Supremes Agree to Test Geofence Warrants

You may recall that a few years ago the United States fought a war against a government which they thought was trampling personal freedoms. That was in 1776.

Now a person who has been convicted of bank robbery is asking the Supreme Court to reign in the government. The government asked the Supremes not to reign them in, but they said not so fast bucko.

So here is the story.

First, what is a geofence warrant. It is a warrant where the government, at some level, asks a phone company to give them information about all phones within a fenced in geography inside a particular time. This was used in the January 6th indictments. The government got all the phones and was able to identify exactly were people were to within a few feet.

In this case, Okello Chatrie, pleaded guilty to robbery and sentenced to 12 years in prison for stealing $195,000 at gunpoint.

How did they find him? The feds found security camera footage showing a man on a cell phone near the credit union that was robbed and they asked Google to give them information on all phones that were near the credit union at the time. There is a process where the data is initially anonymous and lets less so as the government pours through the data.

Eventually they narrowed down the list of people, got a search warrant for Chatrie’s house and found a gun, $100,000 in cash and incriminating notes.

He said the warrant was unconstitutional, violating the fourth amendment.

The 4th Circuit Court of Appeals split in favor of the government and, of course, the government does not want the Supremes to “fence them in”, to steal a phrase.

However, the Supremes will hear the case this year.

Cases that the Supremes hear are often not about the particular person in question but rather to clarify law. What is, in this case, the government allowed to do and not allowed to do?

There is a doctrine that says that you voluntarily give your information to a third party, in this case Google, you lose any expectation of privacy, but in this case, voluntary is pretty questionable. The only way you can NOT give your data to Google or Apple is to not have or use a cell phone.

Stay tuned; I have no idea what they will decide. Credit: The Record

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