What rights do travellers have against unreasonable customs officers? I ask or worry not about the standard questions required during customs, such as a traveller's basic personal information, purposes of travel, etc... However, what if a traveller fears for his privacy, and suspects hostility or nosiness from a customs officer? For example, can a traveller exercise his right of silence, without adverse inferences drawn by an impartial court? Or even the customs officer, who may loathe the silent treatment? Afterword: I ask the above for Canada, USA, and UK.
When you refer to customs, that necessarily denotes travel to a foreign county, such that each county will have their own laws, rules, and regulations that govern these issues. It is more than likely that if you refuse to answer the questions of customs officials in ANY country, you will be denied admittance. The same is true if you refuse or balk at being searched (personally or your possessions), and keep in mind that this is without reasonable suspicion or probable cause. The best thing to do is to answer the questions honestly and accurately, but also as narrowly as possible to completely answer. Trying to argue with them will only send up red flags and you will be there longer. Remember it is a privilege, not a right, to enter a sovereign nation of which you are not a citizen. For example, in the U.S., customs reserves the right to detain for questioning, search you, your car, your children, your bags, packages, purse/wallet, or any other travel item with full legal authority to do sol they can even examine your electronics (content and hardware). You place your stuff on the exam station and open it. (After the exam is completed, you will be asked to repack and close the baggage.) If you are unhappy with the way you are being treated, you do have the right to ask to speak to a CBP supervisor, but I cannot see anything good coming of it, unless they were super rude without provocation or broke something of value. The authority to delay and speak with travelers derives from the United States Code (section citations below) enables CBP to prevent the entry of persons who are inadmissible under the Immigration and Nationality Act, and to prevent the smuggling of merchandise, including narcotics and other contraband items, into the United States. Speaking with travelers and examining merchandise coming into or leaving the United States is just one of the mechanisms used to identify illegal or prohibited items, and to determine whether or not someone is trying to enter the U.S. for unlawful or fraudulent purposes. Unless exempt by diplomatic status, all travelers entering the United States, including U.S. citizens, are subjected to routine Customs examinations. At times, people make the mistake of thinking their civil rights are being violated by being asked questions about their trip, personal background and history, etc. That is not the case. Supreme Court decisions have upheld the doctrine that CBP's search authority is unique and does not violate the fourth amendment's protection against unreasonable searches and seizures. U.S. Customs website has a detailed Q&amp;A section. Most modern countries do as well.
It does matter if you invoke your right to silence. First, if you do, that affects what police can do (they have to stop interrogating you). Second, it plays a role in &quot;adoptive admissions&quot;. If the police are asking you questions (you are not under arrest) and they make some statement that implies that you committed a crime, your silence can be used against you: it can be taken to be a form of admitting that you committed the crime. The premise is that if they imply that you murdered X, such an accusation if false would be so outrageous to a reasonable, innocent person that they would protest, therefore your lack of protest (denial) is tantamount to a confession. However, you can protect yourself by preemptively invoking your right to silence. See Salinas v. Texas: a witness who “ ‘desires the protection of the privilege . . . must claim it’ ” at the time he relies on it... the Fifth Amendment guarantees that no one may be“compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself,” not an unqualified “right to remain silent.” Since any right can be waived, at any time, there is no magic expression that you can utter that nullifies a future waiver of a Constitutional right. The closest that you can come is asserting that you hereby exercise your right to an attorney and that you will not speak until you have consulted with your attorney (then you better shut up). Lawyering up only prevents them from further interrogating you. Don't hedge: say &quot;I am asserting my right to silence and refuse to speak without a lawyer&quot;. &quot;I think I should...&quot; is not a definitive assertion of your rights. If you are (briefly) stopped, police may ask if they can search you or your property. If they have a warrant or probable cause, there's really no point in saying anything. In the case that consent is required, you just have to remember to not consent, and it would not be a bad idea to explicitly deny consent. Each and every time they ask. The same with their statement &quot;It would really help us if you would come to the station to answer a few questions&quot;. If you are under arrest, then you have to go with them: ask &quot;Am I free to go?&quot;. You can say &quot;I do not consent to any search&quot;. Your proposed declaration of rights is pretty vague. Exactly what rights are you talking about? Your right to freedom of religion? Your right to bear arms? Your right to not have to quarter soldiers in your house? Your right to an education? Many detainee statements have been found by the courts to be ineffective because they were unclear. You could give it a shot and see if the Supreme Court accepts your &quot;universal assertion of rights&quot; as effectively invoking your specific 4th and 5th amendment rights. Unless you have something in mind (like, the 6th amendment), the most effective statement is a very specific one. Silence, lawyer, no search.
Laws are different around the world and you didn't bother to state your location, but typically no- this is not how the system works. What would be the point? There's no defendant. You, the plaintiff would argue against thin air and then what? The court rules in your favour, declares this illegal, and nothing happens because there's no defendant. Is it so you can use this ruling if you find out later? Pretty sneaky. Let's look into how this would actually work. You bring up a case- Jackson vs a mannequin or something. You make your arguments. The defense makes literally no defense. The judge rules in your favour, with a result of nothing as there is no defendent. Next, you find the culprit and bring a case against them. You point out that this is illegal because we came to that decision last week. What's that defendant? An argument against it being illegal? Too bad, the decision has been made. When I posted this answer, it was before the &quot;Nyah, I was ranting about government spying but was deliberately vague- aren't I clever?&quot; comment and I assumed it was against, say, a neighbour but it doesn't really matter. You cannot have a system that makes a judgement without a defendant so it can be applied later.
