I<\/b><\/p>\r\nOn February 4, 1999, respondents Christopher Drayton and Clifton Brown, Jr., were traveling on a Greyhound bus en route from Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, to Detroit, Michigan. The bus made a scheduled stop in Tallahassee, Florida. The passengers were required to disembark so the bus could be refueled and cleaned. As the passengers reboarded, the driver checked their tickets and then left to complete paperwork inside the terminal. As he left, the driver allowed three members of the Tallahassee Police Department to board the bus as part of a routine drug and weapons interdiction effort. The officers were dressed in plain clothes and carried concealed weapons and visible badges.\r\n\r\nOnce onboard Officer Hoover knelt on the driver\u2019s seat and faced the rear of the bus. He could observe the passengers and ensure the safety of the two other officers without blocking the aisle or otherwise obstructing the bus exit. Officers Lang and Blackburn went to the rear of the bus. Blackburn remained stationed there, facing forward. Lang worked his way toward the front of the bus, speaking with individual passengers as he went. He asked the passengers about their travel plans and sought to match passengers with luggage in the overhead racks. To avoid blocking the aisle, Lang stood next to or just behind each passenger with whom he spoke.\r\n\r\nAccording to Lang\u2019s testimony, passengers who declined to cooperate with him or who chose to exit the bus at any time would have been allowed to do so without argument. In Lang\u2019s experience, however, most people are willing to cooperate. Some passengers go so far as to commend the police for their efforts to ensure the safety of their travel. Lang could recall five to six instances in the previous year in which passengers had declined to have their luggage searched. It also was common for passengers to leave the bus for a cigarette or a snack while the officers were on board. Lang sometimes informed passengers of their right to refuse to cooperate. On the day in question, however, he did not.\r\n\r\nRespondents were seated next to each other on the bus. Drayton was in the aisle seat, Brown in the seat next to the window. Lang approached respondents from the rear and leaned over Drayton\u2019s shoulder. He held up his badge long enough for respondents to identify him as a police officer. With his face 12-to-18 inches away from Drayton\u2019s, Lang spoke in a voice just loud enough for respondents to hear:\r\n\r\n\u201cI\u2019m Investigator Lang with the Tallahassee Police Department. We\u2019re conducting bus interdiction [sic], attempting to deter drugs and illegal weapons being transported on the bus. Do you have any bags on the bus?\u201d\r\n\r\nBoth respondents pointed to a single green bag in the overhead luggage rack. Lang asked, \u201cDo you mind if I check it?,\u201d and Brown responded, \u201cGo ahead.\u201d Id., <\/i>at 56. Lang handed the bag to Officer Blackburn to check. The bag contained no contraband.\r\n\r\nOfficer Lang noticed that both respondents were wearing heavy jackets and baggy pants despite the warm weather. In Lang\u2019s experience drug traffickers often use baggy clothing to conceal weapons or narcotics. The officer thus asked Brown if he had any weapons or drugs in his possession. And he asked Brown: \u201cDo you mind if I check your person?\u201d Brown answered, \u201cSure,\u201d and cooperated by leaning up in his seat, pulling a cell phone out of his pocket, and opening up his jacket. Id., <\/i>at 61. Lang reached across Drayton and patted down Brown\u2019s jacket and pockets, including his waist area, sides, and upper thighs. In both thigh areas, Lang detected hard objects similar to drug packages detected on other occasions. Lang arrested and handcuffed Brown. Officer Hoover escorted Brown from the bus.\r\n\r\nLang then asked Drayton, \u201cMind if I check you?\u201d Id., <\/i>at 65. Drayton responded by lifting his hands about eight inches from his legs. Lang conducted a patdown of Drayton\u2019s thighs and detected hard objects similar to those found on Brown. He arrested Drayton and escorted him from the bus. A further search revealed that respondents had duct-taped plastic bundles of powder cocaine between several pairs of their boxer shorts. Brown possessed three bundles containing 483 grams of cocaine. Drayton possessed two bundles containing 295 grams of cocaine.\r\n
* * * *<\/p>\r\n
