A federal court says privacy rights are diminished due to the proliferation of video cameras throughout society
Law enforcement in Kansas recorded the front of a man’s home for 68 days straight, 15 hours a day, and obtained evidence to prove him guilty on 16 charges. The officers did not have a search warrant, using a camera on a pole positioned across the street to capture Bruce Hay’s home. A federal court ruled on Tuesday that it was fine for law enforcement to do so, in what’s potentially a major reduction in privacy law.
“Mr. Hay had no reasonable expectation of privacy in a view of the front of his house,” said the U.S. Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals in its decision on U.S. vs Hay. “As video cameras proliferate throughout society, regrettably, the reasonable expectation of privacy from filming is diminished.”
Just what we need. Another reason to be paranoid and suspicious of our surroundings. I remember reading how the cops did a similar thing, placing a camera across the street (behind a neighbor’s trashcan) from Brian Laundrie’s parents house, to “monitor” their movements.
The line in the sand for this could mostly likely be the reasonable need for such an action and not just carte blanche video monitoring because they “feel” it is necessary due to the person living within the domicile. Just because the reasonable expectation of privacy is gone as soon as one enters the public realm, that does not mean one should have to live with a video camera purposely placed by the govt with no justification to monitor someone.
The California (SAFE) tasks force is made up of different law-enforcement entities throughout the state even District Attorney’s and FBI agents. They have unlimited resources to do whatever they want, one of the detectives “Compose” told that my name came up on a “Compliance Check” he said they had been surveying my mom’s house and following me around for 24 days before arresting me for visiting my kids at my mother-in-law‘s house, they said it didn’t matter if I lived there or not, it was still a frequent place that I dwelled 290.010 pc
As the article stated, there’s a huge difference in your property being recorded in passing such as being caught on the security camera across the street who’s specific purpose is to guard THAT property or someone passing by, and someone making a specific and active effort to do so continuously with the sole purpose of capturing your property. I’m sure this judge won’t mind then if someone does exactly the same to their property since this ruling isn’t specific to the police activities per their ruling.
If someone had positioned a camera on a pole across from a neighbor who’s junior high age autistic daughter often runs out of the house but naked, and that it was theoretically possible to watch the camera footage live without making any recordings, would this federal court had ruled it was fine to do so?
It’s ALWAYS been fair game for anyone to film anyone else’s front porch for any reason. If it can be seen from a public sidewalk or street or from the house across from it, it can be photographed by anyone at any time. If you want to circumvent that, you need to build a high wall or hedge or put in some trees.
I’ve often wondered if the police worked with one of my neighbors to install a camera to monitor my house as two sex offenders live there. If we were still on parole (and somehow we were actually allowed to live in the same house) our parole agents would be as paranoid as hell as to what we were doing in the house. Indeed, if there actually was a camera looking at the front of the house, I would get a kick out of all the wasted money and time spent on the surveillance. However, I think the police here are pretty realistic about registered citizens. They’re going to be much more concerned about a known SVP or a repeat offender than two men who did something awful 15 and 25 years ago respectively and almost certainly will never reoffend again. The “compliance checks” they perform are performative nonsense funded by the DA’s office. If it wasn’t for that money, they wouldn’t even bother with us. And as it is, I tend to ignore them as is my right when they come pounding on the door in the morning.
If a person does this it is considered stalking. If the police had a warrant, It would have been justified. I think the court got it wrong. What is stopping someone from flying drones and surveiling public spaces?
Now scatter some cameras all over town, filming public spaces where there is no expectation of privacy…link the images back to AI assisted Facial Recognition, and….know where everybody is, all the time. They already do this in China, as part of the “Social Credit” program.
Yes, not only does the State know exactly where everyone is all the time, you too can know the identities of people around you via your Smartphone. Know who they are and know how “Trustworthy” they State has determined them to be… and if they pose a danger to you.
Very soon, everytime you or I leave home everyone in the vicinity will be aware of that, and why they should be concerned. An open invitation to every psycho near you to attack one way or another. This should create some interesting results, particularly in the right to carry states…
Remember, if you have nothing to hide, you have no reason to be concerned that the Morality Police are tracking every aspect of your life 24x7x365! Privacy is the enemy of Safety in both the AmeriReich and The People’s Republic of Amerika! Thus, privacy must be eliminated so we can be safe.
So, arrest warrants or Registrants… who to begin with? Both are low hanging fruit that the Demagogues could easily fabricate an Illusion of Legitimacy to justify.
Few more Uvalde style shootings and we can justify monitoring everything! Only way to stop something like that is to see it coming. Only way to see it coming is to know who will do it. Only way to know who will do it, is to know every single thing about every single person. Only way to do that is to monitor every single moment of everyone’s lives… then, Scientifically Analyze the data to predict the “Future crime”!
If you have nothing to hide, you have no reason to be concerned that the Precrime Police are monitoring you every moment.
Ok, with this reasoning it would show then that the same camera being used to film the front of his house can be used (by pointing it in a different direction) to film the inside of his house through a window where the drape is not closed. If you can sit in front of his house or stand there and see motion through the window and take out your cell phone and film the inside of his home from the street then this is ok because it is the same thing as just standing at the street and looking in; correct?
So I can stand in front of my neighbor’s house for hours with my cell phone pointed at their front window and record everything through the window as long as I am at the street and not on their property? Oh, unless this is only legal if LE using does this.
I am very glad I live in the sticks and on a dead end road and I know there are no cameras on this street or any on the streets leading to my home.
So if someone is standing out on the street in front of my home with a camera pointed at my home recording my home for hours and hours this is ok then? Oh, that’s right, only if it is L.E.
Next step will be for LE or the Government to use city/town cameras with face recognition software to track all persons with felony convictions and also SOs as they walk the streets, go in and out of shops, drive by the cameras and offer the images/videos as real=time on an app so when you are in that area you can track them on your phone in real time so you can avoid being jumped or raped by them.
Really, where does it end?
Get a Life!!
These judges and feds should have their chambers/offices and homes monitored 24/7/365 in the name of public safety to ensure no corruption is going on and they aren’t engaged in big government nanny bs.
This is not any landmark decision. SCOTUS long ago said this is okay and there is no expectation of privacy outside one’s home. And yes, recording from a pole has long been okay, too. It’s perhaps not set in stone from a court case but it’s still simply observing non-private areas of society. Underhanded? Yes, Illegal or constitutionally suspect? No.
See: US v. Moore-Bush for an even more extensive event than this KS one.68 days? Try 8 months!