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by bootlooped 5 days ago
I don't think the crime of destroying evidence / tampering with evidence depends on what your status in custody is. If the police knock on your front door and you start shredding documents, that's still a crime.

Now, could that get tossed about because they denied him access to a lawyer? Maybe, I don't know about that part.

2 comments

> If the police knock on your front door and you start shredding documents, that's still a crime

Isn’t the relevant bit whether you think you’re doing crimes and/or being investigated?

If I’m shredding while the cops knock on my door because they’re looking for a missing cat, that’s obviously not criminal. (I guess the more-pertinent comparison would be they knock on my door and then I put stuff in the shredder while I check around my home.)

If you shred any evidence of a crime you are guilty of a crime regardless if the police ever knock at your door or you think you are being investigated if you have the intent "to prevent the apprehension or cause the wrongful apprehension of any person or to obstruct the prosecution or defense of any person, he knowingly destroys, alters, conceals, or disguises physical evidence or makes, devises, prepares, or plants false evidence"
You're jumping to conclusions.

Deletion to protect privacy does not prove deletion to prevent apprehension.

I could believe that everything is wholly innocent, but wish to protect privacy regardless.

If that was his intent he shouldn't have handed over any pin. This looks like he was hiding evidence of wrongdoing and he will probably be charged with it. I am guessing his only hope will be that they denied his request for a lawyer.
His rights were already being violated. He was falsely arrested and denied his rights to an attorney.

They can prosecute him (and probably will) but he's got a pretty strong civil rights claim against the federal government for a false arrest and illegal search and seizure.

You can't arrest someone without a warrant or a reasonable suspicion of a crime. These thugs had neither when they arrested him, just that he's "a terrorist". That's why they were trying to get him to confess or commit a crime. That's why they didn't want a lawyer to get involved.

What if I have a camera/microphone near my front door, that when law enforcement is detected, it auto wipes my data, with no interaction from me?
I don't think it ceases to be a crime if you automate it. What if instead of wiping data it set off a shotgun that was pointed at the door?