Tenth Circuit Court Rules Broad Search Warrants for Protesters' Devices Violate Fourth Amendment
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3mo ago· 3 min readenNews
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Summary
The Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals overturned a lower court's dismissal of a challenge to broad search warrants targeting protesters' devices and digital data. The case involved Colorado Springs police obtaining warrants to search a protester's devices and a nonprofit's social media data after a 2021 housing protest. The court found the warrants violated the Fourth Amendment's particularity requirement, ruling they were overly broad and lacked specificity about what evidence was sought.
Key quotes
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The case, Armendariz v. City of Colorado Springs, arose after a housing protest in 2021, during which Colorado Springs police arrested protesters for obstructing a roadway.
After the demonstration, police also obtained warrants to seize and search through the devices and data of Jacqueline Armendariz Unzueta, who they claimed threw a bike at them during the protest.
The court found the warrants violated the Fourth Amendment's particularity requirement, ruling they were overly broad and lacked specificity about what evidence was sought.
In a big win for protesters’ rights, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit overturned a lower court’s dismissal of a challenge to sweeping warrants to search a protester’s devices and digital data and a nonprofit’s social media data.The case, Ar
