The law is a living beast and we challenge it constantly, all the way to SCOTUS.
In 1991, U.S. federal agents used infrared technology to scan the house of Danny Kyllo in Florence, Oregon. Based partly on the thermal images, the agents obtained a search warrant and soon found a marijuana growing operation with more than 100 plants.
Ten years later, the case finally wound up in the Supreme Court of the United States. In a 5-4 decision,
the court found that the use of FLIR technology without a search warrant was an unreasonable search without a warrant. It struck out the evidence obtained by the thermal images and the subsequent search warrant.
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So, a closer reading of your article shows, that this dude is dreaming. He is opining that the little teakettle temp sensor I have in the kitchen can be used in law enforcement without warrant.
For what?
IAC, I bet, based on Kyllo, it cannot be. So, I don't get paid by the word like him.
It is just a shell of an article with a catchy headline. And it ends like this.
To be clear, I am not posting this to be critical of
Kyllo (although I have been critical of it elsewhere for other reasons).
Rather, I am just trying to figure out how the case applies a decade or so later. Kyllo deliberately adopted a rule that allows the outcome to change along with society: I’m wondering if the intervening changes in society, as seen in Part II above, mean that the devices that the case prohibited without a warrant can now be used. I can’t be sure of the answer because the courts have never elaborated on the test for “general public use.” (Just how “general” is general enough?) But taking the case seriously, it seems to me that there’s at least a plausible case that the police can now use thermal imaging devices — or at least the simple single-point infrared devices — without a warrant.
