Court approves warrantless searches of cell phones

By Terry Baynes

(Reuters) - Police can search a cell phone for its number without having a warrant, a federal appeals court ruled on Wednesday.

Officers in Indiana found a number of cell phones at the scene of a drug bust, and searched each phone for its telephone number. Having the numbers allowed the government to subpoena the owners' call histories, linking them to the drug-selling scheme.

One of the suspects, Abel Flores-Lopez, who was convicted and sentenced to 10 years in prison, argued on appeal that the police had no right to search the phone's contents without a warrant.

The U.S. Court of Appeal for the 7th Circuit rejected that argument, finding that the invasion of privacy was so slight that the police's actions did not violate the Fourth Amendment's ban on unreasonable searches.

The case gave the 7th Circuit an occasion to examine just how far police can go when it comes to searching electronic gadgets.

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