78 Md. App. 513 - Brown v. State’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

4 state decisions

Most-quoted passages

The sentences later courts lift from this opinion, ranked by how many decisions quote each — the parts of the opinion doing the work. These counts are smaller than the citation total above because most of the 4 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “It is well recognized that stopping an automobile and detaining its occupants constitutes a “seizure” within the meaning of the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments to the federal constitution, even though the purpose of the stop is limited and the resulting detention is quite brief. The Fourth Amendment, however, does not prohibit all seizures but only those which are unreasonable. In other words, as the Supreme Court made clear both in Prouse and Martinez-Fuerte, such seizures are not per se violative of the Fourth Amendment simply because the stop was not based on either probable cause to believe or reasonable suspicion that the motorist was engaged in conduct in violation of the criminal law. As Prouse states, the essential purpose of the Fourth Amendment is to impose a standard of reasonableness upon the exercise of discretion by governmental officers in order to safeguard the privacy and security of individuals against arbitrary invasions. Hence, “the permissibility of a particular law enforcement practice is judged by balancing its intrusion on the individual’s Fourth Amendment interests against its promotion of legitimate governmental interests.” (citations omitted).”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Gadson v. State

2. “A majority of courts, however, have sustained the use of roadblocks as a proper law enforcement tool. As a general rule, the constitutionality of traffic checkpoints has been upheld where: (1) the discretion of the officers in the field is carefully circumscribed by clear objective regulations established by high level administrative officials; (2) approaching drivers are given adequate warning that there is a roadblock ahead; (3) the likelihood of apprehension, fear or surprise is reduced by a display of legitimate police authority at the roadblock; and (4) vehicles are stopped on a systematic, nonrandom basis that shows drivers they are not being singled out for arbitrary reasons.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Gadson v. State