(Source: MIRS.news, Published 07/22/2022) The Grand Rapids Police Department's policy to photograph and fingerprint suspicious people not charged with a crime is an unconstitutional violation of a person's Fourth Amendment rights, the Michigan Supreme Court ruled Friday in a unanimous decision.
In overturning an appellate court ruling, Justice Richard Bernstein wrote that fingerprinting anybody without probable cause is an unreasonable search, despite the contention the procedure was used to help solve prior crimes.
Collecting a person's prints and taking his or her photograph is not the same thing as a "stop-and-frisk" exception to not having a warrant, regardless of whether the person involved gave consent or not, the Court ruled.
The decision stems from a pair of cases involving Denisho Johnson and Keyon Harrison, two Black teenagers in Grand Rapids, and what is commonly referred to as the "photograph and print" procedure (P&P).
Johnson, 15, was walking through a parking lot, allegedly looking into the windows of cars. Apparently, there had been reports of thefts in the area and officer Elliott Baragas stopped Johnson and asked what he was doing.
The police didn't believe his story and decided to perform a P&P to see if the teen could be tied to the other thefts. His superior, Capt. Curtis VanderKooi, signed off on it.
In the second case, another young Black teen, Keyon Harrison, was exchanging a large model train with another boy. VanderKooi was suspicious of what was going down and followed Harrison to a park and stopped him.
Harrison said he had borrowed another kid's model train for a school project and was returning it. VanderKooi was suspect of the story and did a P&P on him.
Justice Elizabeth Welch wrote separately in a concurring opinion to say the fingerprinting policy also infringes on a person's reasonable expectation of privacy.
