Opinion ID: 783430
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Governing Fourth Amendment Jurisprudence

Text: 23 The Fourth Amendment provides that [t]he right of the people to be secure in their persons, ... against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause.... U.S. Const. amend IV. Generally, under the Fourth Amendment, an official seizure of an individual must be supported by probable cause, even if no formal arrest is made. Dunaway v. New York, 442 U.S. 200, 208, 99 S.Ct. 2248, 60 L.Ed.2d 824 (1979). As the Supreme Court noted in Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 16, 88 S.Ct. 1868, 20 L.Ed.2d 889 (1968), 24 [i]t is quite plain that the Fourth Amendment governs seizures of the person which do not eventuate in a trip to the station house and prosecution for crime arrests in traditional terminology. It must be recognized that whenever a police officer accosts an individual and restrains his freedom to walk away, he has seized that person. 25 Thus, for purposes of the Fourth Amendment guarantee against unreasonable seizures, the general rule [is that] every arrest, and every seizure having the essential attributes of a formal arrest, is unreasonable unless it is supported by probable cause. Summers, 452 U.S. at 699-700, 101 S.Ct. 2587; see also United States v. Mendenhall, 446 U.S. 544, 554, 100 S.Ct. 1870, 64 L.Ed.2d 497 (1980) ([A] person is `seized' within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment only if, in view of all of the circumstances surrounding the incident, a reasonable person would have believed that he was not free to leave.). 26 However, in Summers, the Supreme Court recognized that 27 some seizures significantly less intrusive than an arrest have withstood scrutiny under the reasonableness standard embodied in the Fourth Amendment. In these cases the intrusion on the citizen's privacy was so much less severe than that involved in a traditional arrest that the opposing interests in crime prevention and detection and in the police officer's safety could support the seizure as reasonable. 28 Id. at 697-98 (quoting Dunaway, 442 U.S. at 209, 99 S.Ct. 2248). The Supreme Court has therefore carved out narrowly drawn exceptions to the probable cause warrant requirement for seizures not rising to the level of a formal arrest. United States v. Sharpe, 470 U.S. 675, 689, 105 S.Ct. 1568, 84 L.Ed.2d 605 (1985) (Marshall, J., concurring) (quoting Pennsylvania v. Mimms, 434 U.S. 106, 115, 98 S.Ct. 330, 54 L.Ed.2d 331(1977)); see also Douglas K. Yatter, et al., Warrantless Searches & Seizures, 88 Geo. L.J. 912, 912-13 (2000). 29 Two of the exceptions recognized by Summers are relevant to the matter at hand. Specifically, the Summers Court recognized the stop and frisk exception as set forth in Terry v. Ohio, wherein the Court held that a police officer may briefly stop an individual and conduct a patdown or frisk for weapons when the officer has a reasonable suspicion (something less than probable cause) to believe that criminal activity is afoot. See Summers, 452 U.S. at 698, 101 S.Ct. 2587 (citing Terry, 392 U.S. at 16, 88 S.Ct. 1868). The other relevant exception recognized by Summers is that a warrant to search for contraband founded on probable cause implicitly carries with it the limited authority to detain the occupants of the premises while a proper search is conducted. Id. (footnotes omitted) In a footnote to this holding, the Court opined that [a]lthough special circumstances, or possibly a prolonged detention, might lead to a different conclusion in an unusual case, we are persuaded that this routine detention of residents of a house while it was being searched for contraband pursuant to a valid warrant is not such a case. Id. at 705 n. 21, 101 S.Ct. 2587. In United States v. Fountain, 2 F.3d 656, 663 (6th Cir.1993), overruled on other grounds, Burchett v. Kiefer, 310 F.3d 937 (6th Cir.2002), this Court extended the exception established in Summers regarding the detention of residents of a home being search pursuant to a valid warrant, to the detention of visitors to the home as well. 30 Despite these exceptions, it must be remembered that the exceptions are just that, and the general rule [is that] every arrest, and every seizure having the essential attributes of a formal arrest, is unreasonable unless it is supported by probable cause. Summers, 452 U.S. at 699-700, 101 S.Ct. 2587; Mendenhall, 446 U.S. at 554, 100 S.Ct. 1870 (finding that a seizure has occurred when a reasonable person under the circumstances would not have believed that he was free to leave). The essential attributes of a formal arrest, or stated differently, the point at which the detention ripens into a de facto arrest requiring probable cause, is decided on an individual basis. See Sharpe, 470 U.S. at 685, 105 S.Ct. 1568 (Much as a `bright line' rule would be desirable, in evaluating whether an investigative detention is unreasonable, common sense and ordinary human experience must govern over rigid criteria.); see also Gardenhire v. Schubert, 205 F.3d 303, 313 (6th Cir.2000) (When a detention rises to the level of a full-fledged arrest, ... the Fourth Amendment demands that the seizure be supported by probable cause.). 31 For purposes of determining whether a Terry stop has exceeded its permissible scope, this Court has found that `[w]hen police actions go beyond checking out the suspicious circumstances that led to the original stop, the detention becomes an arrest that must be supported by probable cause.' United States v. Butler, 223 F.3d 368, 374 (6th Cir.2000) (quoting United States v. Obasa, 15 F.3d 603, 607 (6th Cir.1994)). This Court has also found that when officers restrained an individual in a police cruiser after he refused to consent to a search of a storage locker and truck, the scope of the seizure went beyond the bounds of Terry and ripened it into a custodial arrest under the Fourth Amendment. See United States v. Richardson, 949 F.2d 851, 857-58 (6th Cir.1991). 32 For purposes of determining whether the scope of the detention has exceeded the Summers exception that a warrant to search for contraband founded on probable cause implicitly carries with it the limited authority to detain the occupants of the premises while a proper search is conducted, Summers, 452 U.S. at 705, 101 S.Ct. 2587 (footnotes omitted), it would appear that so long as the officers do not detain the occupants beyond the point of the premises' search, the detention has not exceeded its permissible scope. This conclusion comports with the legitimate government interests which the Summers Court believed justified the detention, such as preventing flight in the event that incriminating evidence is found, minimizing the risk of harm to the officers by allowing officers to exercise unquestioned command of the situation, and facilitating the orderly completion of the search. See id. at 702-03 & 705 n. 21, 101 S.Ct. 2587 (noting that a prolonged detention might have led the Court to reach a different result). However, it is not merely the length of the detention that is looked at in determining whether the detention was reasonable. Rather, the scope and nature of the restraints placed on an individual's liberty is also considered. Yatter, supra at 920. As the Court noted in Summers, special circumstances and a prolonged detention, might have led to a different result. See Summers, 452 at 705 n. 21, 101 S.Ct. 2587. 33