Interesting Dissent from Denial of Certiorari,
handed down today in Pennsylvania v. Dunlap, by Chief Justice Roberts and joined by Justice Kennedy. It begins:
North Philly, May 4, 2001. Officer Sean Devlin, Narcotics Strike Force, was working the morning shift. Under cover surveillance. The neighborhood? Tough as a three dollar steak. Devlin knew. Five years on the beat, nine months with the Strike Force. He’d made fifteen, twenty drug busts in the neighborhood. Devlin spotted him: a lone man on the corner. Another approached. Quick exchange of words. Cash handed over; small objects handed back. Each man then quickly on his own way. Devlin knew the guy wasn’t buying bus tokens. He radioed a description and Officer Stein picked up the buyer. Sure enough: three bags of crack in the guy’s pocket. Head downtown and book him. Just another day at the office.Roberts. Kennedy. Correct on the law? You betcha. Just error correction though. Two votes less than four. No dice.
* * *
That was not good enough for the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, which held in a divided decision that the police lacked probable cause to arrest the defendant. The Court concluded that a “single, isolated transaction” in a high-crime area was insufficient to justify the arrest, given that the officer did not actually see the drugs, there was no tip from an informant, and the defendant did not at tempt to flee. 941 A. 2d 671, 679 (2007). I disagree with that conclusion, and dissent from the denial of certiorari.
Related Posts (on one page):
- Literary Style of the Opening Paragraph in Pennsylvania v. Dunlap:
- Interesting Dissent from Denial of Certiorari,
Thomas Sowell once wrote a column about this. He talked about how these criminals aren't getting released and going to back to the judges' neighborhoods to live. Sowell was so right. These liberal judges think they are standing up for civil rights, when all they are doing is keeping places like North Philly scum-infested.
Perhaps those Pennsylvania Supreme Court justices need to live a few weeks on Lehigh Avenue.
Perhaps you want to pay for their room and board for the next 12-18 years?
In my experience and study most cases don't get overturned on constitutional grounds. But the vast majority of cases DO plead out and the criminals get lighter sentences and are then let out ahead of time because of overcrowding.
The few cases that get out on constitutional grounds aren't supporting a crime wave.
Cops in Philly will no longer arrest you doing a drug deal, provided you remain calm (don't flee) and keep the drugs concealed in something like a brown paper bag.
Seems like this will make it very easy to be a drug dealer in Philly.
What's your point? Are you saying we shouldn't arrest anybody?
Unless I'm mistaken, the idea behind incarceration is deterrence. Pay for 12-18 years of room and board for one guy and hopefully, in addition to getting him off the street, you deter 10 other would-be criminals from committing the same crime.
In a similar vein, if you let one guy go "on Constitutional grounds" or through excessive plea bargaining or for whatever other reason, you reduce the deterrent effect of the law being enforced.
I'm not arguing perps should never be allowed to walk. Our Constitution occasionally demands it. But to pretend there is no relationship between letting perps go free and the incidence of crime is ridiculous.
See Justice Scalia's dissent in Youngblood for the likely answer.
The point of incarceration is specifically to prevent someone from causing a social harm. The deterrence aspect of it is typically secondary. As far as deterrence goes, fines and requirements of community service both provide some deterrence and actually benefit society, rather than creating an obligation (i.e. three hot meals, guards, walls, etc).
So, it's hardly bizarre to ask if putting people in jail for committing nonviolent offenses is really the best investment of our resources.
Wouldn't this be a summary reversal as opposed to a GVR?
GVR's are grant, vacate, and remand for consideration in light of ...
A summary reversal would be a decision on the merits contrary to the decision reached in this case.
Strongly disagree. Incarceration comes after the social harm, so that can't be the primary point. The classical primary point is to punish the malefactor. Making anything else the primary point rewards injustice.
If you seek mainly to stop future harm, you will imprison everyone. If you seek mainly to deter, you will frame the innocent (it's easier).
First, Dunlap probably doesn't let alot of drug dealers go free. It lets alot of drug users go free. Our office refers to Dunlap motions as "first buyer motions" because it's pretty difficult to get the first buyer convicted. The second and third and fourth buyers are no problem, and neither is the dealer if there are several observed sales. Usually the cops will wait around for a couple of observed sales anyway (or will use a confidential informant, not an undercover officer, over a period of time), or will get some other evidence of dealing (scales, large amounts of cash) through a search warrant.
The follow-up to that is that no one's getting or not getting 12-18 years in most Dunlap-related cases. Most drug users get probation in Philly, and actually, so do some drug dealers (i.e., first-time marijuana dealers) because the system's so crowded and also because we have elected judges who are somewhat pro-defense on the average.
Finally, it should be noted (and I don't know whether or not this has anything to do with the denial of cert) that the PA state constitution gives significantly broader privacy protections than the US constitution does. For instance, PA doesn't recognize the automobile exception, and requires search warrants for pen registers, among other things. So it really may be up to the PA Supreme Court to change this one. The makeup of the PA Supreme Court has changed since Dunlap and it's possible that they'll reverse the decision themselves when the right case is brought up on appeal. Or at least that's what we're all hoping for. Until then, don't worry, we'll keep trying to put away the bad guys.
I disagree.
Because you can tell me with certitude that our justice is retributive and not at all deterrent or remedial?
How would one even begin to make such a claim?
"How would one even begin to make such a claim?"
The way he did. Is there a flaw in his reasoning? I imagine that there is, but I think he's more interested in your own thoughts.
"Cert should be granted by the granting the granting of cert of cert of cert of cert. Certain. Certainly certain cert . . ."