Press Release:
Date: May 15, 2001
From: Civil Liberties Monitoring Project
Re: Highway Searches
Good News for Motorists:
Commissioner D.O. "Spike" Helmick, head of the California Highway Patrol (CHP), has announced a six-month moratorium on "consentual" car searches by CHP officers. These searches conducted in the absence of "probable Cause" to believe a crime is taking place, and therefore constitutionally permissible only with the consent of the individual being subjected to the search. The ban was recommended by a team of CHP managers after a review of search data recently collected by the CHP in response to a legislative investigation sparked by widespread complaints of racial profiling by police in selecting targets for traffic stops and searches. According to American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) lawyer Michelle Alexander, "Officers are encouraged to use minor traffic violations to stop motorists and then get consent to search their cars for drugs... They're operating on a hunch, on a guess, on a stereotype."
For several years, the Civil Liberties Monitoring Project (CLMP) has been receiving complaints from motorists asserting that they have felt pressured into consenting to a roadside search. During a recent radio interview conducted by CLMP, a CHP officer was asked what was the best way to withhold consent for such a search without provoking a negative reaction from an officer. He replied that refusing to give consent for a search would most likely elicit suspicion that the motorist was hiding something. That exercising a clearly recognized constitutionally protected right may now be considered by some police to be a suspicious act in itself is an alarming development.
Enforcement of the "War on Drugs" has resulted in large numbers of motorists being stopped for alleged minor violations, then being subjected to intense, invasive and protracted interrogations and often pressured into consenting to a search in order to satisfy an officer's curiosity before being allowed back on the road. In California and elsewhere, there has been increasing opposition to these speculative searches. The 1999 report resulting from Gary Webb's investigation for the California Legislative Task Force on Government Oversight of the CHP's "Operation Pipeline" concluded that CHP figures showed that in nine out of ten cases, these searches turned up nothing incriminating. The newly announced moratorium on seeking consent for searches where no "probable cause" to search exists should essentially eliminate this kind of abuse, so long as it remains in effect.
If you support this 6 month moratorium and an end to "consent searches", this is a good time to contact your state legislative reps and California Attorney General, Bill Lockyer and the CHP and let them know your views.
If you experience a contact with police where you feel your rights may have been violated, please contact the Civil Liberties Monitoring Project at 707-923-4646, PO Box 544 Redway, Ca 95560 or email us. CLMP is a community based non profit organization dedicated to preserving and protecting individual rights protected under the laws and constitutions of California and the United States of America.
The purpose of having law enforcement doctors, attorneys and political representatives and others, on our civil liberties public radio programs is to try and bridge an ever widening gap between the people, law makers and law enforecment. It is disturbing to learn than the Attorney General's office and the Department of Justice are unwilling to come forward and have a spokes person be available to the public to explain their position on various issues and answer questions.
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