II<\/b><\/p>\r\nLaw enforcement officers do not violate the Fourth Amendment\u2019s prohibition of unreasonable seizures merely by approaching individuals on the street or in other public places and putting questions to them if they are willing to listen. <\/i>See, e.g.,<\/i> Florida <\/i>v. Royer,<\/i> 460 U.S. 491, 497 (1983) (plurality opinion); see id.,<\/i> at 523, n. 3 (Rehnquist, J., dissenting); Florida <\/i>v. Rodriguez,<\/i> 469 U.S. 1, 5\u20146 (1984) (per curiam) <\/i>(holding that such interactions in airports are \u201cthe sort of consensual encounter[s] that implicat[e] no Fourth Amendment interest\u201d). Even when law enforcement officers have no basis for suspecting a particular individual, they may pose questions, ask for identification, and request consent to search luggage provided they do not induce cooperation by coercive means. See Florida <\/i>v. Bostick, <\/i>501 U.S., at 434\u2014435 (citations omitted). If a reasonable person would feel free to terminate the encounter, then he or she has not been seized.\r\n
* * * *<\/p>\r\nApplying the Bostick<\/i> framework to the facts of this particular case, we conclude that the police did not seize respondents when they boarded the bus and began questioning passengers. The officers gave the passengers no reason to believe that they were required to answer the officers\u2019 questions. When Officer Lang approached respondents, he did not brandish a weapon or make any intimidating movements. He left the aisle free so that respondents could exit. He spoke to passengers one by one and in a polite, quiet voice. Nothing he said would suggest to a reasonable person that he or she was barred from leaving the bus or otherwise terminating the encounter.\r\n
* * * *<\/p>\r\nRespondents make much of the fact that Officer Lang displayed his badge. In Florida<\/i> v. Rodriguez,<\/i> 469 U.S., at 5\u20146, however, the Court rejected the claim that the defendant was seized when an officer approached him in an airport, showed him his badge, and asked him to answer some questions. Likewise, in INS<\/i> v. Delgado<\/i>, 466 U.S. 210, 212\u2014213 (1984), the Court held that INS agents\u2019 wearing badges and questioning workers in a factory did not constitute a seizure. And while neither Lang nor his colleagues were in uniform or visibly armed, those factors should have little weight in the analysis. Officers are often required to wear uniforms and in many circumstances this is cause for assurance, not discomfort. Much the same can be said for wearing sidearms. That most law enforcement officers are armed is a fact well known to the public. The presence of a holstered firearm thus is unlikely to contribute to the coerciveness of the encounter absent active brandishing of the weapon.\r\n\r\nOfficer Hoover\u2019s position at the front of the bus also does not tip the scale in respondents\u2019 favor. Hoover did nothing to intimidate passengers, and he said nothing to suggest that people could not exit and indeed he left the aisle clear. In Delgado<\/i>, the Court determined there was no seizure even though several uniformed INS officers were stationed near the exits of the factory. Id., <\/i>at 219. The Court noted: \u201cThe presence of agents by the exits posed no reasonable threat of detention to these workers, \u2026 the mere possibility that they would be questioned if they sought to leave the buildings should not have resulted in any reasonable apprehension by any of them that they would be seized or detained in any meaningful way.\u201d Ibid.\r\n\r\nFinally, the fact that in Officer Lang\u2019s experience only a few passengers have refused to cooperate does not suggest that a reasonable person would not feel free to terminate the bus encounter. In Lang\u2019s experience it was common for passengers to leave the bus for a cigarette or a snack while the officers were questioning passengers. App. 70, 81. And of more importance, bus passengers answer officers\u2019 questions and otherwise cooperate not because of coercion but because the passengers know that their participation enhances their own safety and the safety of those around them. \u201cWhile most citizens will respond to a police request, the fact that people do so, and do so without being told they are free not to respond, hardly eliminates the consensual nature of the response.\u201d Delgado<\/i>, supra,<\/i> at 216.