NO FLIGHT FROM REALITY

If you saw someone on the street and he turned and walked away, you'd think
nothing of it. On the other hand, if you saw someone on the street and he
suddenly ran in the other direction, your suspicion would be aroused.
Common sense is a useful tool in the lives of ordinary people. It also can
be invaluable to police, an insight not lost on the Supreme Court in a
recent ruling.

One day in 1995, four uniformed Chicago police were driving into a known
drug-trafficking area on the West Side when they saw William Wardlow
standing next to a building, a white bag under his arm. He also saw
them--and took off running. Their curiosity piqued, they chased him down,
frisked him, and found he was carrying a loaded handgun.

Wardlow was convicted of unlawful use of a weapon by a felon, but the
Illinois Supreme Court overturned the verdict on the ground that the police
were not justified stopping him merely because he broke into a sprint upon
glimpsing some blue uniforms.

Given that a citizen has the perfect right to walk away from a police
officer, even if he has been asked a question, the court reasoned, the same
citizen was fully entitled to make his departure at the highest possible
rate of speed.

By a 6-3 vote, the U.S. Supreme Court disagreed. The combination of
Wardlow's presence in a high-crime area and his sudden flight provided the
cops a "reasonable suspicion" that he was up to no good. That's not
sufficient grounds to arrest him, but it was enough to justify stopping him
and patting him down.

In dissent, Justice John Paul Stevens said there are any number of reasons
a pedestrian might suddenly start running - "to catch up with a friend a
block or two away, to seek shelter from an impending storm, to arrive at a
bus stop before the bus leaves, to get home in time for dinner, to resume
jogging," and so on.

But ordinarily it would not be the sight of a police officer that would
elicit such haste. Fleeing from a cop is not evidence of guilt but can
certainly be grounds for suspicion. And if someone runs for an innocent
reason and not, say, because he's carrying an illegal gun, he then must be
allowed to go about his business.

Skeptics worry that the ruling will invite police to harass minorities. But
police bent on brutality and abuse are not likely to feel bound by the
Supreme Court's instruction anyway.

Its guidance is for law-abiding police, for whom this decision will sound
like what it is - an example of simple common sense.