agrees

Jan. 16 (UPI) — The Supreme Court on Friday agreed to review a challenge to geofence warrants filed by a man who was convicted of robbing a bank in 2019.

Okello Chatrie was convicted of robbing $195,000 from a Virginia bank on May 20, 2019, after investigators used location-tracking data from Google to identify him.

Google provided a geofence that records and stores location data within a certain radius of the bank that Chatrie robbed at gunpoint.

A detective obtained three warrants for related geofence data, which Google provided after receiving the respective warrants.

The geofence data tracked the movements of the cellphone carried by Chatrie when he robbed the bank and afterward and recorded the respective longitudes and latitudes of the phone’s location at different times.

Chatrie challenged the use of the geofence data in the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, saying it violated his Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable search and seizure and violated his reasonable expectation of privacy.

The location data was a key piece of evidence against him, but Chatrie said he did not voluntarily provide the information to investigators, and they had no probable cause to seek a warrant for the geofence data.

The Fourth Circuit in April ruled against Chatrie, saying he voluntarily provided the location data to Google, which in turn provided it to law enforcement when presented with warrants to do so.

An earlier ruling by the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in a separate case reached an opposite conclusion, saying geofence warrants violate the Fourth Amendment, but the evidence presented is still valid because law enforcement in that case acted in good faith.

While both appellate court rulings ultimately reach the same conclusion that the evidence is valid in the respective cases, the matter of whether or not geofence warrants are constitutional remains to be decided.

The Supreme Court justices agreed to render a decision during the current session that ends in the fall.

For the second time in as many months, the Dodgers swooped in to secure a major free-agent signing.

After weighing multiple offers this week, outfielder Kyle Tucker reportedly agreed to a four-year, $240-million contract with the Dodgers on Thursday.

Tucker, who reportedly had been offered $50 million per year by the New York Mets and received overtures from the Toronto Blue Jays, is a four-time All-Star and two-time Silver Slugger whose left-handed bat will fit into the middle of the Dodgers’ lineup.

The signing addresses an area where the Dodgers were in need of an upgrade, after the outfield corps posted minus-1.6 wins above replacement in 2025.

But the question heading into the offseason was how the Dodgers would go about improving their outfield. Although they had plenty of financial flexibility at the start of the offseason, with more than $60 million in salary from last season coming off the books, the front office also touted potential internal options. Some of those included Alex Call, Hyeseong Kim and Ryan Ward, who was named the Pacific Coast League’s MVP in 2025 and was added to the Dodgers’ 40-man roster this offseason.

The team used that flexibility to make a splash last month when they signed reliever Edwin Díaz to a three-year, $69-million deal, emerging as a surprise winner after Díaz appeared on track to sign elsewhere.

Chicago Cubs right fielder Kyle Tucker bats against the Colorado Rockies on Aug. 31.

(David Zalubowski / Associated Press)

They seemingly followed a similar pattern with Tucker, who spent last year with the Chicago Cubs after he was traded by the Houston Astros following the 2024 season. When reports emerged about the Mets offering a short-term deal worth $50 million per year, the Dodgers appeared to be out of the running.

But instead they landed another marquee free-agent signing in Tucker, who turns 29 on Saturday. They are banking on the productivity he’s shown when healthy — he’s a career .273 hitter with an .865 OPS — but he’s dealt with injuries the last two seasons. With the Cubs in 2025, Tucker hit .280 with 17 home runs before the all-star break, but a fractured right hand and a left calf strain slowed him down as he finished with 22 home runs. He served as the Cubs’ designated hitter during their postseason run, which ended in a five-game loss to the Milwaukee Brewers in the division series.