People v. Rodriguez

206 N.Y.3d 227

229 N.E.3d 1120

41 N.Y.3d 1

The PEOPLE of the State of New York, Respondent,

v.Lance RODRIGUEZ, Appellant.

Court of Appeals of New York.

Decided November 21, 2023

Patricia Pazner, Appellate Advocates, New York City (Hannah Kon and David L. Goodwin of counsel), for appellant., for appellant.

Melinda Katz, District Attorney, Kew Gardens (Mariana Zelig and John M. Castellano of counsel), for respondent.

White & Case LLP, New York City (B. Cameron Brewer, Stefan Mentzer, Renata Rogers de Castilho, Joshua J. Howard and Tripp Odom of counsel), for Alice Ristroph and others, amicus curiae.

New York Civil Liberties Union Foundation, New York City (Daniel R. Lambright, Molly Biklen and Christopher T. Dunn of counsel), for Transportation Alternatives and others, amici curiae

The Legal Aid Society, New York City (Corey Stoughton, Philip Desgranges and Sungso Lee of counsel), for The Legal Aid Society, amicus curiae.

OPINION OF THE COURT

RIVERA, J.

₄Late one winter evening, defendant was riding his bicycle down a road in Queens, New York, when several New York City Police Department officers drove alongside him and twice asked him to stop. Defendant complied and, in response to an ₅officer’s inquiry, acknowledged that he was carrying a gun which turned out to be loaded. Afterwards, he pleaded guilty to a weapons charge. The question presented on this appeal is whether the officers violated the federal and state constitutions when they stopped defendant. We conclude that they did and hold that police interference with a bicyclist is a seizure requiring reasonable suspicion of a criminal offense or probable cause of a Vehicle and Traffic Law violation.

I.

Defendant was indicted on several weapons counts based on allegations that, after the police stopped him on his bicycle, he admitted he was carrying a loaded firearm ’ in his waistband, which the police recovered. Defendant moved to suppress the gun and his statements as products of an unlawful seizure.

During the suppression hearing, one of the officers testified that he and two other officers were patrolling in an unmarked police cruiser in Queens. At some point, the officers turned onto a two-way road running north-south when they saw defendant—who he described as "a male Hispanic"—roughly 20 to 25 yards away riding south on a beach-cruiser bicycle. Defendant was wearing sweatpants, a puffy "snorkel" jacket, and a hat. The road did not have a center-lane divider or a bike lane, and cars could park legally on its east side.

Three details drew the officers’ attention to defendant. First, defendant was riding the bicycle down the middle of the road in a "somewhat reckless" fashion in that "two or three cars" had to "stop so they didn’t hit him or go around him," although the officer acknowledged that the defendant was not charged with any traffic infractions. Second, defendant had only his right hand on the handlebars. And third, defendant was "favoring his waistband" and holding "something" with his left hand over his pants. The officer did not know what the "object" was except that it was "bulky."

The officers followed the defendant with one vehicle between their patrol car and the defendant’s bicycle. Less than a minute later and shortly before the defendant reached an intersection, the officers pulled alongside the defendant and either "said" or "yelled out" "Police, stop" or "Hold up, police." Defendant did not stop right away, so the officers continued following him and "commanded" him to stop a second time, yelling "even louder" either "stop the bicycle, police" or "Mold up, police." Defendant then turned right onto a side street and stopped his bike.

₆The officers pulled alongside defendant. Defendant straddled the bike next to the testifying officer’s passenger-side door, Through the open car window, the officer identified himself as police and asked the defendant if he had "anything on him" and the defendant answered he did. The officer was "caught … off guard" and repeated his question, and the defendant confirmed that he was carrying something. The officer then asked defendant to "step back" so that he could exit the car, at which point he repeated his question. Defendant responded that he had a "gun in [his] waistband."¹ The officer restrained defendant while his sergeant recovered a gun. The gun was loaded with eight rounds and its chamber was empty. The officers then arrested defendant.

Supreme Court denied suppression, concluding that defendant had not been seized and that the officers’ observations provided "founded suspicion" for the stop (People v. De Bow 40 N.Y.2d 210, 223, 386 N.Y.S.2d 375, 352 N.E.2d 562 [1976]).² Defendant subsequently waived his right to appeal, pleaded guilty to a reduced count and was sentenced to two years’ incarceration and 1½ years of post-release supervision.

The Appellate Division affirmed based on the appeal waiver (176 A.D.3d 1111,108 N.Y.S.3d 880 [2d Dept. 2019]), but we reversed after concluding the waiver was "invalid and unenforceable" (People v. Bisono, 36 N.Y.3d 1013, 1017-1018, 140 N.Y.S.3d 433, 164 N.E.3d 239 [2020]). On remittitur, the Appellate Division again affirmed, concluding that an officer’s encounter is subject to De Bour analysis and that the officers here had engaged in a justified common-law inquiry when they stopped defendant (194 A.D.3d 968, 147 N.Y.S.3d 678 [2d Dept. 2021]). We now reverse and make clear that, like a stop of a motor vehicle, a stop of a bicyclist is a seizure under both the federal and state constitutions.

