WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Police do not violate the constitutional ban on unreasonable searches and seizures when they stop someone suspected of one crime and then cite a different crime as the basis of the arrest, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled on Monday.
Justice Antonin Scalia said for the unanimous high court that an arrest is reasonable if there is probable cause to believe a crime has been or is being committed based on the facts known to the police at the time.
Scalia said a federal appeals court was wrong to add the requirement that the different crime used as a basis for the arrest must be “closely related” to the crime initially cited when the suspect was stopped and questioned.
The case involved a Washington state man, Jerome Alford, who was stopped by the police and suspected of impersonating a police officer.
While questioning Alford at the scene, police discovered he was taping their conversation and arrested him for violating the state’s privacy law. A state court later dismissed the privacy charge.
Alford then sued the two officers and sought damages for unlawful arrest. The officers said they had sufficient grounds to arrest Alford for impersonating an officer and for obstructing a law enforcement officer.
A jury found the police had probable cause to make the arrest. But the appeals court disagreed and ruled the other two offenses were not “closely related” to the privacy charge cited at the time of Alford’s arrest.
Scalia said the appeals court ruling would not eliminate “sham arrests.” He said it would have “perverse consequences” by causing officers to stop providing reasons for the arrest or to cite every offense that could conceivably exist.