Court Opinion

ID: 9726128
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 12:32:21.424995+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:13:29.977931
License: Public Domain

BROWN, J.
¶ 18. (dissenting). To me, the issue is whether the arresting officer had "probable cause" to arrest for obstructing or whether the officer had merely a "reasonable suspicion" that Nieves was obstructing. The difference between the two is significant in that, with probable cause, the officer's search of the automobile was justified, but with a Terry1 stop, it would not have been.
¶ 19. What troubles me, in particular, is the quantum of evidence provided by the State to justify probable cause that Nieves obstructed the officer. This is the evidence: (1) in the evening hours, the officer saw a Taurus next to a Suburban that had been connected with drug activity; (2) the officer observed some interchange between the occupants of the Taurus and the Suburban; (3) the Taurus had temporary license plates, *192which raised the officer's suspicion because he knew that the parties associated with drug dealing in the area had used temporary plates in the past; (4) the Taurus appeared to have excessive window tint; (5) Green, the driver of the Taurus in which Nieves was a passenger, was a known associate of the Suburban's owner and was himself a suspected drug dealer; (6) when Green grabbed his backpack from the backseat, the officer noticed several bills of currency in the backpack; (7) Nieves said he was from Chicago and gave his name as "Anthony Otero." The officer could not verify this by a database search; and (8) the officer believed that persons suspected of drug activity often give false names if there are outstanding warrants.
¶ 20. When Nieves gave the name "Anthony Ot-ero" and it did not turn up in the database, the officer no doubt had a good hunch that Nieves had not given his true name because he had a guilty mind based on the situation at hand. On the above-stated facts, the officer had a " 'particularized and objective basis' for suspecting the person stopped of criminal activity." Ornelas v. United States, 517 U.S. 690, 696 (1996) (citation omitted). The officer therefore would have been justified in "freezing" the situation and putting Nieves in his squad, handcuffed, until he could find out more.
¶ 21. But did the officer have probable cause to arrest at this point? In Alabama v. White, 496 U.S. 325, 330 (1990), Justice White explained the differences in the "reasonable suspicion" and "probable cause" standards:
Reasonable suspicion is a less demanding standard than probable cause not only in the sense that reasonable suspicion can be established with information that is different in quantity or content than that required to *193establish probable cause, but also in the sense that reasonable suspicion can arise from information that is less reliable than that required to show probable cause.
¶ 22. Thus, it is the content of information possessed by police and the degree of reliability which demarcate the difference between the two standards. Let us sample the "reliability" aspects of the two relevant facts which led to the obstructing charge.
¶ 23. First, the officer had facts from which he could readily form a good guess that drug activity was afoot. These facts certainly strengthen the false identity suspicion, though only marginally. A person suspected of being involved in drug activity might have outstanding warrants and therefore that person might have an incentive to give a false name. But the key word here is "might." That a person involved with drug suspects might have warrants outstanding and might therefore lie about his or her identity is a nice hunch, but it is not a fact — at least not a reliable fact.
¶ 24. Second, the name "Anthony Otero" did not come up in the database. That would no doubt raise suspicion. But does this mean that Nieves was probably lying about his identity? I take my cue from Erickson v. State, 141 P.3d 356 (Alaska Ct. App. 2006), rehearing granted, 141 P.3d 355 (Alaska Ct. App. 2006). The Alaska court, faced with similar facts, observed that it had no knowledge about how accurate and usable the database at issue was. Id. at 359. The court surmised that even though the State alleged that the database contained all the licensed drivers and people who had contact with police in Alaska, it would still exclude a huge number of people whom a policeman might encounter. Id. The court concluded that an officer does not *194have probable cause to arrest for obstructing simply because a name is not in some database. Id. at 359-60.
¶ 25. Looking at the record here, there are even greater gaps in knowledge about the database in this case. The only description in the record is the statement in the complaint that Otero "did not come back on file in Wisconsin or Illinois." We do not know what the database contained — whether it was limited to licensed drivers, everybody who had come into contact with law enforcement or something different. We do not know how accurate or flexible the database was; for example, whether a typo or use of a nickname would result in a person's failure to come up on file. We only know that an Anthony Otero, from Chicago, was not in the database.2 In my view, the fact that Anthony Otero was not in the database did not result in a "fair probability" that Nieves obstructed. No doubt, there was suspicion, but the United States Supreme Court has said that probable cause must be based on more than mere suspicion. Henry v. United States, 361 U.S. 98, 104 (1959). And citing to the United States Supreme Court again, the "process does not deal with hard certainties, but with probabilities." United States v. Cortez, 449 U.S. 411, 418 (1981). It is my opinion that a man or woman who is at a possible drug scene who gives a name that does not show up on a database does not satisfy the law of probabilities that he or she has given a false name. Suspicion, yes, probabilities, no.
¶ 26. The State suggests that, had there been no arrest, the only other option was to let Nieves go *195without verifying his identification. That is wrong. The officer, as I indicated at the outset, could have held Nieves on a Terry stop until the identity problem had been resolved. Once resolved, Nieves could have been placed under arrest for obstructing. Until then, the officer had no right to search Green's car incident to arrest.
¶ 27. I fully realize that, while courts often opine that "reasonable suspicion" is a less demanding standard than "probable cause," there is no clear sense and no offered guidance as how to differentiate between the two in a mathematically finite way. The difference between the two standards seems to move along a spectrum that defies fixed points. I am convinced that this inability to clearly define "probability" with any certainty is what gives succor to the majority's view that the facts in this case allowed the "inference" of obstructing. But I am not so satisfied. I dispute the relationship of the premises (Nieves was at a possible drug scene and his name was not in the database) to the conclusion drawn by the officer (Nieves was probably lying about his identity).
¶ 28. If we are to allow officers to arrest persons who are suspected of being at a drug-related scene simply because a name given to the officer is not in a database, officers can use that database failure to search a car, search a person, search a home, all without a warrant. It is my view that the inferences an officer draws from the facts must be of reliable vitality before privacy interests entirely give way. If the facts are less reliable, the government's interest in stopping illegal drug activity must be measured against existing privacy interests. Here, the governmental interest in ferreting out the true information as to Nieves' identity could have been accomplished without intruding into the *196private realm of Green's automobile. It is unreasonable to entrust freedom from unreasonable search and seizure to an unknown computer database. I respectfully dissent.

 Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1 (1968).

 Interestingly, the record suggests that there is, in reality, an Anthony Otero who is the brother of the defendant. If such is the case and, if Anthony Otero were the one in the passenger seat instead of Nieves, could Otero have been arrested simply because his name was not in the database?