IA: Def already stopped in a one-lane alley had officer stop in front of her; not a seizure

“A police officer saw a vehicle driving suspiciously for several minutes in a residential neighborhood at night at a snail’s pace of ten miles per hour. After the vehicle entered a one-lane alley that ran between two streets and then did not emerge from the alley, the officer approached the stopped vehicle from the front without activating flashers. He stopped his own patrol car at least twenty feet away, turned the lights down to low beam, got out of his patrol car, and walked up to the driver to engage in a conversation. This resulted in the officer learning that the driver was under the influence of alcohol. Eventually it resulted in the driver’s conviction for driving while intoxicated.” Defendant was not seized by the encounter because, although she was ostensibly blocked in, there were at least two places where she could back up to turn around without having to backup 125′. Despite the “norm” “we have grown up with is that we should cooperate with law enforcement,” she was not seized. State v. Fogg, 2019 Iowa Sup. LEXIS 114 (Dec. 20, 2019):

The overview that we provided in Wilkes is sound law, and it remains the law today. We recognize that one of the norms of society we have grown up with is that we should cooperate with law enforcement. Fogg may have been operating under that norm. However, for a seizure to occur, there must be more—”objective indices of police coercion,” “[t]he element of coercion,” or “coercive or authoritative behavior.” Id. at 843, 844. One way of looking at the matter is whether the officer was simply engaging in activity that any private person would have a right to engage in. See id. at 844; Harlan, 301 N.W.2d at 720.

Under the circumstances of this case, we conclude there was no seizure. Officer Frazier never activated the emergency lights on his vehicle. He parked at least twenty feet away from Fogg’s parked vehicle and approached her on foot. He did not shine a light into or knock on Fogg’s vehicle. In fact, Fogg opened her car door before Officer Frazier arrived. Officer Frazier engaged in conversation to ask if everything was ok and what was going on. None of this is objectively coercive.

Fogg’s appeal boils down to a simple point. The alley was only wide enough for one car at a time, and by driving down it from the north, Officer Frazier created a situation where she would have had to leave by backing up about 125 feet to the south.

But the alley was a public alley that was not posted for a single direction of traffic. Officer Frazier had as much right to pull in from the north and park as Fogg did to pull in from the south and park. Officer Frazier was not doing something a private person could not have done.