The issue is more likely that there is no law or regulation allowing the use of dogs to sniff passengers in the US for matters not related to crime, whereas Dubai, a monarchy, has a different political system. In general, you have the constitutional right to move about in the U and the right not to be unreasonably seized, a right which may not exist in some other jurisdictions. That right can be restricted in accordance with law, but there has to be some such law. It is not a crime to have covid, or to travel while infected (it is a crime to carry bombs and drugs on a plane). One area where there is some restriction is where there always has been a restriction, namely entry into the US. There is (was) covid screening at certain airports for flights from certain countries. This directive indicates the airport restrictions, but does not explain what screening will take place. The above DHS site says that &quot;the passenger will be asked about their medical history, current condition, and asked for contact information for local health authorities. Passengers will then be given written guidance about COVID-19 and directed to their final destination, and immediately home-quarantine in accordance with CDC best practices&quot;. It is not clear whether a mandatory temperature check without even reasonable suspicion of a crime would constitute an unreasonable search (body searches are subject to higher standards than property searches, it seems), and constitutional law surrounding searches has emphasized the primacy of privacy in search law, not the fact of physically entering property of the body. Some airlines and airports offer voluntary temperature checking, so it might be possible if someone has a covid-sniffing dog to offer voluntary sniff testing, especially if it is offered by a private concern and does not have the appearance of government mandate (which would require a law).
What are the reasons/ legal requirements that the police might need my personal information, given that I had not been able to provide any further information/ witness testimony to the incident that they were investigating? The police in england-and-wales have a duty to undertake reasonable lines of enquiry and to carry out a proportionate investigation in to allegations of crime. No-one is legally obliged to answer house to house questions but, notwithstanding the honesty and integrity of the majority of members of the public, any information held by the police may need to be corroborated to identify or eliminate suspects, witnesses, evidential opportunities or other lines of enquiry. Also, if it is established that someone has no information that may assist the investigation this is recorded to prevent duplication of effort thus enabling the police to focus their resources accordingly. All the while complying with the relevant privacy and data retention legislation.
I'm a notary. If someone showed me a marked-up license, I'd refuse to perform the notarization, and make a note of the persons name and phone number, to make sure I would never make another appointment with the person. Is there a law that says I have to refuse? I don't think so. Is there is a law that says I can refuse if I have any doubts about the person's identity? Absolutely.
someone I spoke with said "there is to be no recording of this or any other calls". Must I follow this instruction? Although, in Canada, there is no requirement on you to obtain consent to make recording, this explicit objection creates a hurdle. If you simply ignore the objection and record the conversation anyway without letting the objecting party know, you may give them a ground for a claim under the breach of confidence doctrine. The safest move would be to reply: No. There will be recording of this and any other calls. It will be then up to them to hang up. If they don't, they lose all grounds for any claims.
Special regimes For some kinds of questions there are special presumptions or forms of evidence that are specified by statute. For example, in Canada and the United States, registering a copyright creates presumptive proof that the copyright exists and is owned by the registrant. In Canada, breathalyzer results are conclusive proof of the blood alcohol concentration if certain conditions are met. Some of these regimes are not subject to challenge: they are legal facts even if they are not objectively true (e.g. the breathalyser results). Others create presumptions that can be overcome by contrary evidence (e.g. copyright ownership). The default: present relevant evidence, including testimonial evidence But outside of special regimes, you prove a fact by introducing evidence. The default is that all relevant evidence that bears on a material fact is admissible. Evidence is relevant when, if is were to be accepted, it would make the fact in issue more or less likely to be true. Evidence comes in many forms: testimony of the parties or witnesses, documentary evidence, physical evidence, expert opinion evidence. If you are wondering, &quot;How do I prove X?&quot; Ask yourself, why do you believe X? Or, how do you know X? Or, how has the event X left its mark on the world? Whatever has led you to believe X probably is the evidence that you would want to introduce to the court to help prove X. Perhaps you saw X: you can tell the court you saw X. Perhaps you took a photo of X: you can present that photo in court. Perhaps you have a receipt for X: you can show that receipt in court. Perhaps X is a proposition about your own actions: you can tell the court about those. Obtaining the evidence Evidence can be obtained from the other party during the discovery process, or from third-parties using subpoenas, subject to objections relating to relevance or privilege. Not all (potentially) relevant evidence is admissible However, some evidence will be inadmissible despite it being potentially relevant. I will only present a few categories, some very general and some more specific: hearsay (unless it falls within an exception to the hearsay exclusion), privileged material (unless it is a case-by-case privilege or a discretionary privilege and the person seeking to admit the evidence demonstrates to the judge that it should be admitted), sexual history evidence of a sexual assault complainant when it will be used to support an inference that the complainant is more likely to have consented to the sexual activity that forms the subject-matter of the charge or is less worthy of belief (this is because it has been recognized as not relevant for this purpose), material that was obtained in contravention of the Charter and where the court has decided that the remedy for the Charter violation is exclusion of the evidence (in the United States, there is stricter, exclusionary rule), there are many more. There are also some meta-rules about the evidence that may be used to impugn a witness's credibility, themselves at trial to provide evidence, but for now I am leaving those out of this fairly summary answer. Weighing the evidence The trier of fact (the judge or a jury) then is to weigh all the admissible evidence, including by weighing the witness and party testimony according to its credibility and reliability after testing through cross-examination, to come to a conclusion on the ultimate question(s) at issue.