No. 24-7021

Moises Garcia v. Pennsylvania

Lower Court: Pennsylvania
Docketed: 2025-04-17
Status: Denied
Type: IFP
IFP
Tags: circuit-split fourth-amendment investigative-detention law-enforcement presumptively-lawful reasonable-suspicion
Key Terms:
CriminalProcedure
Latest Conference: 2025-06-18
Question Presented (AI Summary)

May the police conduct an investigative detention after observing a presumptively lawful act without additional information to suggest that criminal activity is afoot?

Question Presented (OCR Extract)

Pennsylvanians are being detained for participating in a presumptively lawful activity —wearing a single earbud headphone while driving. This egregious encroachment on American’s Fourth Amendment protections is an expanding epidemic across the United States, causing a sharp divide between the circuits. In some jurisdictions, where the legislature designates specific conduct to be lawful under an exception or pursuant to an affirmative defense, the police are permitted stop these individuals and demand that they demonstrate their conduct comports with the exception or defense. This scheme is offensive to the principles that underlie the Fourth Amendment. Rather than demonstrate reasonable suspicion that criminal activity is afoot based upon objective facts and circumstances, the police may simply stop anyone for participating in a lawful act and force them to prove that they are not acting unlawfully. The question presented is: May the police conduct an investigative detention after observing a presumptively lawful act without additional information to suggest that criminal activity is afoot? i

Docket Entries

2025-06-23
Petition DENIED.
2025-06-04
DISTRIBUTED for Conference of 6/18/2025.
2025-04-14
Petition for a writ of certiorari and motion for leave to proceed in forma pauperis filed. (Response due May 19, 2025)

Attorneys

Moises Garcia
Jacob Todd NaylorNaylor Law PLLC, Petitioner
Jacob Todd NaylorNaylor Law PLLC, Petitioner