Judge rules Kansas Highway Patrol 'waged war on motorists,' violated constitutional rights

Source: Kansas City Star

Judge rules Kansas Highway Patrol ‘waged war on motorists,’ violated constitutional rights

Katie Moore, Katie Bernard
Fri, July 21, 2023 at 2:40 PM EDT·4 min read

The Kansas Highway Patrol “has waged war on motorists,” a federal judge wrote in a scathing ruling against the agency’s practice of extending car stops in hopes of discovering drugs.

In the order filed Friday, U.S. District Judge Kathryn H. Vratil wrote that patrol’s tactics in traffic stops violated the Constitution.

The practice, called the “Kansas two step,” is a maneuver in which troopers at the end of a traffic stop take a couple of steps toward their patrol car before turning around to initiate a voluntary interaction with the driver.

The strategy would buy the patrol extra time to probe for incriminating information or get a drug-sniffing dog to a location.

“As wars go, this one is relatively easy,” Vratil wrote. “It’s simple and cheap, and for motorists, it’s not a fair fight. The war is basically a question of numbers: stop enough cars and you’re bound to discover drugs. And what’s the harm if a few constitutional rights are trampled along the way?”

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Read more: https://news.yahoo.com/judge-rules-kansas-highway-patrol-184013769.html