The Young family lives in a single family home in Osawatomie, Kansas. On November 5, 2013, Mr. Young discovered two surveillance cameras mounted to the fence in his backyard. One camera was pointed into the Youngs’ side and backyard, and the other camera was pointed directly at the sliding glass door in the rear of their home. The backyard is where the Youngs’ children play and where the family gathers for to enjoy their everyday domestic life. The sliding glass door opens into an area of the home where Ms. Young breastfeeds her baby and where the parents change the baby’s diapers.
After discovering the cameras, Mr. Young removed them from his fence. When he checked the SD cards in the cameras, Mr. Young saw images of Osawatomie police officer Will Bradshaw installing the cameras on the fence in the Youngs’ backyard. When Mr. Young called the Osawatomie police department to complain about the cameras, detective Dave Stuteville told him that the police had every right to take photographs of anybody’s back yard because a backyard is a “public access” area where there is no right of privacy.
In a letter sent to Police Chief Mike Stiles on November 15, 2013, the ACLU protested the police department’s warrantless use of surveillance cameras to spy on a private home without permission and without notice to the homeowners.
The Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution protects the home and its immediate surroundings from unreasonable governmental intrusions and surveillance. The Fourth Amendment further requires that, before undertaking video surveillance, the government must seek and receive judicial approval by demonstrating, among other things, “probable cause . . . that a particular person is committing, has committed, or is about to commit a crime.”
“Installing surveillance cameras without notice to and permission of the homeowner and without obtaining a search warrant violates the Fourth Amendment. But, more fundamentally, such police practices bring to mind the Stasi, which spied on the everyday activities of East German citizens as a matter of course,” said Doug Bonney, Legal Director of the ACLU Foundation of Kansas. “Especially in light of recent disclosures about the surveillance activities of the NSA, this incident reminds us that modern technology has put the reality of the Orwellian state well within reach of our government.”
In the letter sent to Chief Stiles, the ACLU demanded assurances from the police department and other responsible city officials that this Orwellian misconduct will not be repeated, that the police department and city will adopt policies that will prohibit future warrantless video surveillance of private homes, that the police department will retrain its officers regarding the fundamental requirements of the Fourth Amendment, and that the city will take other steps to compensate the family for this invasion of privacy.
This is the second time in the past year that our ACLU has dealt with this kind of surveillance camera issue. See https://www.aclu.org/blog/free-speech-national-security-technology-and-liberty/more-police-cameras-focused-homes.