A Wisconsin court has decided that cops, or any legal authority for that matter, don’t need a warrant to attach a global positioning system (GPS) device to your car and track you wherever you go.  They claim that since you can be seen in public, it doesn’t violate any civil rights, including your Fourth Amendment rights protecting you from unreasonable search and seizure.

You don’t even have to be a suspect in a crime:

The ruling came in a 2003 case involving Michael Sveum, a Madison man who was under investigation for stalking. Police got a warrant to put a GPS on his car and secretly attached it while the vehicle was parked in Sveum’s driveway. The device recorded his car’s movements for five weeks before police retrieved it and downloaded the information.

The information suggested Sveum was stalking the woman, who had gone to police earlier with suspicions. Police got a second warrant to search his car and home, found more evidence and arrested him. He was convicted of stalking and sentenced to prison.

Sveum, 41, argued the tracking violated his Fourth Amendment protection against unreasonable search and seizure. He argued the device followed him into areas out of public view, such as his garage.

The court disagreed. The tracking did not violate constitutional protections because the device only gave police information that could have been obtained through visual surveillance, Lundsten wrote.

It isn’t too often I read something and think to myself, “There should be a law against that.”  However, this story made me think exactly that. 

It’s even less often that I side with the ACLU on an issue, but every once and a while, even that happens. Larry Dupuis, Wisconsin’s ACLU legal director, said, “”The idea that you can go and attach anything you want to somebody else’s property without any court supervision, that’s wrong.”

I agree.

What about property rights? Don’t they have some importance here? If they can attach it to a car, why not in a coat? The tracking device would still give the same information. Where does it stop?

And that brings me to the point where I thought there should be a law against this. I don’t mind cops tailing a guy who might be stalking someone, or might be a serial rapist. I don’t even have a problem with them getting a warrant to track people via GPS. But the idea that they can attach a tracking device to any car they want without a warrant is a bit troubling.

Hat Tip: Reason’s Hit and Run

Related posts:

• Obama Administration Wants Supreme Court to Limit Defendents’ RIghts
• Case Overturned by Minnesota Supreme Court, Rights Not Read in Native Language
• What’s the Last Thing You Want If You Go to Court for Defacing a Leatherneck’s Car? UPDATE: Michelle Malkin Has an Eye Witness Account
• Cops Bust Down Wrong Door, Refuse to Pay for It, Then It Gets Insulting
• Germantown, PA Burglar Previously Deported, And That’s Not the Worst Part of This Story