A federal district judge ruled Friday that a technique used by the Kansas Highway Patrol (KHP) to discover out-of-state cannabis violated the Fourth Amendment.
Kathryn H. Vratil of the federal District Court for the District of Kansas ruled that the KHP could no longer use the "two-step" practice because it qualified under "unreasonable searches and seizures."
The technique was allegedly employed by KHP Superintendent Herman Jones and involved officers ending a routine traffic stop and beginning to return to their cruiser before turning around and attempting to search for cannabis.
It was primarily used by officers in Kansas, a state where cannabis is illegal, to catch drivers traveling with the drug from states where it is legal recreationally, like Colorado and Missouri.
The opinion argued that the KHP "has waged war on motorists — especially out-of-state residents traveling between Colorado and Missouri on federal highway I-70 in Kansas."
"The war is basically a question of numbers: stop enough cars, and you're bound to discover drugs. And what's the harm if a few constitutional rights are trampled along the way?" the opinion read.
"All drivers on I-70 have moving targets on their backs," Vratil further concluded.
Blaine Shaw, Joshua Bosire, Mark Erich, Samuel Shaw, and Shawna Maloney, on behalf of the American Civil Liberties Union of Kansas and Spencer Fane LLP, initially filed the complaint in 2020.
In a press release, ACLU Kansas Legal Director Sharon Brett called the ruling "a huge win" for everyone driving on Kansas highways by ending the KHP's "cowboy mentality of policing."
"Today's decision validates that motorists' constitutional rights cannot be cast aside under the guise of a 'war on drugs,'" Brett stated. "It also demonstrates that courts will not tolerate the cowboy mentality of policing that subjects our citizens to conditions of humiliation, degradation, and, in some tragic cases, violence."
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