Illinois v. Wardlow 528 U.S.119 (Case law) - Research Paper Example

They found a handgun from him and later o arrest him for further enquiry. When the case was presented in the Illinois Trial court, Wardlaw’s motion in that area was denied to suppress by the court and they also gave the judgment as the gun was found during a legal stop and search operation. But state Appellate Court reverse the decision stating that there was not enough evidence of doubt for Nolan to stop and search Wardlaw. Latter on Supreme Court stated the fact that sudden movement or flight in a high crime zone could not be a reason to suspect and stop-search an individual as the movement can be treated like “right to go on one’s way”.

But as the suspect tried to flight from the place therefore the further investigation can be carry on. (Legal Information Institute, 2000). The Fourth Amendment of US law did support the action of the police office. According to Ferguson & Bernache (2008), under the guidelines of the Supreme Court, lower court while giving any decision can consider an area as high crime area as a factor to review the reasonableness of Fourth Amendment stop. But the definition of high crime area was not mentioned by the highest court, and therefore a lot of controversies were there during Illinois v Wardlaw case.

After this incident, the need of defining high crime area was understood. According to them, high crime area could be defined based on three different parameters, such as: the area have to be marked by high degree of particularized criminal activities, the geographical boundary of that area have to be specified and thirdly the assigned police officer adjacent to that specific area should have knowledge about the boundary of the high crime area (Ferguson & Bernach, 2008, p.1586). According to Amar (1994), the Fourth amendment always calls for warrants and probable cause for any kind of police searches and exclusion of vehicle obtained illegally from any individual or group of people” (Amar, 1994, p.757). Carmen and Walker(2011), in their writing presented this case with analysis as how the fourth amendment was imposed on Wardlaw by the two police officer and whether it was justifiable or not.

According to the