CRS 334 PROJECT #1 POSITION PAPER. High-Tech Policing

CRS 334 PROJECT #1 POSITION PAPER 

Total Value: 15% of Final Grade
The Fourth Amendment in the Digital Information Age
Consider: technological changes have complex effects on crime and law enforcement. Technology make crimes easier to coordinate and conceal, while also providing the government with new investigative tools. This project requires you to examine the competing interests of the government, the public and the individual. The issues encompass our class discussions about privacy vs secrecy, reasonable expectations of privacy, the constitutional definition of a search etc.
In 1979, before the days of cellphone, the Supreme Court ruled a that person has no reasonable expectation of privacy in information they turn over to a third party, such as a phone company. in Smith v. Maryland, 442 U.S. 735 (1979), the telephone company, at police request, installed a pen register to record the numbers dialed from the telephone at Smith's home. A pen register is an electronic device that records all numbers called from a particular land-based telephone line. Pen registers do not record sound, so they do not listen in on conversations and they do not record content. The police did not get a warrant or court order before having the pen register installed. The Court held: The installation and use of the pen register was not a "search" within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment, and hence no warrant was required. 
In U.S. v Miller, 425 U.S. 435 (1976), the Court ruled that the defendant could not assert Fourth Amendment protection in bank records. In that case the Court held: There is no legitimate "expectation of privacy" in the contents of the original checks and deposit slips, since the checks are not confidential communications, but negotiable instruments to be used in commercial transactions, and all the documents obtained contain only information voluntarily conveyed to the banks and exposed to their employees in the ordinary course of business. 
Contrast that with Riley v. Johnson, 573 U.S. ___ (2014), where the Court found that a warrantless search of the contents of a cell phone that had been legally seized in the course of an arrest was not constitutional. The Court held there was a legitimate expectation of privacy in the contents of a cell phone.  While the Court acknowledged that a person in police custody and under arrest has diminished privacy interests, the Court insisted that those interests are not obliterated. The Court asserted: Modern cell phones are not just another technological convenience. With all they contain and all they may reveal, they hold for many Americans “the privacies of life,” The fact that technology now allows an individual to carry such information in his hand does not make the information any less worthy of the protection for which the Founders fought. Our answer to the question of what police must do before searching a cell phone seized incident to an arrest is accordingly simple—get a warrant.
So too, in Carpenter v. U.S., October 2017, the Court held that the Government’s acquisition of wireless carrier cell-site records revealing the location of Carpenter’s cell phone whenever it made or received calls was a search under the Fourth Amendment. The Court further acknowledged that an individual has a legitimate expectation of privacy in the record of their movements, thereby requiring a warrant to obtain cellphone location records created and stored by a third (non-governmental) party.
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Read the CQ Researcher, High-Tech Policing edition uploaded to the Project 1 file in Bb. Use the publication as a writing prompt. Take a position on the issue of high-tech policing. Be sure you offer more than your opinion. Argue your case; develop your reasoning. Do not merely provide a description of the multiple sides of the issue, you must take a stand and support it.
Begin with your opinion, then explore what grounds that opinion. In other words, why do you hold that opinion?• Which facts are relevant to your opinion? Why?• Consider issues of definition.• What are the assumptions upon which you base your opinion?o Be sure to examine your assumptions. Question them. o Are there other available assumptions that might change your opinion? • You will not be able to adequately support your opinion without doing further research. The reading prompts are not sufficient. o You must research the issue and cite 3-5 sources described below as "Research Sources" The Research Sources must include scholarly or argumentative sources.  Scholarly sources:• As defined by Syracuse University, scholarly sources: are found in peer-reviewed, or refereed, journals. Such journals have editorial boards of experts who accept or reject articles for publication. Therefore, the articles are considered high quality and represent important research in a given field.• Articles from popular magazines do not include the same level of research and are not reviewed in the same way. They often contain stories of interest to a wider audience. See: http://researchguides(dot)library(dot)syr(dot)edu/c.php?g=258120&p=1725787 Argumentative sources take a position on the issue.• The argumentative sources must present differing views or reach different conclusions regarding the issue.  In other words, the sources should not be repetitive of one another. Together, they should expand your knowledge of the issue rather than merely repeat the same discussion.• Write your essay. I do not want to see an over-reliance on someone else’s language in the essay as you argue the case. Use your own reasoning skills and language to support your position.
Objective:• Draft a written argument that demonstrateso Relevant, well-organized support for the claim, including A clear, concise, controversial claim/thesis Relevant, well-organized support for the claim, including• An introduction and conclusion that are logically supported by the analysis  A command of conventions of standard English grammar, usage, capitalization, punctuation, and spelling.• See the rubic uploaded to Bb for greater detail.
Format:• Provide a Bibliography or a Works Cited page. APA or MLA format is fine. • Please format your letter in 12-point font and one-inch margins. • The paper should be no fewer than 1400 words and no more than 2200 words. If the paper is fewer than 1400, you will fail the assignment and will not be given the opportunity to re-write. Word count does not include Works Cited.• Upload the paper in Microsoft Word format.
AudienceYour audience is the readership of a national newspaper. Do not use the word “I.”