On February 20th, 2014, A citizen with a video camera recorded an illegal Georgia Roadblock and posted it to copblock.com where Troopers asked if he had any drugs and ordered him to pull over for a “vehicle safety inspection.” Georgia law only allows Roadblocks for limited purposes and under limited conditions including license and insurance inspection, DUI, and seat belt compliance. Roadblocks for general crime deterrence as strictly prohibited. Further, the delay to motorists must be minimal. See, Brown v. State, 293 Ga. 787, 750 S.E.2d 148 (2013). In fact, just recently in Athens-Clarke County, the Georgia State Patrol roadblock policy was declared unconstitutional by Judge Auslander. Roadblocks are an exception to the 4th Amendment prohibition against unreasonable searches and seizures. Therefore, Roadblocks must be planned in advance by programmatic level supervisors, must comply with standard operating procedures, must be for defined time periods, and can not be initiated at whim by Police Officers in the field.
-Author: George Creal