\r\n\r\nDrayton contends that even if Brown\u2019s cooperation with the officers was consensual, Drayton was seized because no reasonable person would feel free to terminate the encounter with the officers after Brown had been arrested. The Court of Appeals did not address this claim; and in any event the argument fails. The arrest of one person does not mean that everyone around him has been seized by police. If anything, Brown\u2019s arrest should have put Drayton on notice of the consequences of continuing the encounter by answering the officers\u2019 questions. Even after arresting Brown, Lang addressed Drayton in a polite manner and provided him with no indication that he was required to answer Lang\u2019s questions.\r\n\r\nWe turn now from the question whether respondents were seized to whether they were subjected to an unreasonable search, i.e.,<\/i> whether their consent to the suspicionless search was involuntary. In circumstances such as these, where the question of voluntariness pervades both the search and seizure inquiries, the respective analyses turn on very similar facts. And, as the facts above suggest, respondents\u2019 consent to the search of their luggage and their persons was voluntary. Nothing Officer Lang said indicated a command to consent to the search. Rather, when respondents informed Lang that they had a bag on the bus, he asked for their permission to check it. And when Lang requested to search Brown and Drayton\u2019s persons, he asked first if they objected, thus indicating to a reasonable person that he or she was free to refuse. Even after arresting Brown, Lang provided Drayton with no indication that he was required to consent to a search. To the contrary, Lang asked for Drayton\u2019s permission to search him (\u201cMind if I check you?\u201d), and Drayton agreed.\r\n\r\nThe Court has rejected in specific terms the suggestion that police officers must always inform citizens of their right to refuse when seeking permission to conduct a warrantless consent search. See, e.g.,<\/i> Ohio<\/i> v. Robinette,<\/i> 519 U.S. 33, 39\u201440 (1996); Schneckloth <\/i>v. Bustamonte,<\/i> 412 U.S. 218, 227 (1973). <\/i>\u201cWhile knowledge of the right to refuse consent is one factor to be taken into account, the government need not establish such knowledge as the sine qua non<\/i> of an effective consent.\u201d Ibid. <\/i>Nor do this Court\u2019s decisions suggest that even though there are no per se <\/i>rules, a presumption of invalidity attaches if a citizen consented without explicit notification that he or she was free to refuse to cooperate. Instead, the Court has repeated that the totality of the circumstances must control, without giving extra weight to the absence of this type of warning. See, e.g.,<\/i> Schneckloth, supra;<\/i> Robinette,<\/i> supra, <\/i>at 39\u201440. Although Officer Lang did not inform respondents of their right to refuse the search, he did request permission to search, and the totality of the circumstances indicates that their consent was voluntary, so the searches were reasonable.\r\n\r\nIn a society based on law, the concept of agreement and consent should be given a weight and dignity of its own. Police officers act in full accord with the law when they ask citizens for consent. It reinforces the rule of law for the citizen to advise the police of his or her wishes and for the police to act in reliance on that understanding. When this exchange takes place, it dispels inferences of coercion.\r\n\r\nWe need not ask the alternative question whether, after the arrest of Brown, there were grounds for a Terry<\/i> stop and frisk of Drayton, though this may have been the case. It was evident that Drayton and Brown were traveling together\u2013Officer Lang observed the pair reboarding the bus together; they were each dressed in heavy, baggy clothes that were ill-suited for the day\u2019s warm temperatures; they were seated together on the bus; and they each claimed responsibility for the single piece of green carry-on luggage. Once Lang had identified Brown as carrying what he believed to be narcotics, he may have had reasonable suspicion to conduct a Terry <\/i>stop and frisk on Drayton as well. That question, however, has not been presented to us. The fact the officers may have had reasonable suspicion does not prevent them from relying on a citizen\u2019s consent to the search. It would be a paradox, and one most puzzling to law enforcement officials and courts alike, were we to say, after holding that Brown\u2019s consent was voluntary, that Drayton\u2019s consent was ineffectual simply because the police at that point had more compelling grounds to detain him. After taking Brown into custody, the officers were entitled to continue to proceed on the basis of consent and to ask for Drayton\u2019s cooperation.\r\n\r\nThe judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.\r\n\r\nIt was so ordered.