Home -> Law Blog Directory -> Criminal Law Blogs -> Fourth Amendment

Criminal Law

: Fourth Amendment

VA: Defendant had right to walk away from approaching officer

By John Wesley Hall, Jr.

The defendant was seen with a group of men by a bike cop who headed toward them in what the officer described was a "high crime area." The defendant walked 15' to his town house. This was not "headlong flight" as in Wardlow. The defendant had a right to walk away from the officer. Jones v. Commonwealth, 2008 Va. App. LEXIS 561 (December 23, 2008): The facts of the instant case can hardly be equated to those of Wardlow. Unlike the facts in Wardlow, the officers in the instant case were on a routine patrol, not targeting participants in a drug transaction at a specific location where drug transactions were known to frequently occur. Furthermore, Jones carried no item, such as the opaque bag in Wardlow, which together with the other circumstances, would objectively indicate his involvement in criminal activity...continue to full post

Full post as published by Fourth Amendment on December 31, 2008 (boomark / email).