Contents Of Record
Depositions
Mr. Jonathan Huntley
Officer Petroff
MIT Plans Dorm Room Inspections
(http://www-tech.mit.edu/V119/N58/58search.58n.html )
Dartmouth College Students Subjected to Legal Searches by Police (http://halogen.note.amherst.edu/~astudent/2002-2003/issue09/news/01.html)
Yale University Requires Dorm Searches Due to President Bush�s Graduation Speech (http://www.yaledailynews.com/article.asp?AID=15797 -)
Nichols College Student Handbook-Room Inspection Policy (http://www.nichols.edu/campuslife/handbook/residence.html� - see �Inspection� section)
Westminster College Housing Policies (http://www.westminster.edu/Student/handbook/emerge.html )
Mills College Graduate Student Handbook/Drug Policy (http://www.mills.edu/PUBS/ARCHIVE/ARCHIVE_STUDHBK/STUDHBK_GR98-99/sh-gr_alcohol.html� -unannounced room searches permitted)
Brown University ACLU Flyer About Room Searches (http://www.brown.edu/Students/ACLU/RHalogen.html� )
Q:������� Please state your full name.
A:������� My name is
Q:������� Jason, are you a good student?
A:������� Yes, I am.� I currently maintain a 3.8 grade point average and am on the �dean�s list.�
A:������� Yes, I do.� He has been to our room before to fix our smoke detector, I believe.� We�ve always been friendly, and I always say �hi� when I run into him around campus.
Q:������� Do you and your roommates feel that you are entitled to privacy in your common room?
Mr. Williams:������������ Objection.� Mr. Cave�s subjective opinions about privacy are not at issue here.
Ms. Kamezawa:�������� Save it for your cross examination, Mr. Williams.� You can answer, Jason.
A:������� Yes, definitely.� I mean, we sometimes leave our door open so that our friends can wander in and hang out, and sometimes we throw a birthday party or something in the common room, but otherwise, we expect it to stay relatively private.
A:������� Well, on a college campus, there are often a lot of thefts, so I just wanted to make sure to secure my belongings.
Q:������� Do you think that most of your friends also feel that their belongings should be secure in their common rooms?
A:������� Of course.� Our suite is like our �home away from home.�� Where else would we put all our stuff?� Have you ever seen our bedrooms�they are way too small to fit all our junk!
Q:������� One last question.� Were those your drugs in the footlocker, Jason?
A:������� I don�t see why it matters.� My rights were violated.� Mr. Huntley had no business searching my personal property when he was only supposed to be in our room to do maintenance.
Q:������� Thanks, Jason.� That�s all for now.
Q:������� Have you had any run-ins with the police before, Jason?
Ms. Kamezawa:�������� Objection.� That question is irrelevant to the issue in this case.
A:������� Well, last year, I was questioned by Officer Petroff about some drug paraphernalia they found, but nothing ever came of it.
A:������� Do I have to answer that?
Q:������� Yes, you do.
A:������� (looking a bit nervous) No, definitely not.
Q:������� Jason, isn�t it true that you actually
leave your common room door open all the time, and your suite has been
designated the �floor hang-out� by everyone in Lloyd Dormitory?
A:������� Like I said, sometimes people wander in and sometimes we have parties in the common room.� That�s it.
A:������� Um, well, not usually.� Everyone knows that you keep your doors unlocked in college.� It�s too much of a hassle to worry about keys all the time.
Q:������� Thank you very much, Jason.� That�s all the questions I have.
Mr. Williams on
DIRECT EXAMINATION
Q:������� Please state your full name.
A:������� Johnathan Q. Huntley.
A:������� I work as a senior maintenance man assigned to the Lloyd Dormitory.� I am responsible for general upkeep of the building and address any problems the students have in their rooms�fixing light bulbs, screens, smoke detectors�that sort of thing.
A:������� Yes, on a college campus there are always minor thefts, drug issues, and so forth, and I�ve tried to help out whenever possible.
A:������� Well, the established procedure is for me to knock first.� Then, if no one answers, as in this case, I just open the door and go about my business.� I would say, in most cases I end up going into the rooms on my own.
A:������� No, it was unlocked.� Most of the kids leave their doors propped open, or at least unlocked.� I try to tell them it�s not safe, but they don�t listen.
A:������� Oh- they were sitting out on the coffee table in the common room.
A:������� Once I saw the seeds and pipe out there in the open, I had a feeling that there was more illegal stuff going on.� I just wanted to do the right thing to help the police and get these kids straightened out.
Q:������� Thank you so much, Mr. Huntley.� I have no further questions.
A:������� I was a front deskman at an apartment building.
Mr. Williams:������������ Objection.� That question is irrelevant.
Ms. Kamezawa:�������� It is relevant�it goes to credibility.� Please answer the question, Mr. Huntley.
A:������� I was fired.
A:������� The manager caught me in one of the resident�s rooms.� I wasn�t doing anything wrong though�just checking to make sure everything was in order.
Q:������� Thank you, no further questions.
