4th Am Seizures & Arrests vs Stop & Frisks Flashcards
governing rule for arrests
governing rule: without a warrant, police may, if they have probable cause, arrest persons in public places (Watson) but cannot arrest people in their homes without a warrant (Payton) unless an exception to the warrant requirement is applicable
• to have PC to arrest, there must be PC to believe that a crime has been committed and that the arrestee committed it
rules (2) for arrests in the home or similar space
rule: irrespective of the seriousness of the offense, in the absence of exigent circumstances, law enforcement cannot enter a home to effectuate an arrest without a warrant (Payton)
• the expectation of privacy afforded an individual in her home, for purposes of a warrantless arrest, has been extended to other areas, such as hotel rooms and offices not open to the general public – if the business is not generally accessible to the public, or the person is located in an area of the business that is not open to the public, then a warrant would be required
rule: when an individual is “not merely visible to the public but [is] exposed to public view, speech, hearing, and touch as if she had been standing completely outside her house” a warrantless arrest is permissible (Santana)
2 ancillary arrest rules (level of offense; state protections)
rule: if an officer has probable cause to believe that an individual has committed an offense in her presence, even a minor offense for which imprisonment is not available as a sentence, she may without violating the Fourth Amendment arrest the offender (Atwater)
• court: “we need not, and thus do not, speculate whether the Fourth Amendment entails an “in the presence” requirement for purposes of misdemeanor arrests”
rule: states are free to provide heightened protections through limitations upon arrests, but those heightened protections do not alter the constitutionality of an arrest under the Fourth Amendment (Moore)
• accordingly, officers may constitutionally arrest a person within the bounds of the 4th Amendment even if state law only allows for citation and not arrest for the crime committed (i.e. state law prohibiting arrest is immaterial)
governing rule (and exception) for seizures
governing rule: not all contact between law enforcement and citizens constitutes a seizure – a person is seized only when, by means of physical force or show of authority, her freedom of movement is restrained (Mendenhall)
• **seizure of a person occurs only if, under the totality of the circumstances, a reasonable person would have believed that she was not free to leave (objective standard)
exception: person has not been seized if he or she fails to yield or submit to the officer’s show of authority (Hodari D.)
• so, where individuals claim they were seized by a show of police authority, it is not enough that they do not feel free to leave; the officer must, in addition, restrain their freedom of movement or the individuals must voluntarily submit to the officer’s request
• where officers command a suspect to stop and she or he disregards the order, the suspect cannot claim unlawful seizure
• nor can a suspect claim seizure if police officers merely follow him or her in their car without ordering the suspect to stop, blocking his or her movement, displaying their weapons, or using the car’s siren
6 factors suggesting a seizure
Examples of factors suggesting a seizure:
• presence of several officers,
• display of a weapon by an officer,
• physical touching of the person,
• the use of language or tone indicating that compliance might be required,
• blocking/impeding of the citizen’s path,
• an officer holding onto a person’s property (luggage, purse, etc.) or identification (driver’s license, passport)
rule for seizure on public transport
rule: a seizure on a bus – the inquiry becomes: “would a reasonable person feel like they could decline the police request?” (Bostick/Drayton)
• **instead of “would a RPP feel like they can leave?” (because think about it – the person wants to stay on the bus to get where they need to go)
3 key points distinguishing terry stops from arrests
for an arrest, there must be PC – but for a stop there need only be reasonable suspicion
if a person is arrested, police can do a search incident to arrest – but if a person is stopped, there can be a frisk only if there is reasonable suspicion that the person is armed and dangerous
the line between a Terry stop and a de facto arrest can be hazy – both the duration and nature of the seizure impact whether a Terry stop has occurred or a de facto arrest
• burden on the government to show that the seizure is a Terry stop and not an arrest
• **remember a full search is only allowed as an incident to arrest
• ex) an arrest has occurred if police officers take a suspect to the station house for questioning (Dunway)
• ex) taking a suspect from the public area of an airport into a small room is an arrest (Royer)
• ex) taking a suspect to the police station house for fingerprinting is an arrest (Hayes)
• ex) detaining a person’s luggage for 90 minutes is a seizure (Place)
• ex) detaining a person between 30-40 min while waiting for the arrival of a DEA agent is a stop (no hard-and fast limit)
governing rules for terry stops
governing rule: based upon reasonable suspicion that criminal activity is afoot, a law enforcement officer may make a brief investigatory stop/seizure of a person (Terry)
• an investigatory detention, however, must be temporary and last no longer than reasonably necessary to effectuate the purpose of the detention
• a valid Terry stop does not automatically give the officer permission to frisk/pat down the person instead law enforcement may only do so where the officer has reasonable suspicion that the person is armed and dangerous
o **so you need RS both for the stop and then the pat down – the pat down is not a given
• court is effectively bringing these types of “pre-arrest detentions” into 4th Am protection – these are considered search & seizure, but you only need reasonable suspicion
remember: police may conduct a cursory “frisk” of a car if there is reason to believe that there is a weapon in the car and that the person may gain access to that weapon (Long)
rule: an officer’s actions in a Terry stop must be reasonably related in scope to the circumstances which justified the intervention in the first place (Hiibel)
• questions concerning a suspect’s identity are a routine and accepted part of Terry stops
governing rule for reasonable suspicion needed for terry stop
governing rule: must look at the totality of the circumstances of each case to see whether the detaining officer has a particularized and objective basis for suspecting legal wrongdoing (Arvizu)
• this process allows officers to draw on their own experience and specialized training to make inferences from and deductions about the cumulative information available to them that might well elude an untrained person
• accordingly, for reasonable suspicion there must be more than a mere hunch; law enforcement needs a particularized and objective basis, rising to the level of reasonable suspicion, for suspecting criminal activity (the basis of reasonable suspicion need not rule out the possibility of innocent conduct or an innocent explanation)
anonymous tips and terry stops
anonymous tips: reasonable suspicion, like probable cause, is dependent upon both the content of information possessed by police and its degree of reliability (White)
• both factors—quantity and quality—are considered in the totality of the circumstances—the whole picture, that must be taken into account when evaluating whether there is reasonable suspicion
• **thus, if a tip has a relatively low degree of reliability, more information will be required to establish the requisite quantum of suspicion than would be required if the tip were more reliable (i.e. needs sufficient corroboration)
