Terry v. Ohio

On October 31, 1963 in Cleveland Ohio, Cleveland police noticed two men (John Terry and Richard Clinton) acting suspiciously in front of a jewelry store. Officer Martin McFadden was keeping a close on their behavior while in his car in plain clothing. He then realized this appeared to be two men conspiring about a crime they were about to commit in the jewelry store. Officer McFadden approached Terry and Clinton and identified himself as a law enforcer. The men decided to provide an incoherent response, at which point Officer McFadden performed stop and frisk on the men.

He found a pistol in Terry’s pocket and a revolver in Clinton’s pocket. Another man, (Katz) that Terry and Clinton met with right before the officer approached them was found unarmed at the time. The men were arrested and taken into custody for the concealed weapons they were carrying.

The Legal Question: Did the search and seizure of Terry, Clinton and Katz violate their Fourth Amendment rights?

John Terry made the case that the pat down was an “invasion of his privacy.”

The court’s decision on the case was 8-1, claiming that the officer’s search was conducted based on reasonable suspicion under the Fourth Amendment. The court found the convicted men a threat to society and the officer’s safety and that Officer McFadden had probable cause for his initiation.

Chief Justice Warren provided the majority opinion, concluding that the officer had probable cause to conduct the search for his own safety based on the men’s suspicious behavior.

The minority vote consisted of only Justice Douglas, a liberal, which is important to note in cases like these, especially when analyzing them since the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement. It has become more controversial all around. He believed that deciding the officer’s right to search the men gives law enforcement more power while individual liberty is minimized.

The facts of the case state that Officer McFadden had 39 years of experience in his field, so he was able to easily recognize that Terry and Clinton’s behavior was a threat to himself and to anyone in the area. With that being said, I do agree with the court’s decision that Officer McFadden had reasonable suspicion and probable cause to pat the men down based on their repeated pacing in front of the store. The justices voted accordingly based on the facts of the case that were provided, and I would have voted the same way.

However, it is impossible to read this case today without also thinking about what happened to Trayvon Martin, Alton Sterling, and other high profile cases just in the past few years. Justice Douglas’ opposing argument is a very strong one even though he was alone on that one in 1968. Today, maybe the facts would not be first priority in delivering the opinion.