Q:������� Officer
Petroff, are you in the habit of using civilians to help you with your police
work?
A:������� Not as a general rule, but when issues of campus safety are concerned, we like to have as many people as possible on the look out for trouble.
Q:������� Do you think the students are entitled to privacy in their common rooms?
A:������� You know, the fact of the matter is, these kids have no privacy.� They have other kids coming in and out of those rooms all the time.� Those common rooms are practically traffic thoroughfares.� I think that it is ridiculous to even suggest they have a �reasonable� expectation of privacy in the common room.� Besides, maintenance men are allowed to go into the rooms- university policy.
Q:������� Officer
Petroff, isn�t it true that you had it out for
A:������� I don�t have it out for anyone.� The way I see it, you do the crime, you do the time.
A:������� I do what I need to do to keep this campus under control.� Sure I do have my �helpers� out there like Mr. Huntley, but as long as we maintain order and safety on this campus for these students, that is all that matters to me.
A:������� Fourth Amendment?� Well, um, of course, that matters.� You have my word as a police officer that I would never knowingly violate the Fourth Amendment.
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MIT Plans Dorm Room Inspections By Kevin R. Lang This story was published on MIT�s Residential Fire Safety Committee and the Dormitory Council are currently planning to implement semesterly safety inspections of dorm rooms. DormCon President and committee member Jennifer A. Frank �00 said the committee and DormCon are currently working on a plan in cooperation with the administration. �We�re trying to give them a proposal on how to do it that will make it best for everyone,� said DormCon Secretary-Treasurer Brandy L. Evans �01. �Right now, I think people are working on the final drafts of the proposal.� According to MIT housing policy, �the Institute reserves the right to enter a room or apartment at any time when imminent danger to life, safety, health or property is reasonably suspected as determined by the [Undergraduate Education and Student Affairs], the House Manager or their authorized representative.� Fire safety inspections would most likely fall under this category. More specifically, �The Institute also reserves the right, with advance notice to the residents whenever reasonably possible... to inspect for fire and health hazards...� Inspections not
quite searches �I think people are wrongly getting the impression that this is related to incidents and that this is a room search,� Frank said. �It�s not so that MIT can come into a room looking for probable cause to do a search.� Evans said that the inspections are intended to be purely for fire safety purposes. The inspections would be pre-scheduled. Frank said that she did not think any one specific incident had prompted the decision to begin inspecting rooms. �This is intended to avoid that type of incident,� Frank said. MIT would be liable in case of fire. �This is something that MIT hasn�t done in a long time,� Frank said. She thought that MIT used to conduct regular safety inspections in past years, but that they gradually fell out of that practice. Forums scheduled
for discussion Frank hoped that the committee and DormCon could make the inspection policy work for both sides. �We�re bringing it up to the residents so they can discuss their concerns,� Frank said. Students will be able to discuss room inspections at
several forums in the coming weeks. The first will be held from The Residential Fire Safety Committee is chaired by Housing Finance & Administration General Manager Carl A. Seagren. Also on the committee are Burton-Conner housemaster, Halston W. Taylor, Assistant Residential Life Dean, Carol Orme-Johnson, and Residential Life and Student Life Programs Director, Phillip M. Bernard. |
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Court rules Tracy Ke, Staff Writer Published On Oct. 24, the Supreme Court of New Hampshire ruled that
police officers at The Supreme Court of New Hampshire ruled that there was
not a �sufficient relationship� between the According to the Chronicle of Higher Education, the ruling came in a case involving a student, Adam Nesmer, who was charged with marijuana possession after campus police officers found illegal drugs during a search of his dorm room. The counsel for the student argued that the search had violated the student�s protection against improper searches and seizures, under the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The student alleged that all charges should be dismissed because the evidence was gathered improperly. The court disagreed. The crux of the case depended on whether or not campus police officers were agents of the state simply because they regularly cooperate with local police officers, according to the Chronicle. This is an important distinction because searches by private officials on private property are not protected by the Fourth Amendment. �I am very surprised by that ruling. I don�t think that
would ever be the practice here at Some students said they disagreed with the decision. �There are certain constitutional rights that we as Americans have which should not be superseded by state law,� said Jacqueline Koypt �04. According to Chief of Campus Police John Carter, �a
similar appeal in While the College�s police officers are employed by the
College, they are effectively agents of the state. �The Massachusetts Supreme
Court would have found unwarranted searches to be a violation of the Fourth
and Fourteenth Amendments,� said Carter. �The �My opinion is that here at Amherst, regardless of the stature of the police as agents of the state, we would not infringe upon people�s protections under the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments,� said Carter, �If you are going to intrude on someone�s privacy, you need an articulated reason and sufficient cause. Everything needs a system of checks and balances.� �If a campus police officer needs to go into a student�s room and something illegal is in plain view, then they would confiscate the material,� said Boykin-East. �But they would not be authorized to go through student�s drawers without a search warrant.� One of the justifications for the search at Campus police at the College will only search through a student�s room if that student is forewarned, which is the case with routine safety checks during holiday break, or if they are called in for a disturbance. Otherwise, they will only conduct a search when they have an articulated reason to believe that drugs are present, have a legal reason to be in the room, have a search warrant, or are concerned with issues of officer safety. �If we were to move to a policy of unwarranted searches, that would necessitate broader conversations with the campus community,� said Boykin-East. � |
Tight security at Bush speech
BY ANDREW PACIOREK
YDN Staff Reporter (Yale Daily News)
Published
Security for the 2001 Commencement was the tightest for any
Yale graduation ceremony since the last time a President received an honorary
degree and addressed the University's graduates.
