Enlarge / An Oakland Police patrol car sits in front of the Oakland Police headquarters on December 6, 2012 in Oakland, California. (credit: Justin Sullivan / Getty Images News)
OAKLAND, Calif.—Defense attorney Martha Boersch has strong words for federal law enforcement’s warrantless use of cell-site simulators, better known as stingrays.
Her client, Purvis Ellis, charged with attempted murder and racketeering, was tracked down to an East Oakland apartment in January 2013 with the help of not just one stingray, but two. Prosecutors initially insisted that only one stingray was used, but as was revealed last summer, that turned out to not be the case. The Oakland Police Department’s own stingray was seemingly insufficient, so officers then called in the FBI, both times without a warrant.
“When they then take that technology and use it in a run-of-the-mill criminal case and use it secretly and clearly without providing defendants with notice or any of the Constitutional protections that a defendant is supposed to have, that’s a real problem,” Boersch, who herself served as a federal prosecutor for 12 years, told Ars during a recent in-person interview at her downtown office.
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