Court Opinion

ID: 9690715
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 19:37:27.411825+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:19:02.614253
License: Public Domain

VENTERS, Justice,
dissenting.
I am unable to agree with the majority’s conclusion that the circumstances present in this case meet the Constitutional standard of “at least articulable and reasonable suspicion” required by Delaware v. Prouse, 440 U.S. 648, 663, 99 S.Ct. 1391, 59 L.Ed.2d 660 (1979), and, therefore, I respectfully dissent. I understand the majority’s reliance upon Steinbeck v. Commonwealth, 862 S.W.2d 912 (Ky.App.1993) because the facts are similar. But, I would regard that similarity as cause to re-examine Steinbeck, not to stretch even thinner the concept of articulable, reasonable suspicion.
Even so, the facts in Steinbeck deemed to constitute reasonable suspicion were markedly stronger than those we find here. In Steinbeck: 1) the vehicle turned onto a side road within sight of, but before reaching the checkpoint; 2) the side road was an “uninhabited and unpaved” country road, so no legitimate reason for the turn was apparent; 3) in the arresting officer’s experience, the drivers of all vehicles that have turned away from a checkpoint have been drinking alcohol; and 4) the event occurred at 3:15 a.m.
In this matter, Bauder was arrested at a time when many people are still out, around 11:00 p.m. Mill Road, onto which Bauder turned before the checkpoint, is a marked, paved, public road, with several residences in plain sight. Mill Road forms a shortcut for people traveling between Kentucky Highway 34 and Kentucky Highway 300.2 It was also a shortcut to Bau-*594der’s house. Additionally, Bauder correctly notes that KRS 189.930(3) prohibits driving into a block where emergency vehicles with lights flashing have stopped for an emergency. Thus, unlike the facts in Steinbeck, there were legitimate explanations for Bauder’s turn onto Mill Road that the arresting officer should have considered before determining “articulable and reasonable suspicion” existed to instigate a stop. Bauder could have been taking a shortcut or avoiding what appeared to be an emergency on the road ahead. Significant is the fact that the arresting officer acknowledged that he attempts to stop every vehicle that turns before reaching a checkpoint3, despite his own experience that some drivers who turn to avoid the checkpoint are not guilty of any offense. He did not, therefore, use any discretion or articulate any reason to differentiate Bauder’s activity from the innocent drivers he has previously stopped.
The facts in this case do not support the level of suspicion created by the facts in Steinbeck. The majority’s holding expands Steinbeck so that the police may now apprehend and detain any person who acts in a manner that suggests an aversion to police contact.
We recently held that one’s mere presence on the street in a high crime area late at night does not create an articulable, reasonable suspicion to support police intervention. Strange v. Commonwealth, 269 S.W.3d 847, 852 (Ky.2008). We also held, citing Florida v. Royer, 460 U.S. 491, 103 S.Ct. 1319, 75 L.Ed.2d 229 (1983), that a police officer is free to approach any person in a public place for any reason, and ask questions. Strange, 269 S.W.3d at 850. However, the corollary of that rule is that the “person may decline to listen to the questions at all and may go on his way for doing so; and his refusal to listen or answer does not, without more, furnish those grounds [to seize his person].” Royer, 460 U.S. at 498, 103 S.Ct. 1319 (Emphasis added). See also Quintana v. Commonwealth, 276 S.W.3d 753, 759-760 (Ky.2008) (holding that one’s refusal to open his door and talk to police when they knock does not justify any further intrusion by the police). The majority’s opinion in this matter contradicts that rule, saying in effect that any behavior that indicates a desire to avoid interaction with the police is alone suspicious enough to justify a seizure of the person and at least a temporary detention of that person for further investigation.
The freedom to be left alone is a cherished aspect of our liberty. I fear that the majority opinion will lead to the infringement of that freedom because it sanctions the government’s interference with those who simply choose to be left alone, thereby equating the desire to be free from government intrusion with criminal behavior. Despite his own experience, the arresting officer here considered nothing other than Bauder’s lawful turn onto a side street as a reason to pursue him. The officer did not exercise any discretion whatsoever. He did not evaluate any of the innocent explanations for Bauder’s turn. He did not even act on a non-specific hunch that illegal activity was afoot. He simply acted on his own rule — apprehend the driver of every car that turns away before reaching *595the checkpoint. The only “circumstance” articulated by the majority to constitute reasonable suspicion is that the officer could think of no reason for Bauder’s turn other than an apparent preference to avoid police contact, from which the officer inferred illegal activity. Nothing is offered to justify the stop except Bauder’s use of the shortcut that bypassed the roadblock.
It is absurd hyperbole of the majority to suggest that, “There would be no law on our highways” if, as I urge here, we simply adhere to our time-honored Constitutional concept of probable cause and reasonable, articulable suspicion. By this decision, we are now declaring that a citizen’s desire to be left alone, to avoid conversation with the police, is by itself a justification for detention and interrogation. For that reason, I dissent.
MINTON, C.J., and NOBLE, J., join.

. The majority opinion implies that Bauder “re-entered” Kentucky Highway 300 after traveling on Mill Road. The record however reflects that Bauder was traveling on Kentucky Highway 34, turned onto Mill Road, then turned onto Kentucky Highway 300, *594which begins at the intersection where the police roadblock was located.

. The trooper testified that when the officers are busy with vehicles at the checkpoint, it may be impossible to pursue those that turn away. It is interesting that Appellant was the first vehicle to approach the checkpoint, and when the officer left the site to catch him, the roadblock dissolved due to lack of manpower. Thus, not a single vehicle ever went the through the checkpoint that night.