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Walking away from police was not reasonable suspicion

By John Wesley Hall, Jr.

Upon seeing the police, defendant looked shook hands with the people in the group he was talking to and walked away. This is hardly suspicious behavior and does not amount to flight. This conduct, as testified to by the police, is not objectively reasonable suspicion. United States v. McCrae, 2008 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 2314 (E.D. N.Y. January 11, 2008)*: While flight upon seeing police officers can give rise to reasonable suspicion if it occurs in a high-crime area, see Illinois v. Wardlow, 528 U.S. 119, 124 (2000) ("Headlong flight ... is the consummate act of evasion"), it is clear, and I find, that McCrae's behavior fell well short of this threshold, cf. id. at 125 ("'[R]efusal to cooperate, without more, does not furnish the minimal level of objective justification needed for a detention or seizure...continue to full post

Full post as published by Fourth Amendment on January 15, 2008 (boomark / email).