National park checkpoints at entrances upheld (9th Circuit)

[usregimechange]

A federal appeals court on Tuesday upheld checkpoints at national park entrances to keep out poachers, saying the brief vehicle stops help to preserve park wildlife and cause little inconvenience to motorists.

The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco rejected a driver's claim that a park ranger violated his constitutional rights by stopping his car and questioning him in October 2007 at the entrance to Kings Canyon National Park in the southern Sierra Nevada, east of Fresno.

Rangers at the checkpoints ask drivers entering or leaving the park if they are hunting or have been hunting, a process that usually takes 15 to 25 seconds, the court said. Ricardo Fraire said he hadn't been hunting, but the ranger detained him after smelling alcohol on his breath and noticing that his eyes were bloodshot and glassy, the court said.

Fraire was charged with drunken driving after failing a field sobriety test. After a federal magistrate upheld the evidence against him, he pleaded guilty and was fined $2,000, according to court records...

The park checkpoint "prevents hunters from destroying a precious natural resource" by catching or deterring poachers and educating the public about the ban on hunting in national parks, Judge Barry Silverman said in the 3-0 ruling. "The goal was prevention, not arrests," he said.

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/08/05/BA1P193QH7.DTL#ixzz0NLyKP7WR


Judges on the panel

Silverman, Barry G. - Nominated by William J. Clinton on November 8, 1997.
Smith, Milan Dale Jr. - Nominated by George W. Bush on February 14, 2006.
Clifton, Richard R. - Nominated by George W. Bush on September 4, 2001.


Ruling

http://www.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2009/08/04/08-10448.pdf

[KansDem]

1. I don't know. Maybe I'm old-fashioned.

But whenever I visited national parks, the last thing on my mind was getting shit-faced before I arrived there.

And I've been to King's Canyon. I don't recall many liquor stores on the way to the park once you get off the highway. Maybe he made a stop in Fresno?

[usregimechange]

2. I would want my senses intact

[KansDem]

3. Exactly!

Getting out into the great outdoors is all about sensory perception: seeing the majesty and hearing its silence or the sound of its inhabitants. Smelling what air is like uncorrupted by civilization, or feeling its movement on your face. And tasting its resources, like water from a clear stream supplied by melting snow!

The idea of experiencing all this while you're three-sheets-to-the-wind is mindboggling...