Mass detention of persons

From Schurr, Criminal Procedure NSW

[6.1620] Mass detention of persons

Sometimes search warrants are executed on clubs or hotels, where hundreds of people may be present. The requirement for reasonable suspicion applies in those situations. The probability is also that many charges for hindering will be laid and many allegations of false imprisonment made. The NSW Ombudsman in his 1986 report on the execution of a search warrant on "Club 80", a gay nightclub in Oxford Street, Sydney, found that between 150 and 300 people were detained in the club. Police said that patrons remained in the premises to assist police, and the complainants said that they were forcibly detained until they supplied their name and address. The Ombudsman found that this behaviour was "unreasonable" in that it breached the Commissioner's Instructions that police had no power to detain and question prior to arrest. The Ombudsman found that the police suggestion that the patrons voluntarily waited two or three hours to give their names and address, particularly at a time when homosexual activities were still illegal in New South Wales, was ludicrous.

Supreme Court Tackes Warrantless Entry Case

From NPR, 12 January 2011:

The U.S. Supreme Court is wrestling with a case that could give police greater power to forcibly enter a home without a warrant.

The Constitution bars warrantless searches except in certain circumstances — for example, an emergency search to prevent the destruction of evidence. But on Wednesday, the question before the court was whether police, by themselves creating such exigent circumstances, are unconstitutionally evading the warrant requirement.

The case before the court began in 2005 when Lexington, Ky., police banged on the door of an apartment where they thought they smelled marijuana. After loudly identifying themselves, police heard movement inside, and fearing the destruction of evidence, they broke in. Inside they found Hollis Deshaun King smoking marijuana. Police also found marijuana and cocaine on the kitchen counter. King was convicted of drug trafficking and related offenses.

But the Kentucky Supreme Court reversed the conviction. The state court ruled that the drugs found in the apartment could not be used as evidence against King because police had no warrant for the search, and the only emergency circumstances were those created by the police themselves when they loudly alerted the suspect to their presence.

Prosecutors appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, which heard arguments in the case Wednesday.

Kentucky Assistant Attorney General Joshua Farley told the justices that since the smell of marijuana gave police probable cause to believe a crime was occurring in the apartment, and since police heard movement inside after they knocked, they lawfully broke in to prevent the evidence from being destroyed.

Chief Justice John Roberts tested Farley's theory. "So, you have an apartment building where the police know from experience there is a lot of illegal activity, a lot of drugs." Can police every two weeks "walk through and knock on every door" and break in when they hear movement inside? "Is that all right?"