How much investigation does it take to give a parking ticket?

Washburn student intern (now Salina PD) Andrew Parmenter and I won in State v. Gross, No. 97,444 (Kan. App. June 6, 2008), reversing a Sedgwick County drug conviction. Officers saw a car stop too close to a drive way and saw the driver start to walk away. Officers pulled up and stopped the driver to tell him that he was illegally parked and immediately started questioning him regarding other matters. An officer also went up to the passenger side of the car and started questioning Ms. Gross. The COA agreed that the officers had seized Ms. Gross without justification:

At the suppression hearing, neither officer was able to point to anything they discovered in their initial encounter with Stroot that would cause them to reasonably suspect that either Gross or Stroot was involved in drug activity or that evidence of drug activity would be found in the car. Specifically, when questioned by defense counsel during cross-examination, Boucard acknowledged that all he knew when he ordered Stroot to the back of the patrol car was that Stroot had committed a traffic infraction and that he was suspicious about Stroot wanting to leave the car. Consistent with Boucard's testimony, Mains acknowledged that when he went to talk to Gross, the only thing that had happened was the parking violation and that he had suspicions of nothing else. Essentially, when Boucard ordered Stroot to the back of the patrol car and Mains approached Gross, all the officers had was a hunch that there was something suspicious going on and that Stroot and Gross might be involved in criminal activity. The totality of the circumstances known to the officers when the detention occurred did not provide a specific and articulable basis to create a reasonable suspicion that Gross had committed or was about to commit a crime. Without more facts providing an articulable basis for reasonable suspicion that Gross had committed, was committing, or was about to commit a crime, the officers could not lawfully detain Gross to prove their hunch.

In summary, when the officers detained Gross, they had exceeded the scope of any stop or detention for Stroot's parking violation. At that point, the officers did not have reasonable suspicion that Gross was involved in criminal activity to justify her detention. Any evidence that is obtained as a result of an unlawful stop or detention must be suppressed as fruit of the poisonous tree.

Nice job by trial counsel at the suppression hearing. Here is coverage on FourthAmendment.com.

[Update: the state did not file a PR and the mandate issued on July 10, 2008].