Is a high crime rate justified in frisking or searching a motorist stopped in a purported gang area?

California, United States of America


The following excerpt is from King v. State, 195 Cal.Rptr.3d 286, 242 Cal.App.4th 265 (Cal. App. 2015):

location "is not an activity of an individual. Many citizens of this state are forced to live in areas that have high crime rates or they come to these areas to shop, work, play, transact business, or visit relatives or friends. The spectrum of legitimate human behavior occurs every day in so-called high crime areas. As a result, this court has appraised this factor with caution and has been reluctant to conclude that a location's crime rate transforms otherwise innocent-appearing circumstances into circumstances justifying the seizure of an individual." (People v. Bower (1979) 24 Cal.3d 638, 645, 156 Cal.Rptr. 856, 597 P.2d 115.) This rationale applies with equal force to frisking or searching a motorist stopped in a purported gang area, absent reason to suspect that the motorist is a gang member.

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