Knock, Knock! Who's There?

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Recently, the Supreme Court of the United States in Kentucky v. King held that police officers could enter a home without a search warrant due to "exigent circumstances" even if they themselves create those selfsame exigent circumstances. In this case, they passed by a door in an apartment complex and smelled marijuana smoke, knocked and announced they were the police, and heard sounds of people moving about inside. To their minds this was obviously to destroy 'evidence', so they kicked in the door.

All the justices but Ruth Bader Ginsburg (above) voted to overturn the decision of the Kentucky Supreme Court and hold for the police. Their reasoning has the same relationship to reality that fish does to ice cream--NONE! Justice Samuel Alito, declaring the police did not create the exigency, stated that they simply knocked on the door, something that "any private citizen might do." He then states that, "[w]hether the person who knocks and requests the opportunity to speak is a police officer or a private citizen, the occupant has no obligation to open the door or to speak." Aaarghhhh!!!

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Have these people ever had any interaction with the police? Do they really believe that a private citizen would have the cojones to tell an officer, "No, I really don't want to talk with you right now." This view of the world has become a severe problem for the Supremes. They do not see the world the way ordinary human beings do. Have they ever been stopped for speeding? (And, gotten a ticket?) Has anyone close to them ever experienced an arrest? There's just such an air of royalty in their tone and thinking that I would not be surprised to read a line in a future opinion expressing the thought that the people should eat cake if they have no bread. There is a real lack of the humanity of earlier justices. It bodes poorly for the future of law in this wonderful land.