[UVB-76]

Your timeline doesn't match his account.

He consented to the search of the laptop before being detained. He did not know it was an undercover police officer conducting the search, but that is not relevant.

He was subsequently detained, until such time as it became obvious he was innocent, and then released.

[dahart]

That's weird; I didn't present a timeline.

> He consented to the search of the laptop before being detained. He did not know it was an undercover police officer conducting the search, but that is not relevant.

I'm not sure you know what "consent" actually means.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consent_search

A consent search requires the individual whose person or property is being searched to freely and voluntarily waive his or her Fourth Amendment rights, granting the officer permission to perform the search. Where consent is obtained through "deception" on the part of government personnel, the search may be determined to be an unreasonable search in violation of the Fourth Amendment.

[UVB-76]

The matter of consent is much more nuanced than that, but as another comment on this thread points out, the search was not conducted by a police officer, so Fourth Amendment arguments are moot.

He consented to a stranger searching his laptop, and the Fourth Amendment provides no protections against that.

[philh]

The prospective buyer wasn't a police officer.

[UVB-76]

That's an even better point. The Fourth Amendment doesn't protect you from letting a stranger search your laptop.