N.J. Supreme Court rules schools can search cars of students

[chanel]

EGG HARBOR TOWNSHIP -- School officials can search students’ cars on school property if they suspect them of illegal activity, the state Supreme Court unanimously ruled today in a decision that further broadens administrators’ investigatory rights.

Expanding the standard of "reasonable suspicion" to students’ vehicles, the court said that "represents the best way to vindicate each student’s right to be free from unreasonable searches and to receive a thorough and efficient education."

"Obviously the education process is hampered when drugs and other illegal activities are present," Justice John E. Wallace Jr., wrote for the court. "Indeed, the need for school officials to maintain safety, order, and discipline is necessary whether school officials are addressing concerns inside the school building or outside on the school parking lot."

"The administrators at schools have a lot more authority to conduct searches of their (students’) belongings than would be normally allowed by police," he said.

N.J. Supreme Court rules schools can search cars of students | - NJ.com

Good law?

 

[jillian]

modern version of searching their lockers, no?

 

[RetiredGySgt]

EGG HARBOR TOWNSHIP -- School officials can search students’ cars on school property if they suspect them of illegal activity, the state Supreme Court unanimously ruled today in a decision that further broadens administrators’ investigatory rights.

Expanding the standard of "reasonable suspicion" to students’ vehicles, the court said that "represents the best way to vindicate each student’s right to be free from unreasonable searches and to receive a thorough and efficient education."

"Obviously the education process is hampered when drugs and other illegal activities are present," Justice John E. Wallace Jr., wrote for the court. "Indeed, the need for school officials to maintain safety, order, and discipline is necessary whether school officials are addressing concerns inside the school building or outside on the school parking lot."

"The administrators at schools have a lot more authority to conduct searches of their (students’) belongings than would be normally allowed by police," he said.

N.J. Supreme Court rules schools can search cars of students | - NJ.com

Good law?

I have no major problem with it, my problems are with the Zero tolerance bullshit.

 

[chanel]

Yes Jillian. Of course your friends at the ACLU fought against locker searches too.

The problem is see with this is that many schools don't have enough parking for all the students. Many park "off campus". Whether it extends to that also will yet to be seen. Savvy drug dealers will most likely park on the street. Although most of them aren't too smart.

 

[jillian]

Yes Jillian. Of course your friends at the ACLU fought against locker searches too.

The problem is see with this is that many schools don't have enough parking for all the students. Many park "off campus". Whether it extends to that also will yet to be seen. Savvy drug dealers will most likely park on the street. Although most of them aren't too smart.

you make silly assumptions ... my "friends"?

they take the positions they take because people like you get a little er.. overzealous... when you don't like something. they have a job to do.

sorry you hate the first and fourth amendments.

This is all I found on the ACLU site about the subject.

Is the school allowed to search our lockers?
Yes. Even without reasonable suspicion, school authorities can search students’ lockers, but they must first notify students and give them a chance to be present. This also applies to your desk, because lockers and desks are school property. But that doesn’t mean they can search inside any of your belongings that they find inside your locker or desk, like a closed purse or backpack. To search a closed personal container, the school official must have reasonable suspicion that he or she will find evidence of a violation of school rules or the law inside that container.

Locker, Backpack & Body Searches :: American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania

 

[chanel]

Not a big fan of the ACLU simply because I disagree with a lot of their frivolous cases and their support for pedophiles. But believe it or not Jillian, I do believe they serve a purpose and not all their causes are bogus.

My main problem with "friends" of the ACLU is that they often claim that anyone who disagrees is either stupid or hates the Constitution. Rarely are the decisions unanimous. I don't believe dissenting judges are stupid or hate the Constitution, do you?

 

[RetiredGySgt]

Not a big fan of the ACLU simply because I disagree with a lot of their frivolous cases and their support for pedophiles. But believe it or not Jillian, I do believe they serve a purpose and not all their causes are bogus.

My main problem with "friends" of the ACLU is that they often claim that anyone who disagrees is either stupid or hates the Constitution. Rarely are the decisions unanimous. I don't believe dissenting judges are stupid or hate the Constitution, do you?

As a matter of fact she does, just ask her about the Judges on the Supreme Court now. Though that would not be the dissenting Judges in this case.

 

[lawbuff]

N.J. Supreme Court rules schools can search cars of students | - NJ.com

Good law?

I don't have problem with it, from a legal standpoint:


http://www.judiciary.state.nj.us/opinions/supreme/A7708StatevThomasBest.pdf

Of course the decision cites TLO, which was a NJ case in 1984, so the ruling is not surprising.

