Illinois v. Lidster

• Decision Date: 13 January 2004
• Docket Number: No. 02-1060.,02-1060.
• Citation: 540 U.S. 419
• Parties: ILLINOIS <I>v.</I> LIDSTER.
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

540 U.S. 419

ILLINOIS

v. LIDSTER.

No. 02-1060.

Supreme Court of United States.

Argued November 5, 2003.

Decided January 13, 2004.

Police set up a highway checkpoint to obtain information from motorists about a hit-and-run accident occurring about one week earlier at the same location and time of night. Officers stopped each vehicle for 10 to 15 seconds, asked the occupants whether they had seen anything happen there the previous weekend, and handed each driver a flyer describing and requesting information about the accident. As respondent Lidster approached, his minivan swerved, nearly hitting an officer. The officer smelled alcohol on Lidster's breath. Another officer administered a sobriety test and then arrested Lidster. He was convicted in Illinois state court of driving under the influence of alcohol. He challenged his arrest and conviction on the ground that the government obtained evidence through use of a checkpoint stop that violated the Fourth Amendment. The trial court rejected that challenge, but the state appellate court reversed. The State Supreme Court agreed, holding that, in light of Indianapolis v. Edmond, 531 U. S. 32, the stop was unconstitutional.

Held: The checkpoint stop did not violate the Fourth Amendment. Pp. 423-428.

(a) Edmond does not govern the outcome of this case. In Edmond, this Court held that, absent special circumstances, the Fourth Amendment forbids police to make stops without individualized suspicion at a checkpoint set up primarily for general "crime control" purposes. 531 U. S., at 41, 44. Specifically, the checkpoint in Edmond was designed to ferret out drug crimes committed by the motorists themselves. Here, the stop's primary law enforcement purpose was not to determine whether a vehicle's occupants were committing a crime, but to ask the occupants, as members of the public, for help in providing information about a crime in all likelihood committed by others. Edmond's language, as well as its context, makes clear that an information-seeking stop's constitutionality was not then before this Court. Pp. 423-424.

(b) Nor does the Fourth Amendment require courts to apply an Edmond-type rule of automatic unconstitutionality to such stops. The fact that they normally lack individualized suspicion cannot by itself determine the constitutional outcome, as the Fourth Amendment does not treat a motorist's car as his castle, see, e. g., New York v. Class, 475 U. S. 106, 112-113, and special law enforcement concerns will sometimes justify highway stops without individualized suspicion, see, e. g., Michigan Dept. of State Police v. Sitz, 496 U. S. 444. Moreover, the context here (seeking information from the public) is one in which, by definition, the concept of individualized suspicion has little role to play, and an information-seeking stop is not the kind of event that involves suspicion, or lack thereof, of the relevant individual. In addition, information-seeking highway stops are less likely to provoke anxiety or to prove intrusive, since they are likely brief, the questions asked are not designed to elicit self-incriminating information, and citizens will often react positively when police ask for help. The law also ordinarily permits police to seek the public's voluntary cooperation in a criminal investigation. That the importance of soliciting the public's assistance is offset to some degree by the need to stop a motorist — which amounts to a "seizure" in Fourth Amendment terms, e. g., Edmond, supra, at 40 — is not important enough to justify an Edmond-type rule here. Finally, such a rule is not needed to prevent an unreasonable proliferation of police checkpoints. Practical considerations of limited police resources and community hostility to traffic tieups seem likely to inhibit any such proliferation, and the Fourth Amendment's normal insistence that the stop be reasonable in context will still provide an important legal limitation on checkpoint use. Pp. 424-427.

(c) The checkpoint stop was constitutional. In judging its reasonableness, hence, its constitutionality, this Court looks to "the gravity of the public concerns served by the seizure, the degree to which the seizure advances the public interest, and the severity of the interference with individual liberty." Brown v. Texas, 443 U. S. 47, 51. The relevant public concern was grave, as the police were investigating a crime that had resulted in a human death, and the stop advanced this concern to a significant degree given its timing and location. Most importantly, the stops interfered only minimally with liberty of the sort the Fourth Amendment seeks to protect. Viewed objectively, each stop required only a brief wait in line and contact with police for only a few seconds. Viewed subjectively, the systematic contact provided little reason for anxiety or alarm, and there is no allegation that the police acted in a discriminatory or otherwise unlawful manner. Pp. 427-428.

