So if you really want to nab someone but you don't care what the charge is, you can threaten them with a 4th Amendment-violating search, which induces them to destroy evidence. Pretty neat trick. IANAL, but I don't think it's controversial to say that people who treat the Bill of Rights like an obstacle to be hacked around probably shouldn't be in positions of power.

You are describing the world as it exists, while I'm saying that we should have a better one.

Have you heard of entrapment?

IANAL, but I've heard that entrapment defenses are way harder to use, and much rarer, in reality than on TV.

First, you frequently require a judge's permission to even argue it.

But the real burden is showing that your client would not have committed the crime without the effect of the police. A cop posing as a drug dealer and offering you drugs as you pass them in the park every day doesn't count; a cop hounding you for months to commit wire fraud because they mistakenly believe you're in a criminal org might, though.

Yes. That’s why I added the predicate “crimes they didn’t ask you to commit.”

It can’t be destroying evidence if there’s no case or charge being pressed for which that material would be evidence.

“Entering the country while in possession of a device storing binary data” isn’t a crime.

> It can’t be destroying evidence if there’s no case or charge being pressed for which that material would be evidence.

(IAAL, not legal advice, consult your own lawyer)

Where’d you get that idea? That’s not the law. As soon as there is reasonable suspicion that a crime has been committed, and the law enforcement encounter occurs, that’s the threshold for when preservation of evidence begins. It doesn’t matter whether it might not have ultimately resulted in a criminal charge. You cannot intentionally interfere with a lawful investigation, in any way, full stop.

Reasonable suspicion of what though? Is them just being suspicious by default "reasonable"?

What articulable crime is the suspect alleged to have committed?

It’s a subject of debate. CBP stated it was possession of CSAM. Defendant claims it’s a pretext and that CBP was really investigating his ties with the Defend the Atlanta Forest movement.

But it doesn’t really matter in this case. You cannot interfere with a lawful investigation, full stop. It’s not clear to me that even if the search was unlawful that the defendant will be held not guilty of the underlying tampering/destruction charge, since we already have a mechanism to suppress evidence obtained unlawfully.

There was no reasonable suspicion in this case and definitely not of the pretext they used (child porn).

In the case of a border search it’s when the encounter begins; no reasonable suspicion is needed.

Updating my initial statement: to search someone’s phone at the border, the government needs reasonable suspicion that the person has committed or is planning to commit a crime.

There is no right to refusal at border control. It's outside the 4th amendment so it's not even relevant.

That’s not true. US citizens maintain their constitutional rights at the border. That has been tested in court. This is not the case for non-US person.

Unfortunately, this seems to be less true now, depending on which circuit your case is tried in.

Also note that Miranda rights are not constitutional rights.

This guy requested not to proceed without his lawyer present several times, with no result.

> I'm sorry, but the Fourth Amendment does not protect against the intentional destruction of evidence.

It seems to be more true than it did a couple of decades ago, what with more recent rulings like US v. Cotterman and US. v. Koluz better clarifying what counts as a routine border searches vs. more in-depth "forensic" searches that require individual suspicion.

who investigates and prosecutes SS agents who violate constitutional rights?

you'll find it's the same people

Evidence of what?

> I'm sorry, but the Fourth Amendment does not protect against the intentional destruction of evidence.

Certainly not. But, of course, something can only be evidence in relation to a specific crime that is being investigated. If you aren't already a suspect in a crime, then the data on your phone wasn't evidence in the first place.

Allowed to refuse search? What are you smoking?

Look at the username. You're talking to gpt5 smoking tokens. It's hallucinating "evidence," whatever that's supposed to mean. It doesn't recognize that the Fourth Amendment is supposed to protect against law enforcement fishing expeditions that lets the government intimidate people for having the "wrong" political views and invent pretexts for further harassment.

Whatever you think the fourth amendment is supposed to do, doesn’t match reality. Despite your ad-hominem attack.