The Baltimore City Police Department uses many tools to reduce crime. Lying should not be one of them.
Unfortunately, it could be.
Police officers can lie with impunity on applications for search warrants, according to the city and to Circuit Court Judge M. Brooke Murdock.
As Examiner staff writer Luke Broadwater recently reported, Judge Murdock dismissed a $1.5 million defamation lawsuit against the city, filed by officers Sgt. Robert L.D. Smith and Vicki Lynn Mengel, who said other officers made false statements to win a search warrant against them.
What were the allegations?
Two police officers filed an affidavit on Dec. 29, 2005, in order to gain a search warrant saying Smith and Mengel either violated drug laws or planted drugs on people to make false arrests.
The problem was they offered no evidence to support those claims. The affidavit was later leaked to the press.
Judge Murdock said it doesn?t matter if the allegations are true or false because those applying for warrants have total immunity in relation to the information they supply in the application.
How does that mesh with “innocent until proven guilty?”
Or the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which says, “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.”
Even if the two officers did not lie in the affidavit, why should our law protect them if they did?
What?s so different about lying in an affidavit from providing false testimony in the courtroom? Or planting drugs on someone, for that matter?
To remedy the situation, judges must require specific evidence before issuing a warrant.
And it wouldn?t hurt if the police department reviewed affidavits requesting warrants on a quarterly basis to ensure that they met Fourth Amendment standards.
Defamation isn?t the only thing at stake. People can and do die during search and seizures.
Ensuring that warrants are based on fact, not fabrication is the least the police department can do to protect both public safety and our constitutional rights.
Political smoke and mirrors
Del. Peter Franchot, a Democratic candidate for comptroller, boasted recently that his latest financial disclosure reports would show more than $900,000.
Technically, that is true. The reports show Franchot with $916,791 cash on hand. The catch: he loaned himself $750,000 of it. So much for grassroots support.
