©2010 Brian S. Batterton, Attorney, Legal & Liability Risk Management Institute (LLRMI.COM)   On September 8, 2010, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals decided Meadows v. Lake Travis Independent School Districti, which involved a lawsuit involving the mother of a student who was denied access to the school because of her refusal to comply with the schools visitor identification system.  The facts of Meadows, taken from the case, are as follows: Following an incident in which a sex offender gained access to a school in the District and exposed himself to a child, the District implemented Regulation FFF to provide greater safety for the [...]

©2010 Brian S. Batterton, Attorney, Legal & Liability Risk Management Institute (LLRMI.COM)  As public school officials attempt to combat the problem of illegal drugs at school, the use of police drug sniffing canines is becoming more prevalent.  It is well established that canine sniffs of lockers and parked cars do not constitute a “search” under the Fourth Amendment.i However, in some situations, the facts leading up to the use of a canine may implicate the Fourth Amendment by constituting a seizure of a person or property prior to the use of the canine. On March 5, 2010, the Court of Appeals of Texas (Austin) recently [...]

On October 12, 2009, Taser® International issued a training bulletini dealing with the potential impact of Taser® on events ending in cardiac arrest.  Although the bulletin details the unlikely prospect of a Taser® deployment leading to cardiac arrest, it does raise the possibility that such an outcome could occur. “Should Sudden Cardiac Arrest occur in a scenario involving a TASER® discharge to the chest area – it would place the law enforcement agency, the officer, and TASER® International in the difficult situation of trying to ascertain what role, if any, the TASER® ECD could have played in a unique situation that cannot [...]

©2010 Brian S. Batterton, Attorney, Legal & Liability Risk Management Institute (LLRMI.COM)   United States v. Perdoma, No. 09-3394, 2010 U.S. App. LEXIS 19066 (8th Cir. Decided September 13, 2010) On September 13, 2010, the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals decided the United States v. Perdomai, which serves as an excellent Fourth Amendment review of officer/citizen encounters and how an encounter can rapidly escalate from consensual to probable cause to arrest.  The facts of Perdoma are as follows: On the morning of November 17, 2008, Investigator Alan Eberle of the Nebraska State Patrol ("NSP") was on duty in plain clothes at a Greyhound bus terminal in Omaha, Nebraska. [...]

©2010 Brian S. Batterton, Attorney, Legal & Liability Risk Management Institute (LLRMI.COM) Law enforcement officers are frequently dispatched to “loud party” calls that often involve underage persons in possession of alcohol.  When responding to such calls, officers must be mindful of the requirements of the Fourth Amendment when they decide what course of action to take upon their arrival.  An examination of the case of Georgia v. Ealumi provides an excellent review for officers responding to underage party calls involving alcohol. The facts of Ealum, taken directly from the case, are as follows: During the late night hours of October 31, 2004, three law enforcement officers [...]

©2010 Brian S. Batterton, Attorney, Legal & Liability Risk Management Institute (LLRMI.COM)    Recently, the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia decided the United States v. Maynardi, which involved an issue regarding the need for a search warrant to track, via GPS, the long-term movements of a drug conspiracy suspect.  While it is important to note that this decision is only binding in the D.C. Circuit, other circuits may consider it “persuasive” and follow this decision. In Maynard, agent from the FBI-Metropolitan Police Department Safe Streets Task Force began a cocaine distribution investigation involving Maynard and Jones.  During the course of the [...]