play with phones while driving!