Court Opinion

ID: 9682911
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 13:19:24.188187+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:17:43.063164
License: Public Domain

ROBERTS, Judge,
dissenting.
The facts are sufficiently stated by the majority, but I further note the following: that the “experience” of the arresting officer was of some seven months; that one of the appellant’s companion’s parents lived in the neighborhood where they were questioned; that the arresting officer’s testimony was contradictory as to when the appellant became nervous, as the officer approached him or only after he asked for his identification; that the fact that the officer approached appellant because of recent burglaries in the area was brought out by the trial court’s examination of the officer at the motion to suppress;1 that the officer testified that the appellant and his companions were not holding any tools, ropes or crowbars, and were, in fact, empty-handed; that the arresting officer testified that he did not suspect the appellant and his companions to have committed a crime; that the arresting officer stated unequivocally at least four times that the appellant and his companions were doing nothing suspicious.
This case presents the question of whether the reasonableness of a temporary detention for investigative purposes, what we have formerly denominated as a “lesser intrusion upon the personal security of an individual,”2 should be tested by the application of Fourth Amendment principles and Article I, Section 9 of the Constitution of this State when such investigation is merely a request for identification. I would hold that it should be so tested; that the instant investigative detention was unreasonable in light of the facts; and that the evidentiary fruit obtained from such unreasonable investigative detention was improperly admitted into evidence.
A recent federal decision focuses on the exact problem that we face in the case at bar: the reasonableness of the request for identification. In United States v. Salter, 521 F.2d 1326 (2nd Cir. 1975), Judge Friendly, speaking for a unanimous court, stated that a routine request for identification is allowable once an otherwise lawful stop for investigative purposes has taken place.
“Once a lawful stop for investigative purposes is under way, it is mere routine for an officer to ask for identification, see United States v. Lincoln, 494 F.2d 833, 838 (9th Cir. 1974). . . . Such a request is relatively non-intrusive, and there are important reasons why an officer needs to obtain a correct identification. ... an officer may need to know a person’s identity so as to be able to contact him at a later date. (Citation). Naturally, there is a possibility of harassment in even routine requests for identification, but there are too many legitimate uses not to allow it once an otherwise lawful stop has taken place. (Citation)” (Emphasis added).
This is a reasonable view. Part and parcel of practically every temporary detention for investigation is the request for identification. It serves many purposes, and efficient law enforcement requires it. However, we should require that quantum of justification necessary for a lawful investi*53gative detention before we should sanction any of its incidents.
In Brown v. State, 481 S.W.2d 106 (Tex.Cr.App.1972), we stated that:
“The basic purpose of the Fourth Amendment is to safeguard the privacy and security of individuals against arbitrary invasions by government officials. (Citations). Such an intrusion may be justified upon a showing that the facts of a case presented any one of three classes of probable cause. These are probable cause to arrest, probable cause to search and probable cause to investigate. ******
“. . . Probable cause for an officer to detain a person temporarily for investigative purposes exists where the circumstances reasonably indicate that that particular person either has or is preparing to commit a crime. (Citations).
“The inarticulate hunch, suspicion, or good faith of an arresting officer is insufficient to constitute probable cause under any of the three above named classes. (Citations). For ‘[i]f subjective good faith alone were the test, the protections of the Fourth Amendment would evaporate, and the people would be “secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects,” only in the discretion of the police.’ ” (Citation). (Emphasis added).3
In the case at bar, we do not have circumstances which reasonably indicate that the appellant had committed or was preparing to commit a crime. The officer testified that he did not suspect the appellant and his companions to have committed a crime. Indeed, we do not even have the insufficient “inarticulate hunch, suspicion, or good faith” of the arresting officer because he stated unequivocally at least four times that appellant and his companions were doing nothing suspicious.
The record does not reflect how many recent burglaries had been committed in the neighborhood. Even so, the fact that criminal activity is more likely in one geographical area than another does not by itself satisfy the standards required for an interrogatory stop. United States v. Brignoni-Ponce, 422 U.S. 878, 882-886, 95 S.Ct. 2574, 45 L.Ed.2d 607 (1975); United States v. Nicholas, 448 F.2d 622, 624 (8th Cir. 1971); United States v. Davis, 147 U.S.App. D.C. 400, 458 F.2d 819, 822 (1972); People v. Oden, 36 N.Y.2d 382, 385, 368 N.Y.S.2d 508, 329 N.E.2d 188 (1974).
In Thompson v. State, 533 S.W.2d 825 (Tex.Cr.App.1976), we quoted from Wood v. State, 515 S.W.2d ,300 (Tex.Cr.App.1974), and held that:
“. . .A brief stop of a suspicious individual in order to determine his identity or to maintain status quo momentarily while obtaining more information may be reasonable in light of facts known to the officer at the time.” Thompson, at 827.
In the case at bar, the officer testified that the appellant was not a suspicious individual. The only fact known to the officer at the time was that there had been several recent burglaries in the neighborhood. In Thompson, the facts were that the defendant was walking at 1 a.m. in a high crime area and carrying something which bore obvious evidence that it belonged to someone other than the defendant. In the case at bar, the appellant was standing empty-handed at 10:20 a.m. in the neighborhood where one of his companion’s parents lived.4
*54In Hernandez v. State, 523 S.W.2d 410 (Tex.Cr.App.1975), we stated that an “inarticulate hunch” is not sufficient to permit an officer to stop and detain a person for investigation. As noted, we do not even have the “inarticulate hunch” in the instant case. However, we further held in Hernandez that:
“So there will be no misunderstanding, we are not holding that a police officer has the right to stop for investigation any person . . .. (Citation). This Court will not, nor should any court, tolerate unfounded detention or harassment of citizens.” Id., at 412.
I can see how some would view the request for identification as a relatively minor intrusion into the personal freedom of an individual. However, I cannot accept the reasoning that the individual can remedy an unjustified request by simply denying the request and walking away. See, Nicholas, supra, at 624. To so hold would be to belie the fact that most ordinary citizens feel they must act with respect for the color of the law. Unjustified requests for individuals to produce their identification should not take place.
Because there was no shred of justification for the arresting officer’s demand that the appellant produce his identification, I would hold that this action was unreasonable within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution and Article I, Section 9 of the Constitution of this State. The evidence obtained as a result of this unreasonable intrusion should not have been admitted into evidence.5
I am as much for effective law enforcement as anyone. However, I am compelled to reason that police intrusions which have no basis other than the unfettered exercise of police discretion are exactly what the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution and Article I, Section 9 of the Constitution of this State were designed to protect against. Our streets are traversed not only by the criminal minority but also by the law-abiding majority. The housewife scurrying down the sidewalk to get inside the grocery store before it closes should not have to stop and produce her identification at the whim of an officer; the elderly citizen nervously awaiting the walk-signal in order to cross the street and attend a religious service for which he is already late should not be similarly hampered by the hunch of a patrolman; the couple on a Sunday stroll should not have their conversation interrupted by a policeman who arbitrarily wants them to prove who they are. We are inched closer to the horizon of these occurrences by the decision of the majority today. That is why I respectfully dissent.
PHILLIPS, J., joins in this dissent.

