Justices tighten privacy rules for cell phone data
WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court ruled Friday that police generally need a search warrant if they want to track suspects’ movements by collecting information about where they’ve used their cell phones, bolstering privacy interests in the digital age.
The justices’ 5- 4 decision marks a big change in how police may obtain cell phone tower records, an important tool in criminal investigations.
Chief Justice John Roberts, joined by the court’s four liberals, said cell phone location information “is detailed, encyclopedic and effortlessly compiled.” Roberts wrote that “an individual maintains a legitimate expectation of privacy in the record of his physical movements” as they are captured by cell phone towers.
Roberts said the court’s decision is limited to cell phone tracking information and does not affect other business records, including those held by banks. He also wrote that police still can respond to an emergency and obtain records without a warrant.
Justices Anthony Kennedy, Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch each wrote dissenting opinions. Kennedy wrote that the court’s “new and uncharted course will inhibit law enforcement” and “keep defendants and judges guessing for years to come.”
Roberts does not often line up with his liberal colleagues against a unified front of conservative justices, but digitalage privacy cases can cross ideological lines, as when the court unanimously said in 2014 that a warrant is needed before police can search the cell phone of someone they’ve just arrested.
The court ruled Friday in the case of Timothy Carpenter, who was sentenced to 116 years in prison for his role in a string of robberies of Radio Shack and T- Mobile stores in Michigan and Ohio. Cell tower records that investigators obtained without a warrant bolstered the case against Carpenter.
Investigators obtained the
cell tower records with a court order that requires a lower standard than the “probable cause” needed to obtain a warrant. “Probable cause” requires strong evidence that a person has committed a crime.
The judge at Carpenter’s trial refused to suppress the records, finding no warrant was needed, and a federal appeals court agreed. The Trump administration said the lower court decisions should be upheld.
The American Civil Liberties Union, representing Carpenter, said a warrant would provide protection against unjustified government snooping.
“This is a groundbreaking victory for Americans’ privacy rights in the digital age. The Supreme Court has given privacy law an update that it has badly needed for many years, finally bringing it in line with the realities of modern life,” said ACLU attorney Nathan Freed Wessler, who argued the Supreme Court case in November.