Judge:  Reasonable Suspicion Needed For Border Search Of Electronic Devices

(November 15, 2019, 4:55 PM EST) -- BOSTON — Mostly granting summary judgment to a group of plaintiffs claiming violation of the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution from the warrantless searches of their electronic devices by border personnel, a Massachusetts federal judge on Nov. 12 ruled that such searches require reasonable suspicion rather than merely probable cause in light of the privacy implications from the breadth of personal information that can be stored on devices (Ghassan Alasaad, et al. v. Kirstjen Nielsen, et al., No. 1:17-cv-11730, D. Mass., 2019 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 195556). ...