Opinion ID: 2808513
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: whether the encounter occurred in a public

Text: place; (2) whether the suspect consented to speak with the officers; (3) whether the officers informed the individual that he was not under arrest and was free to leave; (4) whether the individuals were moved to another area; (5) whether there was a threatening presence of several officers and a display of weapons or physical force; (6) whether the officers de- prived the defendant of documents she needed to continue on her way; and (7) whether the of- ficers’ tone of voice was such that their re- quests would likely be obeyed. United States v. Johnson, 680 F.3d 966, 975 n.4 (7th Cir. 2012) (quoting United States v. Barker, 467 F.3d 625, 629 (7th Cir. 14 No. 13-3726 2006)). We also have considered “whether police indicated to the person that she was suspected of a crime or was the specific target of police investigation.” United States v. McCarthur, 6 F.3d 1270, 1276 (7th Cir. 1993). The distinction between a consensual encounter, which does not implicate the Fourth Amendment, and an investigative stop, which does implicate the constitutional guarantee because it constitutes a seizure, is often difficult to discern. On one hand, the Supreme Court has recognized that “mere police questioning does not constitute a seizure.” Bostick, 501 U.S. at 434; see also United States v. Childs, 277 F.3d 947, 950 (7th Cir. 2002) (en banc) (noting that police may approach persons and ask questions “provided that the officers do not imply that answers…are obligatory”). Accordingly, “law enforcement officers do not violate the Fourth Amendment by merely approaching an individual on the street or in another public place, by asking him if he is willing to answer some questions, [or] by putting questions to him if the person is willing to listen.” Childs, 277 F.3d at 950 (alteration in original) (quoting Bostick, 501 U.S. at 434). A mere request for identification does not change a voluntary stop, which is outside the purview of the Fourth Amendment, into an investigatory stop. See Bostick, 501 U.S. at 437 (“As we have explained, no seizure occurs when police…ask to examine the individual’s identification… .”); INS v. Delgado, 466 U.S. 210, 216 (1984) (explaining that a request for identification by itself does not constitute a seizure under the Fourth Amendment). These principles do not change when an individual is seated in an automobile. See, e.g., United States v. Douglass, 467 F.3d 621, 624 (7th Cir. 2006) (holding that “the officers’ stance on either side of [the defendant’s] car [did not] convert the encounter into a No. 13-3726 15 seizure because he still could have declined to answer their questions and driven away”). Our decision in Tyler illustrates the distinction between consensual encounters and investigatory stops. In Tyler, we concluded that the defendant would not have believed that he was free to leave, even though “the encounter took place on a public street and the officers did not draw their weapons or (at least initially) lay hands on Tyler,” because the officers “told him he was violating the law, took his identification from him and retained it while they ran a warrant check, and told him he could not leave until the warrant check was completed.” 512 F.3d at 410. We relied on our precedents addressing whether a defendant is seized when he is approached by officers at an airport or train station. In those cases, we had held that a defendant is seized “[w]here the officers told the defendant he was under investigation for carrying drugs or retained possession of his identification, travel documents, and/or luggage.” Id. We contrasted such a situation from “[w]here the officers only generally identified themselves as narcotics investigators and immediately returned the defendant’s identification and travel documents.” Id. We concluded that “[a] reasonable person would not feel free to walk away after being confronted by two police officers and told he was committing a crime in the officers’ presence.” 14 Id. at 410–11. 14Cf. Florida v. Royer, 460 U.S. 491, 501 (1983) (plurality opinion) (holding that a suspect was seized when narcotics agents told him “that he was suspected of transporting narcotics, and asked him to accompany them to the police room, while retaining his ticket and driver’s license and without indicating in any way that he was free to depart”). 16 No. 13-3726 The Supreme Court has characterized a traffic stop as a form of an investigative stop. See Rodriguez v. United States, 135 S. Ct. 1609, 1614 (2015) (“A seizure for a traffic violation justifies a police investigation of that violation. A relatively brief encounter, a routine traffic stop is more analogous to a so-called ‘Terry stop’ than to a formal arrest.” (alterations omitted) (internal quotation marks omitted)); Navarette v. California, 134 S. Ct. 1683, 1687 (2014) (“The Fourth Amendment permits brief investigative stops—such as the traffic stop in this case—when a law enforcement officer has a particularized and objective basis for suspecting the particular person stopped of criminal activity.” (internal quotation marks omitted) (citing Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 21– 22 (1968))). In contrast to a consensual encounter, “[a] traffic stop for a suspected violation of law is a ‘seizure’ of the occupants of the vehicle and therefore must be conducted in accordance with the Fourth Amendment.” Heien v. North Carolina, 135 S. Ct. 530, 536 (2014).