Fox News Insider
FoxNews.com
9/29/2014
A new city ordinance in Seattle will allow garbage collectors to assess fines of up to $50 if 10% of a person’s trash is wasted food.
Judge Andrew Napolitano appeared on “Your World with Neil Cavuto” today and said this law should be trashed, because it is unknowable, for example, how much of a partially eaten hamburger remains, making the ordinance almost impossible to enforce.
Judge Nap added a second problem is that officials have no ability to go through a citizen’s garbage, unless they have reason to believe there is evidence of a crime there.
“To pick through a garbage can looking to see how much food is in there? Absolutely prohibited by the Fourth Amendment,” Judge Nap said. “The Fourth Amendment covers all privacy, and you have a privacy interest in your garbage, unless the government has probable cause to believe there’s a crime scene there.”
Judge Nap said this is “nanny-stating to the extreme,” adding that Seattle is making Mike Bloomberg look like Ron Paul.
“The subjective nature of going through somebody’s garbage and deciding what’s edible and where it came from makes this law unenforceable,” Judge Nap concluded.
Watch the clip from “Your World” at FoxNews.com
