Reality Check
I was on Facebook and came across a video a colleague of mine posted about a police officer’s meltdown over not being able to search a driver’s car after a traffic stop. I clicked on the link thinking, how bad can it be?
See for yourself.
<iframe width=”420″ height=”315″ src=”http://www.youtube.com/embed/wQUzapAzIac” frameborder=”0″ allowfullscreen></iframe>
As a criminal defense attorney, at first blush, this didn’t shock me as it did some of my friends that commented on it. After all, I have had clients share with me stories of being stopped by the police for some minor infraction, and then being asked to search the vehicle. In most States, as long as the traffic stop has ended, and the driver has received his driver’s license, if there is probable cause to search the vehicle, then it is a perfectly legal request. The key is that the encounter must end, or otherwise the driver is not free to leave and it triggers a Fourth Amendment violation of an unlawful seizure and can ultimately lead to an unlawful search. Of course, without probable cause to search the vehicle, then there must either be consent to search, probable cause to search, or a search warrant.
In this situation, there was a traffic stop and it ended. In a shocking move, the officer was not going to give the driver a ticket. I actually found that to be shocking. But that was that was the segue to the officer’s likely goal in the first place. What one must ask if this. If you are doing a traffic stop, why are you searching someone’s arrest record? What are you looking for when a driving history and at most a search for any outstanding warrants of all that is necessary? And in this case, it was simply a prior arrest isn’t relevant to probable cause for a search let alone a conviction history if there is one.
This officer’s response to the driver calmly asserting his rights under the United States Constitution was another head scratching moment. The officer’s obvious shock to the driver having sense enough to say no, “not without a search warrant” and the officer’s shocked tone and “I guess that’s ok” response nearly boggles the mind before he even started to outrageously yell expletives and insults at the driver.
I was left thinking, I am glad that there was at least a dash camera in the car. I shudder to think would could have happened for that officer to reach like that with the cameras rolling. There is no justification. All the yelling, shouting and cursing and the refusal to even give back the license and returning to scream and curse some more.
This is why it is so important to know your rights. And to know how to calmly and clearly express yourself. Of course this is an extreme example of a police officer who clearly had other intentions with the traffic stop, assumed the driver would not know his rights, and had no control of himself and his temper or actions. But it still shows a valuable lesson. It reminded me of a lesson I learned last summer.
About six months ago I was out and about after morning court, and was running some errands for the office in my old reliable Saturn SUV. I happened to see a Mecklenburg County Sheriff car pull up beside me on South Boulevard, saw the deputy look at me, slow down, and get behind me as I approached the I-277 interchange. I braced myself for the blue light because I had not yet received my new registration sticker for my license plate. Well, he didn’t stop me on South Boulevard. He followed me onto I-277, off the exit and on to Kenilworth Avenue towards the Metropolitan shopping center. I sat at the red light. No blue lights. He followed me into the parking deck. No blue lights. He followed directly behind me up the four levels of the parking deck and just as I was parking in front of Staples to get some copy paper, he pulled in behind be, blocking me in and turned on the blue lights. He had followed me for nearly eight minutes and waited behind me at three separate stop lights. The entire time he was following me, I kept saying to myself, surely this man is not going to follow me all the way up this Staples parking deck.
He got out of the car and asked for my license and registration. I produced it and I asked him why he blocked me in. I said nothing about being a lawyer. He went to the car and returned. I explained to him about the registration and waited for my citation. Instead, he proceeds to tell me that as he was following me, he was checking to see if I had warrants. He claimed that because my last name was listed as Troutman on my registration (which was not true) and I didnt’ show up in the system, I was driving without a license and may have had warrants. He says this with my license in hand. He assumed I had warrants and said as such. Now at this point, I have to point out to him (calmly) that if he was going to stop me, he should have activated his blue lights before I pulled into the parking space because I am now clearly not free to leave by blocking me in and it is a Fourth Amendment violation and an unlawful seizure. After the blank look on his face faded, I asked for his name and badge number and just happened to mention that I was a defense attorney. He went back to his car. He returned with my license and told me he is not going to give me a ticket. He apologized for the “inconvenience” but walked away too fast for me to get his name. The implications of that entire encounter are too numerous to express, and some things just go without saying. For me, it was a reality check.
I was mad about that situation. I could instantly relate to how my clients had felt when they reported being treated a certain way by law enforcement. And again, I say that there are many wonderful police officers out there they do their jobs. But it is those experiences that are so negative that can really shape a person’s view of law enforcement, especially when videos like this pop up on You Tube. Educate yourself and know how to handle yourself if you are ever stopped by the police. Know your rights and know how to express yourself.
May you all not have to experience the reality check.
