Our opinion: Game wardens’ job just got harder
We’re honestly a bit surprised that the state Supreme Court has overturned nearly 100 years of precedent by ruling Fourth Amendment protections apply to all private property no matter the distance away from a private home. Previous case law had created what was known as the Open Fields Doctrine, which authorized searches of private property not immediately surrounding a private home. Game wardens used the rule, which was reaffirmed as recently as 2007 in Russo v. Commonwealth, a case in which the state Supreme Court held that the state Game Commission could enter open fields in ...