Citizen
Founder's Club Member
Regarding police encounters with OCers and the Fourth Amendment, the devil is in the details.
In Ohio, police testimony in a certain case emphasized the defendant was trying to evade them. The prosecutor argued the stop was consensual. The trial court refused to suppress the marihuana found. The Ohio Court of Appeals was having none of it. Think about it--the police are saying the guy was trying to avoid them, then want to claim it was a consensual encounter. Huh?? What could be more clear that the guy didn't want to have an encounter than the fact that he was avoiding the police??? Trying to have their cake and eat it, too?
On a quick skim, I did not see a prosecution claim that evasion/avoidance constitutes reasonable suspicion. I've seen a few cases where flight from police is itself sufficient for reasonable suspicion for the police to detain someone.
Thus my comment about the devil being in the details. Part of the police testimony in this case is that the defendant would have been running from the police during a certain period he was out of sight behind buildings. But, unless I missed it, the prosecution did not try the flight-suspicion argument.
So, the overall lesson for OCers may be that you may be able to reinforce your position that the encounter was not consensual by trying to avoid the encounter in the first place. This could be a little tricky. I'm not a big advocate of walking away from a cop who is engaging me--too many reports of cops pretending a consensual encounter when they meant to detain; I don't wanta give them an excuse to grab me and prone me out by walking away from them once the encounter has begun.
But, if I can clearly demonstrate avoiding or walking away from them before contact, I may be able to reinforce the nonconsensual nature of the encounter.
pdf of the decision: http://www.supremecourt.ohio.gov/rod/docs/pdf/9/2015/2015-Ohio-2931.pdf
I found out about it here: http://fourthamendment.com/
In Ohio, police testimony in a certain case emphasized the defendant was trying to evade them. The prosecutor argued the stop was consensual. The trial court refused to suppress the marihuana found. The Ohio Court of Appeals was having none of it. Think about it--the police are saying the guy was trying to avoid them, then want to claim it was a consensual encounter. Huh?? What could be more clear that the guy didn't want to have an encounter than the fact that he was avoiding the police??? Trying to have their cake and eat it, too?
On a quick skim, I did not see a prosecution claim that evasion/avoidance constitutes reasonable suspicion. I've seen a few cases where flight from police is itself sufficient for reasonable suspicion for the police to detain someone.
Thus my comment about the devil being in the details. Part of the police testimony in this case is that the defendant would have been running from the police during a certain period he was out of sight behind buildings. But, unless I missed it, the prosecution did not try the flight-suspicion argument.
So, the overall lesson for OCers may be that you may be able to reinforce your position that the encounter was not consensual by trying to avoid the encounter in the first place. This could be a little tricky. I'm not a big advocate of walking away from a cop who is engaging me--too many reports of cops pretending a consensual encounter when they meant to detain; I don't wanta give them an excuse to grab me and prone me out by walking away from them once the encounter has begun.
But, if I can clearly demonstrate avoiding or walking away from them before contact, I may be able to reinforce the nonconsensual nature of the encounter.
pdf of the decision: http://www.supremecourt.ohio.gov/rod/docs/pdf/9/2015/2015-Ohio-2931.pdf
I found out about it here: http://fourthamendment.com/
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