II.

[1–4] Both the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution and Article I, § 12 of the New York Constitution prohibit ₇"unreasonable searches and seizures" (U.S. Const Amend IV; NY Const, art I, § 12). Under the Fourth Amendment, "a person is seized only when, by means of physical force or a show of authority, [their] freedom of movement is restrained" and, to determine this, courts examine "all of the circumstances surrounding the incident" and ask whether "a reasonable person would have believed that [they were] not free to leave" (United States v. Mendenhall, 446 U.S. 544, 553, 100 S.Ct. 1870, 64 L.Ed.2d 497 [1980]). Applied to police pursuits, the police seize an individual under the federal constitution only once the individual either submits to police authority or, if the individual does not submit, is subdued by force (California v. Hodari D., 499 U.S. 621, 626-628, 111 S.Ct. 1547, 113 L.Ed.2d 690 [1991]). "The Fourth Amendment permits brief investigative stops … when a law enforcement officer has a particularized and objective basis for suspecting the particular person stopped of criminal activity" (Navarette v. California, 572 U.S. 393, 396-397, 134 S.Ct. 1683, 188 L.Ed.2d 680 [2014]; Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 21-22, 88 S.Ct. 1868, 20 L.Ed.2d 889 [1968]). A stop is thus constitutional where there exists "reasonable suspicion" of criminal activity based on "the totality of the circumstances" (Navarette, 572 U.S. at 397, 134 S.Ct. 1683 [internal quotation marks omitted]).

[5] However, federal law draws a bright line for traffic stops. Under the Fourth Amendment, "stopping an automobile and detaining its occupants constitutes a seizure" because, as the Supreme Court has explained, automobile stops "generally entail law enforcement officers signaling a moving automobile to pull over to the side of the roadway, by means of a possibly unsettling show of authority" that "may create substantial anxiety" (Delaware v. Prouse, 440 U.S. 648, 653, 657, 99 S.Ct. 1391, 59 L.Ed.2d 660 [1979] [internal quotation marks omitted]). These realities have given rise to "a societal expectation" that a police officer’s order to pull a car over is an "unquestioned police command" (Brendlin v. California, 551 U.S. 249, 258, 127 S.Ct. 2400, 168 L.Ed.2d 132 [2007]).

[6] The Court has reached similar conclusions under our State’s constitution and the common law (People v. Hollman, 79 N.Y.2d 181, 195, 581 N.Y.S.2d 619, 590 N.E.2d 204 [1992]), which, the Court has said, enshrine the individual’s "right to be let alone and refuse to respond to police inquiry" (People v. Holmes, 81 N.Y.2d 1056, 1058, 601 N.Y.S.2d 459, 619 N.E.2d 396 [1993] [internal quotation marks omitted]; see also People v. May, 81 N.Y.2d 725, ₈728, 593 N.Y.S.2d 760, 609 N.E.2d 113 [1992]).³ Applying these principles in the automobile-stop context, the Court has concluded that diversion of an automobile from the flow of traffic "is a seizure implicating constitutional limitations" (People v. Spencer, 84 N.Y.2d 749, 752, 622 N.Y.S.2d 483, 646 N.E.2d 785 [1995]), even if the automobile is temporarily stopped at a stop sign (People v. Sobotker, 43 N.Y.2d 559, 562-564, 402 N.Y.S.2d 993, 373 N.E.2d 1218 [1978]) and even if " ‘the purpose of the stop is limited and the resulting detention quite brief" (Spencer, 84 N.Y.2d at 752, 622 N.Y.S.2d 483, 646 N.E.2d 785, quoting Prouse, 440 U.S. at 653, 99 S.Ct. 1391).⁴ In New York, such seizures "are lawful only when based on probable cause that a driver has committed a traffic violation" or "when based on a reasonable suspicion that the driver or occupants of the vehicle have committed, are committing, or are about to commit a crime" (People v. Hinshaw, 35 N.Y.3d 427, 430, 132 N.Y.S.3d 90, 156 N.E.3d 812 [2020] [internal quotation marks and citations omitted]).

[7–10] Like an automobile stop, a bicycle stop is a traffic stop that involves a show of governmental authority (see Prouse, 440 U.S. at 657, 99 S.Ct. 1391), and triggers "anxiety" in the individual (id.) in a manner that implicates the same social expectations regarding how reasonable people react to such authority (see Brendlin, 551 U.S. at 258, 127 S.Ct. 2400). Whether an individual is driving a car or riding a bike, a police order to stop requires them to halt their momentum based on the expectation that any "attempt to leave the scene would be so obviously likely to prompt an objection from the officer that" no...