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IL: Asking for consent while the defendant was still seated in patrol car, just as paperwork was returned, was not consent

By John Wesley Hall, Jr.

Asking for consent while the defendant was still seated in the patrol car, just as paperwork was returned was not consent. People v. Bernstein, 2008 Ill. App. LEXIS 637 (June 26, 2008): The circumstances in the case at bar establish that Blanks began questioning Bernstein at the same time he returned Bernstein's documents and the warning citation. The trial court determined that the traffic stop concluded when Blanks gave Bernstein back his documents and the warning citation. We disagree. We do not consider Blanks' superficial termination of the traffic stop to have concluded it. Blanks returned the documents and immediately began posing questions to Bernstein. Blanks inserted his request to ask more questions in the "seamless transition between mandatory and 'consensual' interaction...continue to full post

Full post as published by Fourth Amendment on July 05, 2008 (boomark / email).