Florida v. Bostwick, Essay Example

In the case of Florida v. Bostwick, police officers got on a bus which was going from Atlanta to Miami and discovered cocaine in a suitcase which belonged to Terrance Bostwick. The police officers were provided with no articulable suspicions, however approached Bostwick on the bus and questioned him to search his luggage. The officers announced themselves as narcotics agents, and inspected Bostwick’s tickets which matched the identification and then asked for permission to search his bags. The case is hinging upon two factors, first, the police advised Bostick that he did not have to consent to allowing them to search his bags. Second, there was no point where the officers used their guns to threaten him. Upon searching his bags, they found cocaine, and arrested Mr. Bostwick on the grounds of trafficking cocaine. Bostwick moved to have the cocaine charges suppressed because his Fourth Amendment rights were violated.

The trial court denied the motion from Mr. Bostwick to suppress the cocaine charges. Mr. Bostwick then pleaded guilty however he reserved his rights to appeal the motion to have the ruling suppressed. The Florida District Court of appeal affirmed the findings of the trial court ruling, the court did certify the question to the Florida Supreme Court. The Florida Supreme Court found a different finding. They believed that Bostick would have been seized because the majority of the passengers in this situation would not have felt free to leave the bus in order to avoid police questioning. The court ruled that it was impermissible to conduct a seizure when police conduct a drug search on buses during scheduled questioning and stopping of the boarded passengers without legitimate reasons. Therefore the right to obtain consent to search the passengers’ bags were unwarranted.  The Florida Supreme Court adopted a per se rule that the officers were working the bus and that was unconstitutional.