\r\n\r\nJustice Souter, with whom Justice Stevens and Justice Ginsburg join, dissenting.\r\n\r\nAnyone who travels by air today submits to searches of the person and luggage as a condition of boarding the aircraft. It is universally accepted that such intrusions are necessary to hedge against risks that, nowadays, even small children understand. The commonplace precautions of air travel have not, thus far, been justified for ground transportation, however, and no such conditions have been placed on passengers getting on trains or buses. There is therefore an air of unreality about the Court\u2019s explanation that bus passengers consent to searches of their luggage to \u201cenhanc[e] their own safety and the safety of those around them.\u201d Ante<\/i>, at 10. Nor are the other factual assessments underlying the Court\u2019s conclusion in favor of the Government more convincing.\r\n\r\nThe issue we took to review is whether the police\u2019s examination of the bus passengers, including respondents, amounted to a suspicionless seizure under the Fourth Amendment. If it did, any consent to search was plainly invalid as a product of the illegal seizure. See Florida<\/i> v. Royer,<\/i> 460 U.S. 491, 507\u2014508 (1983) (plurality opinion) (\u201c[T]he consent was tainted by the illegality and \u2026 ineffective to justify the search\u201d); id.,<\/i> at 509 (Powell, J., concurring); id.,<\/i> at 509 (Brennan, J., concurring in result).\r\n\r\nFlorida<\/i> v. Bostick,<\/i> 501 U.S. 429 (1991), established the framework for determining whether the bus passengers were seized in the constitutional sense. In that case, we rejected the position that police questioning of bus passengers was a per se<\/i> seizure, and held instead that the issue of seizure was to be resolved under an objective test considering all circumstances: whether a reasonable passenger would have felt \u201cfree to decline the officers\u2019 requests or otherwise terminate the encounter,\u201d id.,<\/i> at 436. We thus applied to a bus passenger the more general criterion, whether the person questioned was free \u201cto ignore the police presence and go about his business,\u201d id.,<\/i> at 437 (quoting Michigan<\/i> v. Chesternut,<\/i> 486 U.S. 567, 569 (1988)).\r\n
* * * *<\/p>\r\nWhen the bus in question made its scheduled stop in Tallahassee, the passengers were required to disembark while the vehicle was cleaned and refueled. App. 104. When the passengers returned, they gave their tickets to the driver, who kept them and then left himself, after giving three police officers permission to board the bus in his absence. Id., <\/i>at 77\u201478. Although they were not in uniform, the officers displayed badges and identified themselves as police. One stationed himself in the driver\u2019s seat by the door at the front, facing back to observe the passengers. The two others went to the rear, from which they worked their way forward, with one of them speaking to passengers, the other backing him up. Id., <\/i>at 47\u201448. They necessarily addressed the passengers at very close range; the aisle was only fifteen inches wide, and each seat only eighteen. The quarters were cramped further by the overhead rack, nineteen inches above the top of the passenger seats. The passenger by the window could not have stood up straight, id., <\/i>at 55, and the face of the nearest officer was only a foot or eighteen inches from the face of the nearest passenger being addressed, id., <\/i>at 57. During the exchanges, the officers looked down, and the passengers had to look up if they were to face the police. The officer asking the questions spoke quietly. He prefaced his requests for permission to search luggage and do a body patdown by identifying himself by name as a police investigator \u201cconducting bus interdiction\u201d and saying, \u201c\u2018We would like for your cooperation. Do you have any luggage on the bus?\u2019 \u201d Id., <\/i>at 82.\r\n\r\nThus, for reasons unexplained, the driver with the tickets entitling the passengers to travel had yielded his custody of the bus and its seated travelers to three police officers, whose authority apparently superseded the driver\u2019s own. The officers took control of the entire passenger compartment, one stationed at the door keeping surveillance of all the occupants, the others working forward from the back. With one officer right behind him and the other one forward, a third officer accosted each passenger at quarters extremely close and so cramped that as many as half the passengers could not even have stood to face the speaker. None was asked whether he was willing to converse with the police or to take part in the enquiry. Instead the officer said the police were \u201cconducting bus interdiction,\u201d in the course of which they \u201cwould like \u2026 cooperation.