Prosecutors said officers shouted "Police, search warrant," but readily admit that they did not knock on the door and that they waited only three to five seconds before entering and finding Hudson sitting on his couch. He was eventually convicted of drug possession.

"People have the right to answer the door in a dignified manner," Hudson's lawyer David Moran had told the high court. The justices have ruled in the past that police should announce their presence, then normally wait 15 to 20 seconds before bursting into a home.

I chose to meme this article because the headline is extremely misleading. That seems par for the course for Supreme Court reporting.

By law, when the police serve a warrant at your house, they are supposed to give you enough time to put your shirt back on before they barge in. This isn't really to protect you from the search. This is simply a matter of dignity. This headline makes it seem as if this is no longer the law, because the court refused to suppress evidence in this case. That is not at all correct.

In this case the evidence that was found was exactly what was described in the warrant. Had circumstances been different, the result might have also been different. It depends.

In any event, we're really talking about a 12-17 second difference here, not a huge period of time, this sort of entry is still illegal, and there are civil remedies that can be sought if it is employed. If they literally "catch you with your pants down" you might have a significant wad of cash coming your way, although there is some debate about that.

The bottom line is that the correctness of this decision is debatable. I won't fault you for not liking it. But, either way its not a big deal. It just so happens that this is exactly what I think about Kelo v. New London.

Kelo is debatable, but its not a big deal. However, the right wing has engaged in a highly organized campaign of grossly mischaracterizing the scope of the decision in order to promote the political idea that the court system is out of control. This election season is fraught with local legislative campaigns to "stick it to the Supreme Court" by doing exactly what the court intended by having local referrenda on the scope of eminent domain! No, Kelo doesn't let them take your house just because they want to build a Walmart. There are extremely limited circumstances in which Kelo applies.

The ultimate irony of this is that on almost every issue the right thinks the court system is "out of control" in so far is it protects individual rights from the excesses of the legislature, and yet they prop Kelo up as if its representative of the political goal they are trying to achieve. It isn't.

So, if the left decides to, well, grossly mischaracterize the scope of this new 4th amendment decision, and goes nuts claiming the court is too conservative, well, its dishonest, but I have to admit that its well deserved.

CNN.com - Police don't have to knock, justices say - Jun 15, 2006