Caseflicks

Supreme Court of the United States • 1989

United States v. Sokolow

490 U.S. 1 | 109 S. Ct. 1581 | 104 L. Ed. 2d 1 | 1989 U.S. LEXIS 1694 | 57 U.S.L.W. 4401

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Takeaway

In short, Sokolow confirms that reasonable suspicion turns on the totality of the circumstances: several individually innocent travel facts may together justify a Terry stop, even when they resemble a drug-courier profile.

Background

Andrew Sokolow bought two open-return tickets from Honolulu to Miami for $2,100 in cash, paying from a large roll of $20 bills. The tickets were issued in the names “Andrew Kray” and “Janet Norian,” but the telephone number he supplied was listed to a different person. Sokolow and Norian flew to Miami, stayed about 48 hours despite the roughly 20-hour flight from Honolulu, checked no luggage, and returned through Los Angeles. Officers also observed that Sokolow appeared nervous.

When Sokolow and Norian arrived back in Honolulu, DEA agents approached as they were about to take a taxi. An agent grabbed Sokolow’s arm, moved him back to the sidewalk, and asked for identification and his airline ticket. The agents took the pair to a DEA office, where a narcotics dog alerted to their luggage. After obtaining warrants, agents found 1,063 grams of cocaine in Sokolow’s bag.

The District Court denied Sokolow’s motion to suppress, concluding that the agents had reasonable suspicion for the airport stop. Sokolow entered a conditional guilty plea. A divided Ninth Circuit reversed, reasoning that drug-courier characteristics such as cash travel, nervousness, short travel, and lack of checked luggage could not establish reasonable suspicion without evidence of ongoing criminal behavior and empirical proof that the factors did not encompass significant numbers of innocent travelers. The Supreme Court reversed the Ninth Circuit.

Issues

Issue #1

Whether DEA agents had reasonable suspicion under the Fourth Amendment to stop Sokolow at the Honolulu airport.

Holding

Yes. Considering the totality of the circumstances, the agents had a reasonable, articulable basis to suspect that Sokolow was transporting illegal drugs.

Reasoning

Under Terry v. Ohio, officers may briefly detain a person when specific, articulable facts create reasonable suspicion that criminal activity may be afoot. Reasonable suspicion requires more than a hunch, but it is substantially less demanding than probable cause and cannot be reduced to a rigid set of rules.

The Ninth Circuit improperly divided the evidence into two categories: evidence of “ongoing criminal behavior” and merely “probabilistic” drug-courier characteristics. The Fourth Amendment instead requires a practical assessment of the whole picture. Facts do not become categorically decisive or categorically irrelevant simply because they can also have innocent explanations.

The facts known to the agents were collectively significant: Sokolow paid a substantial sum for tickets in cash from a large roll of small bills; he appeared to be traveling under a name inconsistent with the telephone information he gave the airline; he made an unusually brief trip from Honolulu to Miami; he was nervous; and he checked no luggage. Each fact could be innocent in isolation, but their combination reasonably suggested drug trafficking.

The Court reaffirmed that lawful conduct may generate reasonable suspicion when viewed in context. The relevant inquiry is not whether each individual act is innocent or guilty, but the degree of suspicion that attaches to the combination of noncriminal acts.

Issue #2

Whether the agents’ reliance on a DEA drug-courier profile undermined the existence of reasonable suspicion.

Holding

No. The use of a profile does not diminish the evidentiary value of the particular facts that trained agents can articulate.

Reasoning

A reviewing court must require officers to identify the concrete facts that led them to suspect criminal activity. But those facts do not lose significance merely because the DEA has collected similar indicators into a drug-courier profile.

The constitutional inquiry remains fact-specific. Here, the agents did not rely on an unexplained label; they could point to Sokolow’s unusual cash purchase, suspicious identity information, compressed Miami trip, nervousness, and lack of checked luggage.

Issue #3

Whether the stop was unreasonable because the agents could have used less intrusive means, such as first approaching Sokolow for voluntary questioning.

Holding

No. The availability of less intrusive investigative techniques does not determine whether officers had reasonable suspicion to make a Terry stop.

Reasoning

Sokolow relied on language in Florida v. Royer stating that investigative methods should be the least intrusive means reasonably available. The Court explained that this language concerned the permissible scope and duration of an already justified stop, not a requirement that officers exhaust consensual or less intrusive alternatives before initiating one.

Requiring officers to choose the least intrusive possible pre-stop technique would improperly force courts to second-guess quick, on-the-spot police judgments. The agents could reasonably act when Sokolow was about to leave the airport in a taxi rather than risk losing the opportunity to investigate.

Dissents

Justice Marshall

Reasoning

Justice Marshall, joined by Justice Brennan, maintained that the Fourth Amendment permits a Terry detention only when officers reasonably suspect present or imminent criminal activity. In his view, the exception to the ordinary probable-cause requirement rests on the need for swift action against ongoing or impending wrongdoing, not on generalized suspicions about a person’s past conduct or criminal propensity.

He criticized the majority’s acceptance of the drug-courier profile. Profiles built from broad personal and behavioral traits can be applied mechanically and flexibly enough to fit almost any traveler, increasing the risk that innocent people will be detained based on stereotypes rather than particularized evidence of crime.

Marshall viewed the facts as no more meaningful than the inadequate indicators in Reid v. Georgia. Traveling from a so-called source city, taking a short trip with carry-on luggage, appearing nervous, paying in cash, and having a phone listed to a roommate all describe substantial numbers of innocent travelers. Sokolow showed no genuinely evasive conduct, and the agents did not know at the time of the seizure that he was actually using an alias.

In Marshall’s view, the agents could have investigated Sokolow without forcibly detaining him, especially because they had information from which they could locate him later. By allowing a seizure on these generalized facts, the Court weakened Fourth Amendment protection for all airport travelers, innocent as well as guilty.