Consensual Searches

SayUncle has the correct answer here. Just say NO.

After an uptick in city homicides this year, the vast majority of them involving guns, law-enforcement officials have created a task force to try to rid the city of illegal guns.

The unit, funded with $5 million from the state, will hire retired Philadelphia homicide detectives and others to target neighborhoods where gun violence is most pervasive.

Police also plan to ask home owners at times for consent to search their homes without a probable-cause warrant, District Attorney Lynne M. Abraham said Monday.

"If we go to a house, we're going to ask the owner of the house if they will consent to a search for illegal weapons," Abraham said at a news conference. "Any gun that we can find that way is one more gun we can get off the street."

However, Pennsylvania Attorney General Tom Corbett, whose office will oversee the task force, does not plan to include his investigators in the warrantless searches, Corbett spokesman Kevin Harley said.

"We'll be taking information gathered from those searches, but we're going to be specifically investigating gun crimes that are already committed," Harley said. The task-force agents will conduct searches only after getting warrants, he said.

Yep, one more gun off the street and likely one more innocent person in the slam. I believe if the police search your home and find anything illegal, they can act upon it. You can be certain they won't be limiting what they search for when they ask.

There is only one answer when they ask, and that is NO. You can be assured that will mean that they'll return with a warrant, but if you got nothing to hide the warrant will be a waste of time.

One commenter at SayUncle believes this is a conspiracy to violate civil rights. I'm not certain of that, but it is an interesting argument.