Court Opinion

ID: 9483750
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 09:30:35.216509+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:49:49.198126
License: Public Domain

MORRIS SHEPPARD ARNOLD, Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent from the judgment of the court because I do not see any material difference between this case and United States v. Millan, 912 F.2d 1014 (8th Cir.1990). I agree that each case must be decided on its own facts and that the ultimate question is whether the relevant police officers had a reasonable, articulable suspicion that the defendant was engaged in criminal activity. Even if one gives this collection of words the most “liberal” construction that they can reasonably bear, however, I do not think that the detention in this case can survive the test that those words propose. For me, a reasonable sus*1192picion cannot arise from facts unless they make it more likely than not that illegal activity is underway. All of the relevant facts here are, to my mind, at best equivocal, that is, they are just as consistent with legal conduct as not. It is particularly distressing that the court holds that not carrying identification can be counted an incriminating circumstance, either by itself or in combination with other relevant matter. This comes perilously close to requiring citizens to carry an internal passport, a device usually associated only with authoritarian governments, left and right, and certainly not with those that value personal liberty, including the right to travel. Nor is United States v. Sokolow, 490 U.S. 1, 109 S.Ct. 1581, 104 L.Ed.2d 1 (1989), which the court cites, of any relevance to this case. In that case, the fact that the defendant did not have identification was discovered after the Terry stop and could not therefore have provided any of the factual justification for it. Indeed, the Court did not rely on that fact in any respect.
I know that the court and I are on common ground in believing that if the choice must be made between winning the war on drugs and keeping our bill of rights, it is our sworn duty to choose the latter course. If the war on drugs is to be won, the government must win it without resorting to unconstitutional means.