\u201d Ibid.<\/i> The reasonable inference was that the \u201cinterdiction\u201d was not a consensual exercise, but one the police would carry out whatever the circumstances; that they would prefer \u201ccooperation\u201d but would not let the lack of it stand in their way. There was no contrary indication that day, since no passenger had refused the cooperation requested, and there was no reason for any passenger to believe that the driver would return and the trip resume until the police were satisfied. The scene was set and an atmosphere of obligatory participation was established by this introduction. Later requests to search prefaced with \u201cDo you mind \u2026\u201d would naturally have been understood in the terms with which the encounter began.\r\n\r\nIt is very hard to imagine that either Brown or Drayton would have believed that he stood to lose nothing if he refused to cooperate with the police, or that he had any free choice to ignore the police altogether. No reasonable passenger could have believed that, only an uncomprehending one. It is neither here nor there that the interdiction was conducted by three officers, not one, as a safety precaution. See id., <\/i>at 47. The fact was that there were three, and when Brown and Drayton were called upon to respond, each one was presumably conscious of an officer in front watching, one at his side questioning him, and one behind for cover, in case he became unruly, perhaps, or \u201ccooperation\u201d was not forthcoming. The situation is much like the one in the alley, with civilians in close quarters, unable to move effectively, being told their cooperation is expected. While I am not prepared to say that no bus interrogation and search can pass the Bostick<\/i> test without a warning that passengers are free to say no, the facts here surely required more from the officers than a quiet tone of voice. A police officer who is certain to get his way has no need to shout.\r\n
* * * *<\/p>\r\nIn any event, I am less concerned to parse this case against Delgado<\/i> than to apply Bostick\u2019<\/i>s totality of circumstances test, and to ask whether a passenger would reasonably have felt free to end his encounter with the three officers by saying no and ignoring them thereafter. In my view the answer is clear. The Court\u2019s contrary conclusion tells me that the majority cannot see what Justice Stewart saw, and I respectfully dissent.","rendered":"SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES<\/h2>\n
UNITED STATES v<\/b>.<\/i> DRAYTON<\/b>
\n536 U.S. 194 (2002)<\/b><\/h3>\n
Justice Kennedy delivered the opinion of the Court.<\/p>\n
The Fourth Amendment permits police officers to approach bus passengers at random to ask questions and to request their consent to searches, provided a reasonable person would understand that he or she is free to refuse. Florida<\/i> v. Bostick,<\/i> 501 U.S. 429 (1991). This case requires us to determine whether officers must advise bus passengers during these encounters of their right not to cooperate.<\/p>\n
I<\/b><\/p>\n
On February 4, 1999, respondents Christopher Drayton and Clifton Brown, Jr., were traveling on a Greyhound bus en route from Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, to Detroit, Michigan. The bus made a scheduled stop in Tallahassee, Florida. The passengers were required to disembark so the bus could be refueled and cleaned. As the passengers reboarded, the driver checked their tickets and then left to complete paperwork inside the terminal. As he left, the driver allowed three members of the Tallahassee Police Department to board the bus as part of a routine drug and weapons interdiction effort. The officers were dressed in plain clothes and carried concealed weapons and visible badges.<\/p>\n
Once onboard Officer Hoover knelt on the driver\u2019s seat and faced the rear of the bus. He could observe the passengers and ensure the safety of the two other officers without blocking the aisle or otherwise obstructing the bus exit. Officers Lang and Blackburn went to the rear of the bus. Blackburn remained stationed there, facing forward. Lang worked his way toward the front of the bus, speaking with individual passengers as he went. He asked the passengers about their travel plans and sought to match passengers with luggage in the overhead racks. To avoid blocking the aisle, Lang stood next to or just behind each passenger with whom he spoke.<\/p>\n