202 Ill. 2d 1, 779 N. E. 2d 855, reversed.

BREYER, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which REHNQUIST, C. J., and O'CONNOR, SCALIA, KENNEDY, and THOMAS, JJ., joined, and in which STEVENS, SOUTER, and GINSBURG, JJ., joined as to Parts I and II. STEVENS, J., filed an opinion concurring in part and dissenting in part, in which SOUTER and GINSBURG, JJ., joined, post, p. 428.

CERTIORARI TO THE SUPREME COURT OF ILLINOIS

Gary Feinerman, Solicitor General of Illinois, argued the cause for petitioner. With him on the briefs were Lisa Madigan, Attorney General, and Linda D. Woloshin, Lisa Anne Hoffman, and Karen Kaplan, Assistant Attorneys General.

Patricia A. Millett argued the cause for the United States as amicus curiae urging reversal. With her on the brief were Solicitor General Olson, Acting Assistant Attorney General Wray, Deputy Solicitor General Dreeben, and Patty Merkamp Stemler.

Donald John Ramsell argued the cause and filed a brief for respondent.^*

JUSTICE BREYER delivered the opinion of the Court.

This Fourth Amendment case focuses upon a highway checkpoint where police stopped motorists to ask them for information about a recent hit-and-run accident. We hold that the police stops were reasonable, hence, constitutional.

I

The relevant background is as follows: On Saturday, August 23, 1997, just after midnight, an unknown motorist traveling eastbound on a highway in Lombard, Illinois, struck and killed a 70-year-old bicyclist. The motorist drove off without identifying himself. About one week later at about the same time of night and at about the same place, local police set up a highway checkpoint designed to obtain more information about the accident from the motoring public.

Police cars with flashing lights partially blocked the eastbound lanes of the highway. The blockage forced traffic to slow down, leading to lines of up to 15 cars in each lane. As each vehicle drew up to the checkpoint, an officer would stop it for 10 to 15 seconds, ask the occupants whether they had seen anything happen there the previous weekend, and hand each driver a flyer. The flyer said "ALERT . . . FATAL HIT & RUN ACCIDENT" and requested "ASSISTANCE IN IDENTIFYING THE VEHICLE AND DRIVER INVOLVED IN THIS ACCIDENT WHICH KILLED A 70 YEAR OLD BICYCLIST." App. 9.

Robert Lidster, the respondent, drove a minivan toward the checkpoint. As he approached the checkpoint, his van swerved, nearly hitting one of the officers. The officer smelled alcohol on Lidster's breath. He directed Lidster to a side street where another officer administered a sobriety test and then arrested Lidster. Lidster was tried and convicted in Illinois state court of driving under the influence of alcohol.

Lidster challenged the lawfulness of his arrest and conviction on the ground that the government had obtained much of the relevant evidence through use of a checkpoint stop that violated the Fourth Amendment. The trial court rejected that challenge. But an Illinois appellate court reached the opposite conclusion. 319 Ill. App. 3d 825, 747 N. E. 2d 419 (2001). The Illinois Supreme Court agreed with the appellate court. It held (by a vote of 4 to 3) that our decision in Indianapolis v. Edmond, 531 U. S. 32 (2000), required it to find the stop unconstitutional. 202 Ill. 2d 1, 779 N. E. 2d 855 (2002).

Because lower courts have reached different conclusions about this matter, we granted certiorari. See Burns v. Commonwealth, 261 Va. 307, 541 S. E. 2d 872, cert. denied, 534 U. S. 1043 (2001) (finding similar checkpoint stop constitutional). We now reverse the Illinois Supreme Court's determination.

II

The Illinois Supreme Court basically held that our decision in Edmond governs the outcome of this case. We do not agree. Edmond involved a checkpoint at which police stopped vehicles to look for evidence of drug crimes committed by occupants of those vehicles. After stopping a vehicle at the checkpoint, police would examine (from outside the vehicle) the vehicle's interior; they would walk a drug-sniffing dog around the exterior; and, if they found sufficient evidence of drug (or other) crimes, they would arrest the vehicle's occupants. 531 U. S., at 35. We found that police had set up this checkpoint primarily for general "crime control" purposes, i.e., "to detect evidence of ordinary criminal wrongdoing." Id., at 41. We noted that the stop was made without individualized suspicion. And we held that the Fourth Amendment forbids such a stop, in the absence of special circumstances. Id., at 44.

The checkpoint stop here differs significantly from that in Edmond. The stop's primary law enforcement purpose was not to determine whether a vehicle's occupants were committing a crime, but to ask vehicle occupants, as members of the public, for their help in providing information about a crime in all likelihood committed by others. The police expected the information elicited to help them apprehend, not the vehicle's occupants, but other individuals.

Edmond's language, as well as...