
Suspect can be compelled to enter a password to unlock a phone or computer [pdf] - DyslexicAtheist
https://www.mass.gov/files/documents/2019/03/06/12564.pdf
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DyslexicAtheist
> _Accordingly, for the foregone conclusion exception to apply, the
> Commonwealth must establish that it already knows the testimony that is
> implicit in the act of the required production. In the context of compelled
> decryption, the only fact conveyed by compelling a defendant to enter the
> password to an encrypted electronic device is that the defendant knows the
> password, and can therefore access the device. See id. See also Kerr,
> Compelled Decryption and the Privilege Against Self-incrimination, Tex. L.
> Rev. (forthcoming 2019) (manuscript at 18) ( "the only assertion implied by
> entering the password is that the person compelled knows the password"). The
> Commonwealth must therefore establish that a defendant knows the password to
> decrypt an electronic device before his or her knowledge of the password can
> be deemed a foregone conclusion under the Fifth Amendment or art._

> _The concurrence suggests that in addition to proving the defendant 's
> knowledge of the password, the government must also demonstrate that it
> "already knows, with reasonable particularity, the existence and location of
> relevant, incriminating evidence it expects to find on that device." Without
> this added requirement, the concurrence argues, the government may obtain
> "unlimited . . . access, "post at note 4, to a "trove of potential
> incriminating and highly personal data on an electronic device" by proving
> only "that the accused knows the device's pass[word]," This is not correct.

It is well established that under the Fourth Amendment to the United States
Constitution and art. 14 of the Massachusetts Declaration of Rights, the
police are ordinarily required to obtain a search warrant before a search of
the contents of an electronic device may take place. See, e.g., Rileyv.
California, 573 U.S. 373, 386(2014) (cell phones); Commonwealthv. Mauricio,
477 Mass. 588, 594 (2017) (digital cameras); Commonwealthv. McDermott, 448
Mass. 750, 776, cert. denied, 552 U.S. 910 (2007)(computers). Accordingly, in
this case, the police were required to obtain a warrant before they could seek
to search the contents of the LG phone, and they did so. The full protections
against improper searches --probable cause to believe that a crime had been
committed and that evidence of the crime would be found on the device --were
required and, in the opinion of the clerk-magistrate who issued the search
warrant, were satisfied here. The standard proposed by the concurrence
conflates these protections with the protections afforded by art. 12of the
Massachusetts Declaration of Rights. Our task under art. 12 in this context is
to determine only what facts are conveyed to the government when a defendant
is compelled to enter a password to decrypt an electronic device. As we have
explained, the only fact conveyed by the physical act of_

