Actually sir, after the detective took my DL he told me after the check came back I was free to go, so I was temporarily being detained. But there was no reasonable suspension or probable cause to detain me.
Well, sort of, but not exactly.
There is something called Investigatory Detention, which sounds to me like what happened. You did not have to give your physical id card to the officer, but rather you simply could have identified yourself.
I'll refer to this explanation of Investigatory Detention, since it explains it in a pretty simple manner -
Under the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution, a police officer is permitted to detain an individual for investigative purposes if the officer believes, based on a reasonable and articulable suspicion, that the individual is engaged in criminal activity, even if there is no probable cause to make an arrest. The ability to detain an individual under these circumstances is typically referred to as investigative detention.
The purpose of such a detention is to maintain the status quo while investigating the circumstances that give rise to the suspicion of criminal wrongdoing.
Once a lawful stop is made, a police officer's suspicions may become further aroused and the stop may be prolonged and the scope enlarged as required by the circumstances, provided the scope of the investigation remains within the limits created by the facts upon which the stop is predicated and the suspicion which they arouse.
Thus, the permissibility of a particular law enforcement practice is judged by balancing its intrusion on the individual's Fourth Amendment interests against its promotion of legitimate governmental interests. The intrusion must be confined to what is minimally necessary under the circumstances.
The courts have not established a maximum time period that police may constitutionally detain a suspect. The test is reasonableness under the circumstances.
So let's look at the facts as we know them. Each of these things may be viewed separately as different, or unusual, but let's look at them in totality and see the big picture that an officer must see...
1) Someone called the police and reported, as you said a "nutjob with a gun". The police said "someone suspicious with a gun". Any MWAG call is always going to get someone's attention.
2) You are walking down the road videotaping yourself.
3) You are wearing a ruck which to the average person looks like some kind of weird contraption with a bunch of straps across the chest.
4) You have a military style holster on with a firearm.
5) You have a large orange bicycle flag attached to your body and it sticks straight up in the air.
6) When an unmarked detective drove by, he saw you laying on the side of the road....possibly injured? Who knows?
I think a brief, investigative detention is justified in this case, just to ensure that everything is cool. I think a brief stop to check things out is not so intrusive as to be considered unreasonable. That again is simply my opinion as I am obviously not an attorney.