According to Lang\u2019s testimony, passengers who declined to cooperate with him or who chose to exit the bus at any time would have been allowed to do so without argument. In Lang\u2019s experience, however, most people are willing to cooperate. Some passengers go so far as to commend the police for their efforts to ensure the safety of their travel. Lang could recall five to six instances in the previous year in which passengers had declined to have their luggage searched. It also was common for passengers to leave the bus for a cigarette or a snack while the officers were on board. Lang sometimes informed passengers of their right to refuse to cooperate. On the day in question, however, he did not.<\/p>\n
Respondents were seated next to each other on the bus. Drayton was in the aisle seat, Brown in the seat next to the window. Lang approached respondents from the rear and leaned over Drayton\u2019s shoulder. He held up his badge long enough for respondents to identify him as a police officer. With his face 12-to-18 inches away from Drayton\u2019s, Lang spoke in a voice just loud enough for respondents to hear:<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m Investigator Lang with the Tallahassee Police Department. We\u2019re conducting bus interdiction [sic], attempting to deter drugs and illegal weapons being transported on the bus. Do you have any bags on the bus?\u201d<\/p>\n
Both respondents pointed to a single green bag in the overhead luggage rack. Lang asked, \u201cDo you mind if I check it?,\u201d and Brown responded, \u201cGo ahead.\u201d Id., <\/i>at 56. Lang handed the bag to Officer Blackburn to check. The bag contained no contraband.<\/p>\n
Officer Lang noticed that both respondents were wearing heavy jackets and baggy pants despite the warm weather. In Lang\u2019s experience drug traffickers often use baggy clothing to conceal weapons or narcotics. The officer thus asked Brown if he had any weapons or drugs in his possession. And he asked Brown: \u201cDo you mind if I check your person?\u201d Brown answered, \u201cSure,\u201d and cooperated by leaning up in his seat, pulling a cell phone out of his pocket, and opening up his jacket. Id., <\/i>at 61. Lang reached across Drayton and patted down Brown\u2019s jacket and pockets, including his waist area, sides, and upper thighs. In both thigh areas, Lang detected hard objects similar to drug packages detected on other occasions. Lang arrested and handcuffed Brown. Officer Hoover escorted Brown from the bus.<\/p>\n
Lang then asked Drayton, \u201cMind if I check you?\u201d Id., <\/i>at 65. Drayton responded by lifting his hands about eight inches from his legs. Lang conducted a patdown of Drayton\u2019s thighs and detected hard objects similar to those found on Brown. He arrested Drayton and escorted him from the bus. A further search revealed that respondents had duct-taped plastic bundles of powder cocaine between several pairs of their boxer shorts. Brown possessed three bundles containing 483 grams of cocaine. Drayton possessed two bundles containing 295 grams of cocaine.<\/p>\n
* * * *<\/p>\n
II<\/b><\/p>\n
Law enforcement officers do not violate the Fourth Amendment\u2019s prohibition of unreasonable seizures merely by approaching individuals on the street or in other public places and putting questions to them if they are willing to listen. <\/i>See, e.g.,<\/i> Florida <\/i>v. Royer,<\/i> 460 U.S. 491, 497 (1983) (plurality opinion); see id.,<\/i> at 523, n. 3 (Rehnquist, J., dissenting); Florida <\/i>v. Rodriguez,<\/i> 469 U.S. 1, 5\u20146 (1984) (per curiam) <\/i>(holding that such interactions in airports are \u201cthe sort of consensual encounter[s] that implicat[e] no Fourth Amendment interest\u201d). Even when law enforcement officers have no basis for suspecting a particular individual, they may pose questions, ask for identification, and request consent to search luggage provided they do not induce cooperation by coercive means. See Florida <\/i>v. Bostick, <\/i>501 U.S., at 434\u2014435 (citations omitted). If a reasonable person would feel free to terminate the encounter, then he or she has not been seized.<\/p>\n
* * * *<\/p>\n
Applying the Bostick<\/i> framework to the facts of this particular case, we conclude that the police did not seize respondents when they boarded the bus and began questioning passengers. The officers gave the passengers no reason to believe that they were required to answer the officers\u2019 questions. When Officer Lang approached respondents, he did not brandish a weapon or make any intimidating movements. He left the aisle free so that respondents could exit. He spoke to passengers one by one and in a polite, quiet voice. Nothing he said would suggest to a reasonable person that he or she was barred from leaving the bus or otherwise terminating the encounter.<\/p>\n
