| Bailey v. United States | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Argued November 1, 2012 Decided February 19, 2013 | |
| Full case name | Chunon L. Bailey, aka Polo v. United States of America |
| Docket no. | 11-770 |
| Citations | 568 U.S. 186 (more) 133 S. Ct. 1031; 185 L. Ed. 2d 19; 2013 U.S. LEXIS 1075; 81 U.S.L.W. 4065 |
| Case history | |
| Prior | Motion to suppress evidence denied, United States v. Bailey, 468 F. Supp. 2d 373 (E.D.N.Y. 2006); conviction affirmed, 652 F.3d 197 (2d Cir. 2011); cert. granted, 566 U.S. 1033 (2012). |
| Subsequent | Conviction affirmed on remand, 743 F.3d 322 (2d Cir. 2014); cert. denied, 135 S. Ct. 705 (2014). |
| Holding | |
| Suspect who had left property in vehicle prior to search was no longer in immediate vicinity when detained almost a mile away, thus no interests of law enforcement justified detention; evidence obtained from suspect that supported conviction was thus unconstitutionally obtained. Second Circuit reversed and remanded. | |
| Court membership | |
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| Case opinions | |
| Majority | Kennedy, joined by Roberts, Scalia, Ginsburg, Sotomayor, Kagan |
| Concurrence | Scalia, joined by Ginsburg, Kagan |
| Dissent | Breyer, joined by Thomas, Alito |
| Laws applied | |
| U.S. Const. amend. IV | |
Bailey v. United States, 568 U.S. 186 (2013), was a United States Supreme Court case concerning search and seizure.[1] A 6–3 decision reversed the weapons conviction of a Long Island man who had been detained when police followed his vehicle after he left his apartment just before it was to be searched. Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote the majority opinion, and Antonin Scalia filed a concurrence. Stephen Breyer dissented.
The Second Circuit Court of Appeals had upheld the conviction. It accepted the government's argument that the Court's 1981 holding in Michigan v. Summers that persons in the immediate vicinity of a search can be detained while the search was being executed was broad enough to cover the pursuit and detention of a defendant who had left the scene in a vehicle. Kennedy's opinion held that it did not, since once Bailey had driven away none of the law-enforcement interests the earlier holding identified were involved. Scalia said that the only thing that mattered was that the vehicle was no longer in the immediate vicinity, and that balancing tests created confusion. Breyer argued that the police did, in fact, have those interests despite Bailey's departure by vehicle.