. At the motion hearing, when both sides had initially finished questioning the arresting officer who had alluded to “burglaries in the area,” the following occurred:
“THE COURT: The Court has some questions.
* # * * * *
“THE COURT: Did I understand you to say there was a rash of burglaries in that neighborhood?
“[OFFICER]: Yes, sir.
“THE COURT: Is that the reason you went over to these men?
“[OFFICER]: Yes, sir.
“THE COURT: You didn’t tell the attorney that see.”

. Ablon v. State, 537 S.W.2d 267, 269 (Tex.Cr.App. 1976) (and cases there cited).

. We have recently reiterated this rule concerning the requisite justification for a temporary investigative detention. Leighton v. State, 544 S.W.2d 394, 397 (Tex.Cr.App.1976, On Appellant’s Motion for Rehearing).

. Terry, supra, and Baity, supra, relied on by the majority, are also distinguishable as follows:
In Terry, the officer observed the defendant and a companion pace back and forth along an identical route, pausing to stare in the same store window, which they did for a total of about 24 times. Each completion of the route was followed by a conference between the two on a comer, at one of which they were joined by a third man who left swiftly. Because of these facts, the officer testified that he suspected the two men of “casing a job, a stick-up.”
In Baity, the officer, in early morning hours, observed the defendant who he knew *54had a record of many arrests for theft and burglary, enter an alley where the officer was patrolling. He then observed the defendant suddenly turn back out of the alley and walk away rapidly with his coat pulled up tight around him. The officer observed a crowbar and some other object under the defendant’s coat.

. “A ruling admitting evidence in a criminal trial, we recognize, has the necessary effect of legitimizing the conduct which produced the evidence, while an application of the exclusionary rule withholds the constitutional imprimatur.” Terry, supra, 392 U.S. at 13, 88 S.Ct. at 1875.
“Under our decision, courts still retain their traditional responsibility to guard against police conduct which is overbearing or harassing, or which trenches upon personal security without the objective evidentiary justification which the Constitution requires. When such conduct is identified, it must be condemned by the judiciary and its fruits must be excluded from evidence in criminal trials.” Id., at 15, 88 S.Ct. at 1876.