stop, even if you're innocent

Justin Schwartz jkschw at hotmail.com
Mon Jan 21 21:53:14 PST 2002


It's disappointing but not surprising. It's long established that there's a lot less reasonable expectation of privacy in a car than in a home or even a hotel room. Moreover, a traffic stop isn't an arrest; the cops still need probbale cause or consent to search the car (though what that amounts to in a car is less than elsewhere). No dount the decision will lead to more profiling. jks


>
>[Nathan, Justin, John, comments?]
>
>http://www.latimes.com
>
>THE NATION
>
>High Court Backs Agent Who Stopped Motorist
>Ruling: In case of drug smuggling, justices say police need only a
>reasonable suspicion, not
>evidence of a crime, to pull over a vehicle.
>By DAVID G. SAVAGE
>TIMES STAFF WRITER
>
>January 16 2002
>
>WASHINGTON -- The Supreme Court reaffirmed Tuesday that police have broad
>leeway in deciding when to
>pull over vehicles and that they may rely on innocent-looking actions as
>grounds for their
>suspicions.
>
>Even slowing down at the sight of a parked squad car or driving a minivan
>can be a factor that
>weighs in favor of stopping a motorist, the justices said.
>
>The unanimous ruling revived marijuana-smuggling charges against an Arizona
>man whose slow-moving
>minivan was stopped by a Border Patrol agent near the Mexican border. More
>significant, the high
>court used the case to reiterate that there is no "neat set of legal rules"
>to say when officers
>have the required "reasonable suspicion" to stop a motorist.
>
>The pretext must be more than "a mere hunch" but can be well less than
>actual evidence of
>wrongdoing, said Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist. Officers can rely on a
>"common-sense inference"
>from what they observe to decide when a vehicle should be pulled over. And
>judges should not
>casually second-guess these decisions, Rehnquist added.
>
>The ruling marked another Rehnquist reversal of an opinion written by Judge
>Stephen Reinhardt of Los
>Angeles, one of the liberal leaders of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of
>Appeals.
>
>Rehnquist and Reinhardt differ on their interpretations of the 4th
>Amendment, which forbids
>"unreasonable searches and seizures" by the government.
>
>Decision Reverses Los Angeles Judge
>
>Rehnquist has insisted that judges should not tie the hands of police
>officers. Reinhardt has argued
>that judges should protect the privacy of pedestrians and motorists by
>limiting the police from
>conducting searches without warrants.
>
>They clashed over a case that began on a January afternoon in 1998 in
>southern Arizona. Agent
>Clinton Stoddard noticed a minivan traveling on a dirt road north of
>Douglas, Ariz. Smugglers
>frequently take such back roads to avoid checkpoints on the highways.
>
>When the minivan approached Stoddard, it slowed abruptly and the driver sat
>rigid, avoiding eye
>contact. In the back seat were children whose knees were visible, as if
>they were resting on
>something large.
>
>When the minivan suddenly turned onto another remote road, the last turn
>before a checkpoint, the
>agent decided to stop the vehicle. After questioning the driver, Ralph
>Arvizu, the agent learned
>that he lived in a neighborhood known for smuggling and drug-dealing.
>Stoddard then searched the
>minivan and found a duffel bag with 128 pounds of marijuana.
>
>When Arvizu appealed his case, the 9th Circuit ruled that it involved an
>"illegal stop" because the
>agent had relied on too many innocent actions as grounds for stopping the
>motorist.
>
>"Slowing down after spotting a law-enforcement vehicle is an entirely
>normal response," Reinhardt
>wrote, and does not indicate criminal activity. The same is true of driving
>a minivan and of failing
>to make eye contact with a police officer. Moreover, the driver had
>committed no traffic offenses,
>he said.
>
>It is important that courts "clearly delimit" the factors that warrant the
>"stopping and questioning
>of citizens who are minding their business," Reinhardt wrote.
>
>Civil libertarians have faulted the high court for giving police unchecked
>authority to stop
>vehicles. This can lead to "racial profiling" against minority motorists
>and can result in annoying
>and unwarranted stops, they say.
>
>ACLU Study Used by Defendant's Side
>
>One brief filed with the court noted that a study by the American Civil
>Liberties Union found that
>of 34,000 highway stops by the California Highway Patrol in 1997, only 2%
>resulted in arrests.
>
>But the Supreme Court took up the government's appeal in U.S. vs. Arvizu,
>00-1519, and reversed the
>9th Circuit. The chief justice said that searches should be judged by "the
>totality of the
>circumstances" and that a variety of factors tipped the balance in favor of
>stopping Arvizu. He was
>driving along a dirt road on a route used by smugglers and taking actions
>that seemed intended to
>avoid the police.
>
>"Undoubtedly, each of these factors alone is susceptible to innocent
>explanation," Rehnquist said.
>"Taken together, we believe they sufficed to form a particularized and
>objective basis for
>Stoddard's stopping the vehicle."
>
>http://www.supremecourtus.gov/
>

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