Opinion ID: 2739950
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Reasonable Suspicion for a Terry Stop

Text: The Fourth Amendment protects individuals “against unreasonable searches and seizures.” U.S. Const. amend. IV. Ordinarily seizures are “reasonable” only when supported by probable cause to believe an individual has committed a crime. See, e.g., Dunaway v. New York, 442 U.S. 200, 213 (1979); Bailey v. United States, 133 S. Ct. 1031, 1037 (2013). The longstanding exception to this rule arises under Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1 No. 12-1674 7 (1968), which authorizes brief investigatory detentions based on the less demanding standard of reasonable suspicion that criminal activity is afoot, id. at 21-22; United States v. Baskin, 401 F.3d 788, 791 (7th Cir. 2005). Such a brief detention is permitted when it demands only a limited intrusion into an individual’s privacy and rests on “specific and articulable facts which, taken together with rational inferences from those facts, reasonably warrant that intrusion.” Terry, 392 U.S. at 21. Determining whether such an investigatory detention is constitutional requires balancing the governmental interest in the seizure against the degree to which it intrudes on an individual’s personal liberty. See id. at 20-21. And although reasonable suspicion is a less demanding standard than probable cause, such a stop requires at least a minimal level of objective justification and the officer must be able to articulate more than an “inchoate and unparticularized suspicion or ‘hunch’” of criminal activity. Id. at 27; see also Ill. v. Wardlow, 528 U.S. 119, 123-24 (2000). Ultimately, determining whether reasonable suspicion exists is not an exact science, and “must be based on commonsense judgments and inferences about human behavior.” Wardlow, 528 U.S. at 125. Although Matz insists that Officers Klotka and Zuberbier have demonstrated nothing beyond an unparticularized hunch to support their decision to stop his car, the record establishes otherwise. The officers both saw and recognized Salazar from their warrant squad briefings, where he was identified as a member of the Latin Kings gang wanted in connection with an armed robbery. Zuberbier had also been told that Salazar was a suspect in several homicides. And by the time the officers were able to make a U-turn and approach the building in an 8 No. 12-1674 attempt to speak with Salazar, every individual on the porch was leaving the scene.2 During the chase that ensued, officers had no way of knowing where exactly Salazar had gone and could reasonably have believed he was hidden in the car with Matz and other individuals from the porch. In the face of this evidence, Matz insists that neither his proximity to Salazar on the porch nor his flight from officers, standing alone, would establish reasonable suspicion to support a Terry stop. Matz’s assertion is correct as far as it goes. We have recognized that simply being in the presence of others who are themselves suspected of criminal activity is insufficient standing alone to establish particularized suspicion for a Terry stop and frisk. See Ybarra v. Ill., 444 U.S. 85, 91 (1979) (“[A] person’s mere propinquity to others independently suspected of criminal activity does not, without more, give rise to probable cause to search that person.”) (emphasis added). Likewise, we have acknowledged that suspicion of illegal activity at a particular location does not transfer such a suspicion to an individual leaving the property. See United States v. Bohman, 683 F.3d 861, 864 (7th Cir. 2012). Neither does the act of choosing to avoid a police encounter—either by refusing to cooperate or leaving the scene—by itself create 2 Matz submitted a declaration in the district court in which he maintained that he “did not run from the porch area.” But he has not disputed the accounts of both Klotka and Zuberbier that by the time they exited their vehicles all occupants of the porch had left and were moving quickly enough that it was necessary for the officers to give chase in order to speak with anyone from the porch. No. 12-1674 9 sufficient objective justification for a seizure or detention. See, e.g., Fl. v. Bostick, 501 U.S. 429, 437 (1991). But it is axiomatic that in determining whether officers had the requisite particularized suspicion for a Terry stop, we do not consider in isolation each variable of the equation that may add up to reasonable suspicion. See, e.g., United States v. Johnson, 170 F.3d 708, 714 (1999) (“Applying the Terry standard, we have consistently held that reasonable suspicion is to be determined in light of the totality of the circumstances.”). Instead, we consider the sum of all of the information known to officers at the time of the stop. Terry, 392 U.S. at 22-23; United States v. Lenoir, 318 F.3d 725, 729 (7th Cir. 2003). And this includes behavior that may in other circumstances be considered innocent; in other words, context matters. Baskin, 401 F.3d at 793 (“[B]ehavior which is susceptible to an innocent explanation when isolated from its context may still give rise to a reasonable suspicion when considered in light of all the factors at play.”); United States v. Fiasche, 520 F.3d 694, 697-98 (7th Cir. 2008). First, it is undisputed that the officers had particularized suspicion as to Salazar connecting him to armed robbery and multiple homicides. Given that Salazar and Matz were together on the porch, they also had a basis from which to conclude that Salazar may have fled in the same car as Matz and the other individual visible to them in the car. Although Salazar was not visible to the officers from their vantage point outside the car, he could have been hidden in the car to avoid detection and capture. In fact, it is unlikely that a person police believed to be wanted for armed robbery and possibly multiple homicides, 10 No. 12-1674 who had run from law enforcement, would remain in plain view as officers approached the car rather than hide in some way. Given that both Salazar and Matz were together on the porch and both exited the area simultaneously, the officers had an objectively reasonable basis to believe that Salazar could be in the vehicle with Matz, and therefore had an objectively reasonable basis to stop the vehicle and briefly detain the occupants while they ascertained whether Salazar was with him or whether they were complicit in helping him evade law enforcement. And it does not matter whether that was their actual motivation for stopping the vehicle, because the test under the Fourth Amendment is whether the seizure was objectively reasonable. E.g., Whren v. United States, 517 U.S. 806, 813-14 (1996). In sum, the officers possessed particularized and specific suspicion as to Salazar, a known gang member suspected of committing violent crimes. Their attempt to approach Salazar was met with the precipitous departure of the entire group, including Matz. In their justifiable attempt to apprehend Salazar, Klotka and Zuberbier gave chase to everyone scattering from the porch. They were outnumbered as they approached a moving vehicle that they reasonably could have believed contained Salazar, who was suspected of committing violent crimes and who could very well have been armed. Given these circumstances, it was reasonable for them to conduct further investigation, including stopping the vehicle leaving the scene and detaining the occupants so they could assess the situation. See United States v. Howard, 729 F.3d 655, 659 (7th Cir. 2013) (collecting cases and noting that the Supreme Court “has recognized limited situations at the scene of No. 12-1674 11 police activity in which it may be reasonable for police to detain people not suspected of criminal activity themselves, so long as the additional intrusion on individual liberty is marginal and is outweighed by the governmental interest in conducting legitimate police activities safely and free from interference”); cf. Wardlow, 528 U.S. at 125 (recognizing that when officers confront behavior susceptible of two potential explanations, one innocent and one potentially criminal, they are entitled to “detain the individuals to resolve the ambiguity”).