constitutional-law police first-amendment
Constitutionality of neighborhood lockdowns and road blocks
<p>Increasingly police in the United States have resorted to "locking down" buildings, blocks and even entire neighborhoods. For example, recently <a href="http://baltimore.cbslocal.com/2017/11/16/shelter-in-place-in-effect-for-neighborhood-in-west-baltimore/" rel="noreferrer">police in Baltimore reacted to a cop getting shot by locking down an entire section of city</a>. Presumably the only test of such actions would be for someone to get arrested for violating the "lockdown".</p>

<p>On their face, these actions seem to be extra-judicial since in many cases the police are not acting under the penumbra of law, but are essentially creating martial law with no authority.</p>

<p>Another issue is that such actions could be construed as violating the First Ammendment's guarantee of the right of assembly. <a href="http://www.firstamendmentcenter.org/curfews-loitering-freedom-of-association/" rel="noreferrer">A long essay on a Constitutional law web site discussed some of the issues</a> with regards to curfews.</p>

<p>Have these police lockdowns been challenged in court or been declared unconsitutional by a court?</p>

<p>This speaks specifically to roadblocks, as I am unsure about such "lockdowns," especially when considered in various contexts such as active shooters, terror attacks, etc. </p>

<p>Police usually need at least <em>reasonable suspicion</em> that a law has been violated in order to pull a driver over. However, the Supreme Court has recognized that sometimes there are <em>special law enforcement needs.</em> When those needs are present, the Supreme Court has approved of police setting up roadblocks to stop drivers without the police having any suspicion that that drive had violated a law. </p>

<p>There are two things that must be true for any given roadblock to be deemed appropriate. First, it must stop vehicles on a <em>neutral, articulable standard</em>. (An example is: "all cars"). Second, the roadblock must be <em>designed to serve the police officers' efforts closely related to a particular problem regarding vehicles and their mobility.</em> </p>

<p>A roadblock to test for drunk drivers: valid due to the extent of the problem of drunk drivers. </p>

<p>A roadblock to search cars for illegal drugs: invalid because its only purpose is to detect evidence of a regular crime (in other words, it has nothing to do with driving).</p>

<p><strong>Addendum to address fixed checkpoints based on comment:</strong></p>

<p>I came back to this and wanted to expand on the fixed checkpoints, which are checkpoints run by the border patrol inside of the US border. Crossing the checkpoint, a vehicles slow down and officials peer inside. Vehicles may or may not be asked to stop. </p>

<p>Border officials may operate such checkpoints in order to look inside of crossing vehicles and they may do so <a href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/428/543/" rel="nofollow noreferrer"><em>without a reasonable suspicion</em></a> that the car includes illegal aliens. They also do not have to be approved in advance, so there is <a href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/387/523/case.html" rel="nofollow noreferrer">no prior evidence-gathering needed</a> to put one up. Further, officials can point a car to a secondary pull-off location for limited inquiry, also without a reasonable suspicion. It does not require the higher standard because the nature of the secondary pull-off search is not as intrusive as that of a roving stop (where the official is part of a roving patrol and may stop vehicles <em>but does require a reasonable suspicion.</em>). This decision was justified because of the fact that the nature of smuggling makes finding a "reasonable suspicion" standard impractical while not being a great intrusion on Fourth Amendment rights.</p>
