CONSTITUTIONAL INTERPRETATIONS

In District of Columbia v. R.W., Sup.Ct.Slip Op. of April 20, 2026, the Supreme Court of the United States reaffirmed its interpretation of the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution that a police officer may temporarily arrest a person without an arrest warrant, if the officer has a “reasonable suspicion,” based upon the “totality of circumstances” within the officer’s knowledge, that the person he wants to arrest may be involved, or has been involved in criminal activity.  This ruling is entirely compatible with The Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution, as implicitly incorporated into the 14^th Amendment to that instrument.

The Fourth Amendment reads as follows:

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

U.S. Const., Amendment IV

In the R.W. Case at hand, a juvenile identified as “R.W.” was caught by a D.C. police officer attempting to drive out of an apartment house parking lot, at approximately 2:00 a.m., after his two companions in the car had hurriedly fled from the vehicle, leaving one of the car doors open. The officer observed all of that,  pulled his gun, and stopped the driver at the scene. An immediate search of the vehicle and of the driver revealed evidence of stolen merchandise in the car, and evidence of the driver’s violations of several vehicular laws.

The Court held that all of that evidence was admissible at R.W.’s juvenile hearing, despite the officer’s lack of an arrest warrant or even “probable cause” to believe that a crime had occurred at the time the officer pulled his gun to stop R.W. from leaving the scene. The Supreme Court concluded that the officer had formed a “reasonable suspicion” of criminal activity by R.W. at the time of the stop, under the “totality of circumstances” known to the officer at that time, and that that “reasonable suspicion” was sufficient to justify R.W.’s arrest.

The Court’s holding, and reliance on its 4^th Amendment interpretations from earlier cases, were entirely compatible with both the text of the Fourth Amendment, as generally understood by the people of the United States at the time it was adopted, and the evident purpose of that text, to prevent arbitrary arrests, as judged by the documentary and historical contexts in which the Fourth Amendment was written.  The juvenile court judgment against R.W. stands.

/s/ Dan D. Rhea