Absent a few carefully crafted exceptions, a search warrant is needed to invade a person's privacy, TLO ruled that although teachers/school officials ARE agents of the government for 4th AM purposes, they are not held to as strict a scrutiny as the police are.

Since the decision was based on the 4th AM and not soley NJ's Constitution, it is appealable on the federal level.

 

[Contumacious]

[

Expanding the standard of "reasonable suspicion" to students’ vehicles, the court said that "represents the best way to vindicate each student’s right to be free from unreasonable searches and to receive a thorough and efficient education."

"Obviously the education process is hampered when drugs and other illegal activities are present," Justice John E. Wallace Jr., wrote for the court. "Indeed, the need for school officials to maintain safety, order, and discipline is necessary whether school officials are addressing concerns inside the school building or outside on the school parking lot."

They will get an education alright:

Every politically controlled educational system will inculcate the doctrine of state supremacy sooner or later. . . . Once that doctrine has been accepted, it becomes an almost superhuman task to break the stranglehold of the political power over the life of the citizen. It has had his body, property and mind in its clutches from infancy. An octopus would sooner release its prey. A tax-supported, compulsory educational system is the complete model of the totalitarian state. –Isabel Paterson, The God of the Machine (1943


.

 

[JD_2B]

EGG HARBOR TOWNSHIP -- School officials can search students’ cars on school property if they suspect them of illegal activity, the state Supreme Court unanimously ruled today in a decision that further broadens administrators’ investigatory rights.

Expanding the standard of "reasonable suspicion" to students’ vehicles, the court said that "represents the best way to vindicate each student’s right to be free from unreasonable searches and to receive a thorough and efficient education."

"Obviously the education process is hampered when drugs and other illegal activities are present," Justice John E. Wallace Jr., wrote for the court. "Indeed, the need for school officials to maintain safety, order, and discipline is necessary whether school officials are addressing concerns inside the school building or outside on the school parking lot."

"The administrators at schools have a lot more authority to conduct searches of their (students’) belongings than would be normally allowed by police," he said.

N.J. Supreme Court rules schools can search cars of students | - NJ.com

Good law?

I'm torn..

Overall- Yeah it is a good law, for the way our laws currently work. Drugs are illegal, for reasons that I understand, although I do not wholly agree. Guns on school property- another law I understand, but do not agree with.

Schools are breeding grounds for drug dealers and users, as well as the bullying of "different" kids, which ends up in cases like Columbine and Virginia Tech.

For these reasons, I agree that car searches are necessary for the safety of the children, as a means of busting the drug dealers and potential murderers before they get to their targets.

However, I don't think that drug legislation should be pushed as far as it is. Too often, people get tried and convicted of drug crimes like possession with intent to sell, when in reality, it was some violent crime that they committed, and got off on, or never got charged with. Drugs don't cause crimes- people cause crimes. Same idea with guns and knives. If the schools want to have safer schools and create some kind of legislation about that, why not offer drug and violence education programs at the parent teacher meetings, and have like two a year, that are mandatory, and send home information that must be signed by the parent and student a couple of times a year, also?

My son is 11, and has a couple of bullies in his class. He is in 5th grade, and we have already discussed getting him a can of pepper spray to carry with him. He gets kicked for tapping his pencil in class, or singing little songs in line. The bully that kicks him, kicks HARD, and it hurts my son, even puts bruises on his legs sometimes. I am shocked that I have been forced into considering sending him to a "safe place" with a can of mace.. His bully's brother used to kick him, but when he got kicked out of the after school program (different organization) for it, he stopped.
We have other choices we could make, like pressing charges on the abusive child, as it does happen almost every day, or filing for an injunction, which I doubt would do much good, really.

I arm my son with non violent strategies on how to make the bullies stop, but my son won't even call the kid gay out loud. See, he gets kicked in the butt and the legs. I think that if he called that boy gay, and accused him of being in love with my boy's body to the point of not being able to control himself from wanting to touch his butt (its a stretch, lol I know) all the time, then maybe it would embarass the kid, and he will stop doing it. My son said "Well, we are not supposed to get loud at school, because that is disruptive to the other classes."
I would really just tell my kid to turn around and deck the boy, but that is not the answer here. All that would do would be to piss the boy off, and my poor son would end up getting beat up by a big group of kids after school. When we first moved to this neighborhood, some middle aged man got killed with a table leg, by a group of bad local dudes, and that was over a cheating girlfriend. I do not want to be here for a long time, but I also would not want any of these punk kids to think that using a piece of wood on my son's head was an acceptable means of handling their problems, NOW, either.

