I’ll agree that using open fields doctrine violates the spirt of the 4th amendment but not the letter of the law as it stands and as it has been interpreted with precedent. I feel like that’s a shady grey area where the law can violate your freedom and get away with it in most cases. It’s not right, but it’s legal, seems things like that come up a lot these days and I think it’s good to bring them up and talk about them. While it is legal it’s morally upsetting to any constitutional patriot and I find the TWRA officers willingness to “follow orders” on this issue yet another disturbing foretaste of what is to come if another gun ban is instituted.
odds are pretty solid that if TWRA Had been required to get a warrant for either of these individuals ( which I find more inline with my understanding of the constitution and preferable) they would have had no trouble convincing a judge due to prior hunting violations. It’s unfortunate, but when you have a record you get subjected to more scrutiny by the law. As an adult, I also understand that how law enforcement interprets the constitution in your AO often has nothing to do with how it’s written, no matter how plainly stated, the state orfederal Supreme Court May rule in your favor but only after an incredible amount of money is spent to keep your ass out of jail.
The 10 armed agents is probably just protocol for a warrant, and that is established at department levels or field office level for state and federal guys, more dependent on officer safety than anything. Serving warrants is inherrently dangerous business so officers will take appropriate precautions. You would think Though that since it had a transmitter, they already knew it’s last location. Call the guy and ask him if he knew about it’s disappearance, if he lies to you, then go in with a team and a warrant. But I’m no LEO.
I do feel that hanging the guy with theft or destruction of property is baseless and will fall apart in court; if the camera wasn’t labeled “property of TWRA” or “active investigation in process” or something similar, how is a land owner to know that it isnt a burglar casing his property or a serial killer or any number of other nefarious people intending to do him harm? If I find a camera on my property in the city and it isn’t labeled or it’s presence seems sketchy, I’m going to take it out of commission for my own security. I would probably also notify local law enforcement that I had found it and let them follow up but there isn’t anything saying you have to. Being a sarcastic asshole, I would probably just put a trash bag over it and when they came looking I’d say “ I didn’t know who’s this was but I saw all your fancy electronic gadgets were going to get wet so I covered it to keep it from getting ruined, you probably shouldn’t leave cameras outside, no telling what Might happen to that tax payers expense.” The next one I found would be turned to face the tree, and after that my aim with a shotgun would be off while squirrel hunting behind the camera.
