This is a big deal and the decision surprised me, because it doesn't say the police can compel just anyone to provide a name. It has to be someone they've stopped with reasonable suspicion.
The problem is that the average citizen can't know if the officer had reasonable suspicion, which means when deciding whether to provide his name to a police officer who has requested it, the citizen can't know if he's about to commit a crime by refusing. If this isn't void for vagueness, I don't what should be.
An additional problem, of course, is that police can make up reasons that a citizen on the streets is ill equipped to refute. For example, I have some friends who were hassled for taking pictures of big buildings in NYC. Once they got home they were obviously able to determine that there is no such statute, but when you're on someone's beat you're at the mercy of their interpretation.
Posts: 1839 | Registered: May 1999
| IP: Logged |
posted
Interestingly, a California law that had been interpreted to allow arrest of anyone not producing reliable ID during a Terry stop (one requiring reasonable suspicion) was void for vagueness on the grounds I outlined above. Tonight I'm going to look up the cite for that and then see if the defendant briefed that argument. Seems pretty obvious to me.
posted
I was thinking of Kolender v. Lawson. It was vague because there was no real standard on what a credible ID was. But I think the larger issue applies, and think there's also an issue similar to the Chicago gang-loitering case as well.
posted
hrrrm... I must have accidentally deleted my "Larsen v. California" posting, when I meant to add "Edit: Or so I thought. However, I can't find it on the Web"
Posts: 8501 | Registered: Jul 2001
| IP: Logged |
Printer-friendly view of this topic
