Supreme Court rules geofence warrants violate Fourth Amendment

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Chatrie v. United States that geofence warrants constitute a search under the Fourth Amendment. This decision establishes that when law enforcement obtains historical cellphone location data from third-party providers, such as Google, to identify devices within a specific geographic area and timeframe, it must satisfy requirements for probable cause and particularity.

In response to this legal precedent, concerns have been raised regarding the use of mass surveillance tools in local municipalities. In Lewiston, the police department implemented a 13-camera system from Flock Safety following a trial period funded by a U.S. Department of Justice grant. Critics argue that automated license plate readers function similarly to geofence warrants by conducting dragnet searches of innocent individuals without individualized suspicion, potentially violating constitutional protections.