By Leif M. Wright

Despite questions of whether it is constitutional to stop drivers who are not suspected of a crime and a controversy about it last year, Muskogee police are again declaring that they will start conducting roadside checkpoints in Muskogee intersections to check for the following crimes:

The department states that the overall goal is to reduce criminal activity and enhance the safety of our motorists.

While the US Supreme Court has found that DUI checkpoints are violating drivers Fourth Amendment rights against illegal search, the court left it up to the states to determine whether to use them anyway. Eleven states have made them illegal, including Texas, but not Oklahoma. In dissenting the US Supreme Court decision, Justice Clarence Thomas said I rather doubt that the framers of the Fourth Amendment would have considered reasonable a program of indiscriminate stops of individuals not suspected of wrongdoing.

A roadblock whose primary purpose is ultimately indistinguishable from the general interest in crime control violate[s] the Fourth Amendment. City of Indianapolis v. Edmond, 531 U.S. 32, 48, 121 S. Ct. 447, 148 L. Ed. 2d 333 (2000). In addition, the court ruled [A] general roadblock .established on the chance of finding someone who has committed a crime is quite clearly unconstitutional. The decision, which legally called traffic stops seizures, also noted that the general interest in law enforcement simply does not outweigh the liberty interests of those seized, however brief the seizure may be

Muskogee Polices press release about the stops this month states the objective of the roadside safety checks is to deter and/or identify persons operating motor vehicles that are breaking the laws listed above, which falls under the purview of the Supreme Courts decision affirming that such stops are illegal.

Read more:

Muskogee police to again conduct checkpoint stops despite questionable constitutionality - muskogeenow.com