Timeline for Can I booby-trap my property against police?
Current License: CC BY-SA 3.0
27 events
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| Feb 14, 2021 at 1:11 | comment | added | forest | Assuming you're home when they invade with chemical weapons, whether you come out or not, they will force you to disarm whatever booby trapping you may have in place that may destroy evidence, likely walking you in as their human shield in the event you're lying about any dangerous ones. – This seems... completely incorrect. Even if this occurs, that doesn't mean that it's legal or normal. | |
| Mar 30, 2016 at 12:42 | comment | added | A. Darwin | @gracey209 "They may just decide to throw you through the perimeter once they get their hands on you, just to see what happens!"... I'm not from the US, but I've never heard something like this. Is it really possible? And should you die, wouldn't the police officers be liable, at least for manslaughter? | |
| Oct 22, 2015 at 11:56 | history | edited | gracey209 | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| Oct 11, 2015 at 13:58 | history | bounty ended | CommunityBot | ||
| Oct 9, 2015 at 20:40 | history | edited | feetwet♦ | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| Oct 9, 2015 at 20:36 | comment | added | gracey209 | Funny! Those sites are everywhere. :-) | |
| Oct 9, 2015 at 20:30 | vote | accept | feetwet♦ | ||
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| Oct 9, 2015 at 20:29 | comment | added | feetwet♦ | Thanks; Good explanations as always! Maybe I've spent too much time on advocacy sites like this: apainfultruth.com/the-issues/no-knock-warrants ... I guess either way it's time to dismantle all my booby-traps ;) | |
| Oct 9, 2015 at 20:21 | comment | added | gracey209 | I think you're forgetting one important thing which is that the law is never about absolutes but it's about the burden of proof and what can be established. If you weigh all the facts... Probable cause, entry, signs, corresponding damage to your property and potentially to others you will always come out on the losing end of that analysis. And it's actually extremely uncommon that the wrong address gets raided. In my federal district I have heard of that one time. The Warrant said 423 and it was supposed to say 243 or something like that. | |
| Oct 9, 2015 at 20:19 | comment | added | gracey209 | That's why this is a (bit convoluted) hypo:-) Mens rea, or guilty mind, is a ghost, or a shadow... Your putting them up signifies you had the mens rea and nobody would ever believe they're for your amusement bc that is just not believable. You saying, after the fact, that you never intended anyone to get hurt, would be laughable. Your word that you never intended they be seen would be weighed against the damage they caused, and no jury would believe you. If you can see them, you must assume others may too... Just like you said mistakes happen and people enter places unintended. | |
| Oct 9, 2015 at 20:08 | comment | added | feetwet♦ | Again, I might suggest mens rea here, but explicitly I'm a law-abiding citizen doing something for my own amusement. I assert that I have no reason to expect to be raided, other perhaps than to observe that even wrong (innocent) addresses are raided disturbingly often. So does the fact that a LEO, whether accidentally or intentionally, raids my property under warrant, color my activities? If I'm truly innocent of other crimes is my strange hobby/obsession defensible, and that defense disappears if I'm convicted? Or is this activity illegal in itself? Like writing a threat in my diary? | |
| Oct 9, 2015 at 19:53 | comment | added | gracey209 | No. It's not that, so much as you're talking about writing threatening warnings for the express purpose of evading criminal detection. That is not protected. A threat written, is a threat that has consequences if read by others and results in harm. You can't say that because it's in an imaginary perimeter it should be protected. If you weren't a criminal or doing things that led to probable cause of criminal activity, nobody would ever have cause to read it and it would have no impact. It's circular logic. | |
| Oct 9, 2015 at 19:49 | comment | added | feetwet♦ | OK, that's a sort of surprising/alarming result, even though I can't pretend I'm completely surprised by the answer. I think we've seen an analog sometime recently: like somebody writing a threat in their personal journal, and then being prosecuted for it after the journal was subpoenaed? Saying, "That wasn't intended for anyone else to see" is not a defense. Which suggests that we indeed should comport our lives and property as if they are subject to invasive search at any time. And, by extension, as soon as they can read our minds we can't think illegal thoughts! Right? | |