Heavy concentrations of Secret Service agents and police were spread throughout
the Yale campus, particularly around Old Campus and the President's House on
Long lines formed all around Old Campus before the ceremony Monday morning, as
attendees waited to go through airport-style metal detectors and bag searches
at each of the quadrangle's many open gates. While the lines moved relatively
quickly, the sheer volume of people backed the line up substantially along
College, Chapel and High streets.
Less readily apparent than the lines were the Secret Service snipers positioned
in
Agents also manned metal detectors at both High Street gates, the two gates
leading into the Vanderbilt courtyard from Chapel, and the Phelps and Cheney
Ives gates on College. Police closed College, High and Wall streets Monday
morning, while upper
Students living in Old Campus dormitories did not escape the lines. All
students were required to vacate their rooms for at least an hour at
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Inspections - The College affirms the right to privacy of the individual, however, official personnel reserve the right of room inspection when an inspection is thought to be in the best interest of the resident and the common good. Authorized personnel or persons appropriately designated may enter a room at any time for reasons of health, safety, and welfare, to retrieve College property, or to repair/inspect the room or equipment. Room inspections are held normally on a monthly basis during the academic year. When possible and appropriate, advance notice will be given. Room searches may be conducted for violations of the Student Code of Conduct and/or the residence policy.
Public Safety, Residence Life or other authorized personnel may do searches of student rooms under any of the following circumstances:
� With or without the permission of the room occupant
� When there is probable cause that a violation of College policy or state/local law has been broken
� Emergency circumstances
� When mandated by the Dean of Student Services
During authorized searches, any violation of College policies will be noted with appropriate disciplinary action to follow.
Housing Requirements
RIGHT OF ENTRY
The
College reserves the right to enter any room to perform routine maintenance
duties, to inspect any room for reasons of health or safety, and to determine
if College policy is being violated. Upon entering the room, the College
official may confiscate material believed to be associated with an alleged
violation of
ROOM SEARCHES
Searches
of the room, its contents, and personal effects are not made except when
authorized by the Dean of Student Affairs or his designee, and then only in the
presence of the occupant(s), unless it is impossible to locate the occupant(s)
to give them sufficient notice. The Office of Student Affairs recognizes and
respects an individual�s right to privacy.
Graduate Student Handbook
1998-99 Edition
Alcohol and
Other Drugs
DRUG FREE CAMPUS POLICY
Each student at Mills is considered an adult who assumes personal
responsibility for her/his own conduct. As adults, Mills students are expected
to comply with all laws and College policies regarding alcoholic beverages and
other drugs.
Limitations on
Alcohol Use
Ban on Drug Use
In accordance with
ALCOHOL AND DRUG TASK
FORCE
Mills established an Alcohol and Drug Task Force in 1991 to provide leadership
for the College community on ways to combat student drug and alcohol abuse. The
work of the Task Force has concentrated on presenting educational programs,
conducting research and reviewing College policies.
THE UNIVERSITY IN YOUR BEDROOM?
KNOW YOUR RIGHTS!
It's frightening, but true. The University has notified occupants of many dorms that Residential Life will be searching rooms sometime between October 23 and November 13. Here is some important information about your rights during these searches:
� Room searches must be conducted by at least two employees of the Office of Residential Life
� Room searches are strictly on a "plain view" basis. Res. Life may not open drawers or closet doors, nor may they "dig" through your belongings.
� If your room is searched when you are not home, Res. Life must leave notification of their search
� The purpose of these searches is to discover and correct fire hazards. In most cases, if a hazard is found, you will be notified of the problem and required to correct it. However, if a torchiere halogen lamp is found in the "plain sight" search, it will be confiscated, destroyed, and you may be fined.
�
According to the "Student Room Entry
Policy," published by the Office of Student Life, "If in the reasonable course of routine inspections and
maintenance, violations of University Rules are observed, they may be reported
to the appropriate dean." As a result of this reported violation a
student's room may be searched fully by Police and Security "pursuant to
legal process or with the approval of the Chairperson of UDC... such approval
to be given when the Dean of Student Life reasonably demonstrates that a
violation of a University Rule exists." The student whose room is searched
will be given notification of the search "within 72 hours after the
search".
In short: if you have personal articles you don't want inspected, put them in a drawer--out of sight. Know the rules, and know your rights!
If you have a complaint or grievance about the room search process, or you feel that your rights were violated during the process of a room search, then tell us about it! The Brown ACLU is compiling information about room search policy and procedures, and every piece of information that you can provide helps!