Terry v. Ohio 1968

• Author: Daniel Brannen, Richard Hanes, Elizabeth Shaw
• Pages: 449-452

Contenidos

• Casing the Joint.
• Stop and Frisk Approved.
• Suggestions for further reading.

Page 449

Petitioner: John W. Terry

Respondent: State of Ohio

Petitioner's Claim: That Officer Martin McFadden violated the Fourth Amendment when he stopped and frisked petitione r on the streets of Cleveland without probable cause.

Chief Lawyer for Petitioner: Louis Stokes

Chief Lawyer for Respondent: Reuben M. Payne

Justices for the Court: Hugo Lafayette Black, William J. Brennan, Jr., Abe Fortas, John Marshall Harlan II, Thurgood Marshall, Potter Stewart, Earl Warren, Byron R. White

Justices Dissenting: William O. Douglas

Date of Decision: June 10, 1968

Decision: The Supreme Court affirmed Terry's conviction for carrying a concealed weapon.

Significance: In Terry, the Supreme Court said police officers do not need probable cause to stop and frisk suspicious people who might be carrying weapons.

The Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution protects privacy. It requires law enforcement officers to have probable cause before they seize or arrest a person and search his belongings. Probable cause means good reason to believe that the person has committed a crime. In Terry v.

Page 450

Ohio, the Supreme Court had to decide whether the police can stop and frisk a suspicious person in public without probable cause.

Casing the Joint

Martin McFadden, a police officer and detective for 39 years, was patrolling the streets of Cleveland, Ohio, on October 31, 1963. That afternoon, McFadden saw two men, John W. Terry and Richard D. Chilton, standing on a street corner. McFadden's experience told him the men looked suspicious, so he began to observe them from a nearby store entrance.

As McFadden watched, Terry and Chilton took turns walking past and looking inside a store window. Between them the men walked back and forth past the store twelve times. At that point a third man joined them for a brief discussion on the street corner. When the third man left, Terry and Chilton continued to take turns walking past the same store window to peer inside. Ten minutes later they headed down the street in the same direction as the third man whom they had met.

McFadden believed the three men were getting ready to rob the store they were watching. Because it was daytime, he also suspected they were armed and dangerous. McFadden followed Terry and Chilton and found them in front of Zucker's store with the third man. McFadden introduced himself as a police officer and asked...