So it is a conundrum for us. If he is kicked even ONE more time, by this kid, or anyone else, I will buy him pepper spray, and maybe tell him to keep it a secret until he empties the can on the kid after school. Pepper spray is a non violent self defense tool, and the best I can do with my son- My boy is soooo gentle and loving, and my only fear is that he might pull it out when he is getting kicked, lose his nerve, and NOT push the button. If he fights back in school, he could get suspended. If he doesnt fight back, he will keep pulling himself into this unhappy defensive shell he has created, around these asshole kids.

One kid, a 9 year old, when my son was in 1st grade, a BIG kid, used to trip him all the time and bump into him on purpose, and was an all around bully as well- Well, this kid ended up getting a black eye from my son, and he stopped the bullying then. I wish my son would just teach this other boy a lesson, too. Grr... The school system SUCKS.

 

[strollingbones]

no schools should not be allowed to search cars.....however, i am against roadblocks and any type of warrentless search.

 

[chanel]

What if the principal gets a tip that a kid has a gun in his backpack? Should they wait until they can find a judge?

 

[lawbuff]

no schools should not be allowed to search cars.....however, i am against roadblocks and any type of warrentless search.

On the issue of warrantless searches, if an officer is knocking on a door and sees through the window a woman being choked, is it practical to get a warrant to enter??

By the time they did she is dead!!

Firefighters are agents of the government, would you like them to secure a search/administrative warrant to enter your home if it is on fire?? Before you say this is silly that I even ask, there is case law on it, so the answer is, NO, a warrant is not needed to enter to fight a fire, but the question is posed to you, is this a justified warrantless entry?

 

[RetiredGySgt]

no schools should not be allowed to search cars.....however, i am against roadblocks and any type of warrentless search.

On the issue of warrantless searches, if an officer is knocking on a door and sees through the window a woman being choked, is it practical to get a warrant to enter??

By the time they did she is dead!!

Firefighters are agents of the government, would you like them to secure a search warrant to enter your home if it is on fire?? Before you say this is silly that I even ask, there is case law on it, so the answer is, NO, a warrant is not needed to enter to fight a fire, but the question is posed to you, is this a justified warrantless entry?

Different context entirely. Fire fighters are not entering in order to preform a search of your premises or yourself.

As far as I am concerned schools are not private property one gives up the assumption of protection when one goes to the school in a car. One gives up the presumption of private property when one consents to use a school locker or carries anything to school on their person.

Schools are for the most part Government property ( private schools are not YOUR private property either) and different rules apply. Further in grade and High School children are not adults and have not the same rights as adults. Schools act in their best interest and the interest of the student body at the school. Safety is one of those instances.

 

[Skull Pilot]

modern version of searching their lockers, no?

no.

 

[RetiredGySgt]

modern version of searching their lockers, no?

no.

Sorry if you willingly bring your car on school Grounds they have every right to inspect it for contraband. Hell you have to GET permission at most schools just to park on school grounds.

 

[Skull Pilot]

modern version of searching their lockers, no?

no.

Sorry if you willingly bring your car on school Grounds they have every right to inspect it for contraband. Hell you have to GET permission at most schools just to park on school grounds.

So all the kids should be strip searched before entering too?

Easy answer to this. Don't park you car in the school lot.

 

[RetiredGySgt]

no.

Sorry if you willingly bring your car on school Grounds they have every right to inspect it for contraband. Hell you have to GET permission at most schools just to park on school grounds.

So all the kids should be strip searched before entering too?

Easy answer to this. Don't park you car in the school lot.

I suggest you reread what is and is not allowed. And yes a school can search a student if they feel a need for it. They do not even need a search warrant to do THAT.

 

[Skull Pilot]

Sorry if you willingly bring your car on school Grounds they have every right to inspect it for contraband. Hell you have to GET permission at most schools just to park on school grounds.

So all the kids should be strip searched before entering too?

Easy answer to this. Don't park you car in the school lot.

I suggest you reread what is and is not allowed. And yes a school can search a student if they feel a need for it. They do not even need a search warrant to do THAT.

Doesn't make it right.

It should be illegal unless the school has the permission of the parents. And as a parent I would never give permission for some government employee to search my kid.

 

[RetiredGySgt]

So all the kids should be strip searched before entering too?

Easy answer to this. Don't park you car in the school lot.

I suggest you reread what is and is not allowed. And yes a school can search a student if they feel a need for it. They do not even need a search warrant to do THAT.

Doesn't make it right.

It should be illegal unless the school has the permission of the parents. And as a parent I would never give permission for some government employee to search my kid.

Then you are part of the problem.