Second Circuit Judges Disagree Over Stop, Frisk Doctrine

A Second Circuit panel produced three different opinions Tuesday demonstrating problems with deciding when it’s appropriate for police to stop and frisk a citizen.

In the majority opinion, Judge Rosemary S. Pooler said that the facts didn’t support frisking Calvin Weaver and the loaded handgun found in his pants had to be suppressed. But Chief Judge Debra Ann Livingston said the frisk was justified.

Although he joined the majority, Judge Guido Calabresi wrote a concurrence bemoaning the current state of the stop and frisk doctrine and blaming its problematic application on the evolution of the exclusionary rule and qualified immunity. ...