| Oct 9, 2015 at 19:40 | comment | added | gracey209 | Well, there is no liability per se if it's not real, but the same analysis holds. If you get someone hurt in an attempt to evade those fake measures.... You will be liable criminally and tortiously because that speech is not protected. It's really no different where they are placed... Because they've got the right to enter. Also, when your house ends up destroyed trying to evade things that don't exist, or if you are hurt in the melee, you have no basis for recompense. | |
| Oct 9, 2015 at 17:54 | comment | added | feetwet♦ | Right: There is a "sufficiently secure" perimeter around the property to prevent unauthorized access by trespassers (who might claim to have been threatened, or alert authorities to the appearance of something illegal). Inside of that perimeter I indulge my fantasy of mocking up all sorts of countermeasures to a search or raid: I post warnings, threats, and decoy traps, but there is nothing actually more harmful than one finds inside any reasonably-maintained structure. | |
| Oct 9, 2015 at 17:49 | comment | added | gracey209 | I'm confused do you mean they're inside your home? | |
| Oct 9, 2015 at 17:41 | comment | added | feetwet♦ | To clarify the final hypothetical: I have put up "threats" that are not meant to be seen by anyone. The only people who could see and feel threatened by them would be a warranted search party. So do I incur liability by posting the (empty) threats (for my own amusement)? Or because it's inside my property am I free of liability? This goes back to the earlier question: If I incur liability, then wouldn't that essentially be saying, "Comport your life and keep your property under the assumption that you are subject to warranted, invasive search at any time?" | |
| Oct 9, 2015 at 6:30 | history | edited | gracey209 | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| Oct 8, 2015 at 0:52 | comment | added | feetwet♦ | Fair enough. So to put a bow on the answer: I get a kick out of designing mock booby-traps and pretending my home is an impregnable fortress. I have warnings and everything. The warranted search party sees those and I'm not around to say, "No, it's all fake, see?" So they freak out, call in SWAT, HazMat, bomb squad, etc. Any possibility I have incurred civil or criminal liability by staging this on my own property, out of public view or access, for (I allege) my personal amusement? | |
| Oct 7, 2015 at 23:10 | comment | added | gracey209 | well, the raids are meant to not be invasive...thats what the courts and the necessity for probable cause is all about. So, to say we are comporting our lives because the gov't is too invasive, is to not believe in the rule of law. You must have faith, in a civilized society, that for the most part that justice will prevail. Yes, do warrantless searches happen...sure. But not often without probable cause...in your example there is a warrant, so it's a justifiable entry. What is done by the criminal is what frightens me much more than rouge agents | |
| Oct 7, 2015 at 22:43 | comment | added | feetwet♦ | Now can I trouble you to address the sub-scenario in which I post warnings, and maybe even place fake traps inside my property, but they are all a ruse? E.g., if the cops get all exercised but it turns out I didn't place any real traps, could I face any legal liability? (I understand that practically both I and my property would probably be mutilated to the greatest extent possible by the police in such a case. But must we comport our lives as if we are subject to invasive government raids at any moment, or can we mock up the private areas of our property without regard for that?) | |
| Oct 7, 2015 at 22:10 | comment | added | gracey209 | Not if you like living, that is...;0 | |
| Oct 7, 2015 at 22:10 | comment | added | gracey209 | exactly correct! | |
| Oct 7, 2015 at 22:02 | comment | added | feetwet♦ | So the short version of this answer sounds like: You effectively have neither rights nor immunities if you threaten to or actually put a trap in the path of government agents armed with a warrant. | |
| Oct 7, 2015 at 21:58 | history | edited | feetwet♦ | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| Oct 7, 2015 at 20:48 | history | edited | gracey209 | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| Oct 7, 2015 at 20:41 | history | answered | gracey209 | CC BY-SA 3.0 |