* * * *<\/p>\n
Respondents make much of the fact that Officer Lang displayed his badge. In Florida<\/i> v. Rodriguez,<\/i> 469 U.S., at 5\u20146, however, the Court rejected the claim that the defendant was seized when an officer approached him in an airport, showed him his badge, and asked him to answer some questions. Likewise, in INS<\/i> v. Delgado<\/i>, 466 U.S. 210, 212\u2014213 (1984), the Court held that INS agents\u2019 wearing badges and questioning workers in a factory did not constitute a seizure. And while neither Lang nor his colleagues were in uniform or visibly armed, those factors should have little weight in the analysis. Officers are often required to wear uniforms and in many circumstances this is cause for assurance, not discomfort. Much the same can be said for wearing sidearms. That most law enforcement officers are armed is a fact well known to the public. The presence of a holstered firearm thus is unlikely to contribute to the coerciveness of the encounter absent active brandishing of the weapon.<\/p>\n
Officer Hoover\u2019s position at the front of the bus also does not tip the scale in respondents\u2019 favor. Hoover did nothing to intimidate passengers, and he said nothing to suggest that people could not exit and indeed he left the aisle clear. In Delgado<\/i>, the Court determined there was no seizure even though several uniformed INS officers were stationed near the exits of the factory. Id., <\/i>at 219. The Court noted: \u201cThe presence of agents by the exits posed no reasonable threat of detention to these workers, \u2026 the mere possibility that they would be questioned if they sought to leave the buildings should not have resulted in any reasonable apprehension by any of them that they would be seized or detained in any meaningful way.\u201d Ibid.<\/p>\n
Finally, the fact that in Officer Lang\u2019s experience only a few passengers have refused to cooperate does not suggest that a reasonable person would not feel free to terminate the bus encounter. In Lang\u2019s experience it was common for passengers to leave the bus for a cigarette or a snack while the officers were questioning passengers. App. 70, 81. And of more importance, bus passengers answer officers\u2019 questions and otherwise cooperate not because of coercion but because the passengers know that their participation enhances their own safety and the safety of those around them. \u201cWhile most citizens will respond to a police request, the fact that people do so, and do so without being told they are free not to respond, hardly eliminates the consensual nature of the response.\u201d Delgado<\/i>, supra,<\/i> at 216.<\/p>\n
Drayton contends that even if Brown\u2019s cooperation with the officers was consensual, Drayton was seized because no reasonable person would feel free to terminate the encounter with the officers after Brown had been arrested. The Court of Appeals did not address this claim; and in any event the argument fails. The arrest of one person does not mean that everyone around him has been seized by police. If anything, Brown\u2019s arrest should have put Drayton on notice of the consequences of continuing the encounter by answering the officers\u2019 questions. Even after arresting Brown, Lang addressed Drayton in a polite manner and provided him with no indication that he was required to answer Lang\u2019s questions.<\/p>\n
We turn now from the question whether respondents were seized to whether they were subjected to an unreasonable search, i.e.,<\/i> whether their consent to the suspicionless search was involuntary. In circumstances such as these, where the question of voluntariness pervades both the search and seizure inquiries, the respective analyses turn on very similar facts. And, as the facts above suggest, respondents\u2019 consent to the search of their luggage and their persons was voluntary. Nothing Officer Lang said indicated a command to consent to the search. Rather, when respondents informed Lang that they had a bag on the bus, he asked for their permission to check it. And when Lang requested to search Brown and Drayton\u2019s persons, he asked first if they objected, thus indicating to a reasonable person that he or she was free to refuse. Even after arresting Brown, Lang provided Drayton with no indication that he was required to consent to a search. To the contrary, Lang asked for Drayton\u2019s permission to search him (\u201cMind if I check you?\u201d), and Drayton agreed.<\/p>\n
