Appeals Court Rules for D.C. in Protest Case

Updated Nov. 21

The police have no obligation to order a crowd to disperse before making arrests, a federal appeals court ruled today, marking a victory for the District of Columbia in a suit that alleges police unlawfully arrested a group of demonstrators in January 2005.

In a divided opinion, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit remanded the suit to the trial court for further proceedings. The trial judge had granted summary judgment in favor of the plaintiffs. Click here for the D.C. Circuit opinion.

The appeals court found that there remains material issues of fact in dispute. The plaintiffs and police tell different stories about how the plaintiffs ended up getting arrested in an alley the night of January 20, 2005, in the Adams Morgan neighborhood of Northwest Washington.

Some in the crowd took to property destruction. The plaintiffs, including Sarah Carr, said they were not involved in any acts of vandalism. The trial court judge found the arrests of the plaintiffs violated the Fourth Amendment because the police could not have had probable cause to arrest certain marchers.

At issue on appeal is the extent to which police need probable cause to arrest any individual in a crowd when there are people who are committing crimes. Senior Judge Laurence Silberman, writing for the majority, said that “police witnesses must only be able to form a reasonable belief that the entire crowd is acting as a unit and therefore all members of the crowd violated the law."

Silberman said the police do not first need to order the crowd to disperse to give non-offenders a chance to comply with the order.

“If police have probable cause to believe that the group they are arresting is committing or has committed a crime, no more is necessary,” Silberman wrote. “Requiring a dispersal order in addition to the ordinary probable cause threshold would be particularly anomalous in a case like this in which officers have reason to believe that an entire crowd is engaged in or encouraging a riot.”

Stacy Anderson, an assistant attorney general for the D.C. Attorney General’s Office, argued for the District. Daniel Schember argued for the plaintiffs.

Comments

[Sarah Carr]

Mike,

You clearly did not pay attention to what I wrote as your regurgitation is far from what I actually said. I'm sorry you lack close reading skills but fortunately you have nothing to do with this legal ordeal, nor do you know the in-depth details, and you are just a guy who reads blogs.

Old Judge,

Thank you for the information and well-wishes.

Sarah

[Mike]

Yeah right Sarah, if YOU lose, the entire American system of justice might as well be thrown in the trash can, because if YOU can't win, why, no one can. It's all about you, isn't it. You admit you were part of the riot/demonstration. Now you claim you had left the demonstration. You say "broken off", I say "trying to escape". Tell it to the judge or jury. They will judge how credible you are.

[An Old Judge]

Thanks for your comment, Sarah, but that is exactly the point of this decision - you have raised a disputed issue of fact, which means that your case gets to go to trial, not get decided on a preliminary motion that was inappropriately granted by the trial judge. Now you'll get to tell your story to a jury and see what they think, which is how the legal system typically "delivers justice to deserving parties" (and some not-so-deserving ones, as well). Best wishes for your trial.

[Sarah Carr]

I am Sarah Carr. I will tell you that I wasn't even a part of a group at the time I was ordered into a back alley way. I had broken off and was trying to find a metro station with my friends when I encountered a police man who raised his beat stick and told me to "turn the f*ck* around." If we lose this case, Americans should know their legal system is incapable of delivering justice to deserving parties.

[Steve Candelario]

I agree with the Federal Appeals Court decision. If a crowd of demonstrators has individuals that are engaging in unlawful activity, then everyone should be arrested in the demonstration group. It is up to those who are demonstrating, to control and organize themselves accordingly.