Court Opinion

ID: 9686313
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 15:41:46.812599+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:48:59.703722
License: Public Domain

Fitzgerald, P.J.
(dissenting). I respectfully disagree with the majority’s conclusion that defendant was not *700seized when Officer Millikin approached defendant and asked him to produce identification.
A person is seized within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment if, in view of the circumstances surrounding the incident, a reasonable person would have believed that he was not free to leave. Michigan v Chesternut, 486 US 567, 573; 108 S Ct 1975; 100 L Ed 2d 565 (1988); People v Daniels, 186 Mich App 77, 80; 463 NW2d 131 (1990). I agree with the majority opinion that a person who is approached by an officer in a public place and merely asked questions is not, without some form of detention, subject to a seizure. People v Shabaz, 424 Mich 42, 56-57; 378 NW2d 451 (1985); People v Taylor, 214 Mich App 167, .170; 542 NW2d 322 (1995). Indeed, the cases relied on by the majority opinion involve persons who were approached in public places and questioned by officers. The apparent rationale for this principle is that under such circumstances one is free to ignore the questions and simply walk away. The present case is distinguishable in that defendant was on private property at the time he was approached and questioned by Officer Millikin.1 Officer Millikin entered the private property2 and identified himself to defendant as a police officer. Officer Millikin did not merely ask questions, but went one step further and asked defendant to produce identification. At this point, defendant, who was in the driveway of his brother’s *701residence where he would be staying while visiting Michigan, could not logically be expected to simply “walk away,” as one in a public place could be expected to do. Defendant reasonably could have believed that he was not free to ignore Officer Millikin’s request for identification under these circumstances, and for that reason I would conclude that defendant was seized when Officer Millikin asked defendant to produce identification. See, e.g., People v Freeman, 413 Mich 492; 320 NW2d 878 (1982).3 Because there is no dispute that Officer Millikin did not have a reasonable suspicion supported by articulable facts that criminal activity was afoot, the seizure was illegal. Hence, I would affirm the district and circuit courts’ suppression of the evidence and dismissal of the case.

 Defendant was sleeping in his vehicle in his brother’s driveway because, having reached his destination in the middle of the night, he did not want to awaken anyone.

 I refer to private property not because defendant has a reasonable expectation of privacy in the private property of his brother, but rather because defendant was not on public property from which he could be expected to simply walk away.

 The only factual distinction between the present case and Freeman is that the officer in Freeman asked the defendant to step out of the vehicle and produce identification. I do not believe that this distinction is of such significance to hold that the district and circuit courts erred in relying on Freeman in concluding that a seizure occurred in this case when defendant was asked to produce identification.