An attorney out of Nashville, who leads the criminal defense section of Hollins, Raybin & Weissman, said everything Rutherford County Sheriff’s Deputy A.J. Ross did in the DUI checkpoint video that went viral over the Internet is constitutional.
David Raybin outlined why these sorts of roadblocks are constitutionally sound.
“I think (Chris Kalbaugh) was functionally challenging the roadblock or checkpoint,” Raybin said. “But that’s been decided by the U.S. Supreme Court.”
In circumstances outside of a checkpoint, Raybin said, “a law enforcement officer may conduct a brief investigatory stop only if the officer has a reasonable suspicion based upon specific and articulable facts that a criminal offense has been, is being or is about to be committed.”
According to Raybin, in State v. Downey, the Tennessee Supreme Court, relying on decisions by the United States Supreme Court, recognized that “a roadblock seizure … is a departure from … fundamental constitutional principles because it permits officers to stop and question persons whose conduct is ordinary, innocent, and free from suspicion.”
However, Raybin said roadblocks are allowed if they are set up with public interest in mind and that “because of the high prevalence of people driving while intoxicated, the U.S. Supreme Court decided there was public interest in permitting DUI checkpoints.”
There are a few rules that must be followed when sobriety checkpoints are set up, Raybin said.
“The most important thing about the DUI checkpoint is that they must be done in a uniform way,” Raybin said. “If they ask one person to roll down their window, and not the next, that would be outside of their discretion. That is the simple component of these things.”
The officer at the roadblock cannot set the protocol, according to Raybin. “It has to be done by the sheriff or highway patrol in advance and followed in uniformity,” he said.
“The whole idea of checkpoints is something that was authorized by Supreme Court in the interest of public safety,” Raybin said. “Because we are in a car and using a public road, we don’t have the same degree of privacy as we do in our home.”
Raybin also said the deputy was not obligated to answer Kalbaugh’s question about whether he was being detained.
“Anytime you are pulled over,” he said, “legally that is a temporary detention. I don’t think the officer should have to say that.”
People need to understand how they should conduct themselves when they are approached by a police officer, Raybin added, saying that if Kalbaugh had just rolled his window down, the officer likely wouldn’t have reacted the way he did.
