Opinion ID: 1818601
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Applying Lightbourne

Text: The circumstances of this case are similar. The defendant was standing on a sidewalk among a group of men. When police officers approached, some of them walked away. The defendant stayed. One of the officers asked for his identification, which he relinquished. The officer then ran a warrants check, which took no more than a couple of minutes. Golphin, 838 So.2d at 706. While waiting for the results, the defendant warned the officer that he had a history of arrests and that he probably had an `open warrant.' Id. He was rightand was arrested. Now he claims that the identification check constituted an unreasonable seizure in violation of his Fourth Amendment rights. While I recognize that in order to determine whether a particular encounter constitutes a seizure, a court must consider all the circumstances surrounding the encounter rather than rely on per se rules, Florida v. Bostick, 501 U.S. 429, 439, 111 S.Ct. 2382, 115 L.Ed.2d 389 (1991), the circumstances in this case are so similar to those in Lightbourne that we could not hold in the defendant's favor without either receding from that case or creating an inconsistency in the law. In fact, in Lightbourne the officer's conduct came closer to a Fourth Amendment violation than the conduct at issue here. There, the officer returned to his patrol car to check for warrants, whereas in this case the officer apparently without moving away [from Golphin] simply commenced a computer check for outstanding warrants. Majority op. at 1178. The check lasted only two minutes, during which Golphin spoke with the officer. Moreover, because Golphin was standing on the street instead of driving a car, he could have walked away without his identification, thus feeling more freedom to end the encounter than the defendant in Lightbourne, who needed his license to drive away lawfully. Under the totality of the circumstances, therefore, the encounter in this case was even less coercive than the one in Lightbourne. A holding that this defendant was seized while the defendant in Lightbourne was not would create confusion and inconsistency in our Fourth Amendment law. Although the United States Supreme Court has explained that a totality of the circumstances approach may render appellate review less circumscribed by precedent than otherwise, United States v. Arvizu, 534 U.S. 266, 276, 122 S.Ct. 744, 151 L.Ed.2d 740 (2002), some degree of deference to relevant precedent remains prudent. We have an obligation not only to the lower courts, but also to Florida citizens and law enforcement officers to maintain consistency and predictability in our Fourth Amendment jurisprudence. While every police encounter will involve slightly different circumstances, not every difference is constitutionally significant.