Yes, Even Snot-nosed Punks Have Constitutional Rights

We are seeing more and more of these police interaction videos these days. Increasingly, these interactions are planned by those wishing to assert their rights.

Here is one making the rounds today.

I have seen many comments on these videos that amount to “the snot-nosed punk had it coming. If he just did what the police wanted, he would have had no problems.”

While that maybe true, the bottom line is that even snot-nosed punks have constitutional rights. He doesn’t lose his rights to object to unreasonable search just because he has attitude. Yes, he is a punk. But he is right.

In a world in which the obscure and unreasonable ways we all might be breaking the law expand exponentially every day, it is that much more important to uphold the fourth amendment. The police should not be able to use such stops as a pretext for such searches and to skirt the law with trained dogs. Period.