The exact circumstances around the search are not known. But activist Samuel Tunick is charged with deleting data from a Google Pixel before CBP’s Tactical Terrorism Response Team could search it.
That’s the catch isn’t it? In a lawful society and under normal due process you’d expect to start with a crime, reasonable suspicion, and a search warrant. Then yes, if it’s reasonable for you to expect that you’ve destroyed evidence, I’d expect you to be so charged.
But the entire issue with this immigration crackdown is the assertion that constitutional protections no longer apply, laws no longer apply, due process no longer applies. They have claimed for years the right to search smartphones at a border, without a warrant and we didn’t object. Now they’re extending it beyond their jurisdiction purview to search away from a border, away from their intended task, and still with little to no due process or civil rights. Now they’re trying to extend this suspension of law to a protester whose activity they don’t like. This is where the Gestapo analogy comes from.
A bit of speculation here but you can configure your phone to wipe itself automatically for exactly this type of oppression. He could very well have done so. But in what seems similar to me, companies can not destroy evidence by deleting email but they can have a policy to automatically delete it after, say 60 days. It’s automatic, a normal process, so it’s ok. How would a normal process to wipe your phone automatically not be the same?
That’s the catch isn’t it? In a lawful society and under normal due process you’d expect to start with a crime, reasonable suspicion, and a search warrant. Then yes, if it’s reasonable for you to expect that you’ve destroyed evidence, I’d expect you to be so charged.
But the entire issue with this immigration crackdown is the assertion that constitutional protections no longer apply, laws no longer apply, due process no longer applies. They have claimed for years the right to search smartphones at a border, without a warrant and we didn’t object. Now they’re extending it beyond their jurisdiction purview to search away from a border, away from their intended task, and still with little to no due process or civil rights. Now they’re trying to extend this suspension of law to a protester whose activity they don’t like. This is where the Gestapo analogy comes from.
A bit of speculation here but you can configure your phone to wipe itself automatically for exactly this type of oppression. He could very well have done so. But in what seems similar to me, companies can not destroy evidence by deleting email but they can have a policy to automatically delete it after, say 60 days. It’s automatic, a normal process, so it’s ok. How would a normal process to wipe your phone automatically not be the same?