Academic literature on the topic 'Oregon. Fourth Judicial District'

This chapter describes Chambers's efforts to enforce Title II of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibited discrimination in restaurants, motels, and other places of public accommodation, against attempts to circumvent the new law's broad reach, confirmed by an earlier U.S. Supreme Court ruling. The Charlotte YMCA argued for a "private club" exemption under Title II, but quickly abandoned that claim and agreed to desegregate when Chambers filed suit. Chambers also sued the Raleigh YMCA, which sought to prevent desegregation of its exercise facilities on a similar claim notwithstanding that the YMCA's officers had desegregated their cafeteria and rental lodging. After a loss at trial before an unsympathetic U.S. District Court judge, Chambers and LDF won an unqualified victory on appeal before the Fourth Circuit. Chambers also prevailed in a suit to open Moore's Barbecue Restaurant in New Bern to black customers despite Moore's claim to have arranged his business affairs so as to be free of any connection to "interstate commerce," a key element of the Supreme Court's basis for upholding Title II. Here, Chambers overcame a hostile federal judge who willingly ignored a fundamental judicial canon by repeatedly communicating privately about the case with Moore's attorney.

Rene Martin Verdugo-Urquidez was driving in San Felipe, Mexico on a winter’s day in 1986 when he was stopped by several Mexican police officers. The officers arrested Verdugo-Urquidez, placed him in the back of an unmarked car, and forced him to lie down on the seat with his face covered by a jacket. A Mexican citizen, Verdugo-Urquidez was believed to be one of the leading members of a major drug cartel and was suspected of participating in the brutal murder of Enrique Camarena-Salazar, an agent of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA). After a two-hour drive north the Mexican officers walked Verdugo-Urquidez to the international border, where he was transferred to U.S. Border Patrol agents. He was then brought to a federal detention center in San Diego. Working with the Mexican Federal Judicial Police, DEA agents based in Mexico searched Verdugo-Urquidez’s residences in Mexicali and San Felipe, where they found incriminating documents relating to drug trafficking. This seemingly smooth example of international police cooperation ran into a hurdle once Verdugo-Urquidez faced trial in the United States. His lawyers sought to suppress the evidence, arguing that it had been obtained without a warrant and in violation of the Fourth Amendment’s prohibition against “unreasonable searches and seizures.” The district court agreed, declaring that the Fourth Amendment applied to the search in Mexico. The court called the search a “joint venture” of the DEA and the Mexican police. Because the DEA had failed to obtain a warrant, and because the search was improperly handled, the district court held that the incriminating evidence had to be suppressed pursuant to what is usually called the “exclusionary rule.” The Reagan administration immediately appealed the ruling. Drug trafficking had become a major concern of the United States in the 1980s, and the DEA overseas activities at issue in the Verdugo-Urquidez case were an important front line in what was commonly termed the war on drugs. If the Constitution regulated searches and seizures outside the United States, the DEA and other agencies would have to revamp their approach to foreign criminal investigations.