The Court has rejected in specific terms the suggestion that police officers must always inform citizens of their right to refuse when seeking permission to conduct a warrantless consent search. See, e.g.,<\/i> Ohio<\/i> v. Robinette,<\/i> 519 U.S. 33, 39\u201440 (1996); Schneckloth <\/i>v. Bustamonte,<\/i> 412 U.S. 218, 227 (1973). <\/i>\u201cWhile knowledge of the right to refuse consent is one factor to be taken into account, the government need not establish such knowledge as the sine qua non<\/i> of an effective consent.\u201d Ibid. <\/i>Nor do this Court\u2019s decisions suggest that even though there are no per se <\/i>rules, a presumption of invalidity attaches if a citizen consented without explicit notification that he or she was free to refuse to cooperate. Instead, the Court has repeated that the totality of the circumstances must control, without giving extra weight to the absence of this type of warning. See, e.g.,<\/i> Schneckloth, supra;<\/i> Robinette,<\/i> supra, <\/i>at 39\u201440. Although Officer Lang did not inform respondents of their right to refuse the search, he did request permission to search, and the totality of the circumstances indicates that their consent was voluntary, so the searches were reasonable.<\/p>\n
In a society based on law, the concept of agreement and consent should be given a weight and dignity of its own. Police officers act in full accord with the law when they ask citizens for consent. It reinforces the rule of law for the citizen to advise the police of his or her wishes and for the police to act in reliance on that understanding. When this exchange takes place, it dispels inferences of coercion.<\/p>\n
We need not ask the alternative question whether, after the arrest of Brown, there were grounds for a Terry<\/i> stop and frisk of Drayton, though this may have been the case. It was evident that Drayton and Brown were traveling together\u2013Officer Lang observed the pair reboarding the bus together; they were each dressed in heavy, baggy clothes that were ill-suited for the day\u2019s warm temperatures; they were seated together on the bus; and they each claimed responsibility for the single piece of green carry-on luggage. Once Lang had identified Brown as carrying what he believed to be narcotics, he may have had reasonable suspicion to conduct a Terry <\/i>stop and frisk on Drayton as well. That question, however, has not been presented to us. The fact the officers may have had reasonable suspicion does not prevent them from relying on a citizen\u2019s consent to the search. It would be a paradox, and one most puzzling to law enforcement officials and courts alike, were we to say, after holding that Brown\u2019s consent was voluntary, that Drayton\u2019s consent was ineffectual simply because the police at that point had more compelling grounds to detain him. After taking Brown into custody, the officers were entitled to continue to proceed on the basis of consent and to ask for Drayton\u2019s cooperation.<\/p>\n
The judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.<\/p>\n
It was so ordered.<\/p>\n
Justice Souter, with whom Justice Stevens and Justice Ginsburg join, dissenting.<\/p>\n
Anyone who travels by air today submits to searches of the person and luggage as a condition of boarding the aircraft. It is universally accepted that such intrusions are necessary to hedge against risks that, nowadays, even small children understand. The commonplace precautions of air travel have not, thus far, been justified for ground transportation, however, and no such conditions have been placed on passengers getting on trains or buses. There is therefore an air of unreality about the Court\u2019s explanation that bus passengers consent to searches of their luggage to \u201cenhanc[e] their own safety and the safety of those around them.\u201d Ante<\/i>, at 10. Nor are the other factual assessments underlying the Court\u2019s conclusion in favor of the Government more convincing.<\/p>\n
The issue we took to review is whether the police\u2019s examination of the bus passengers, including respondents, amounted to a suspicionless seizure under the Fourth Amendment. If it did, any consent to search was plainly invalid as a product of the illegal seizure. See Florida<\/i> v. Royer,<\/i> 460 U.S. 491, 507\u2014508 (1983) (plurality opinion) (\u201c[T]he consent was tainted by the illegality and \u2026 ineffective to justify the search\u201d); id.,<\/i> at 509 (Powell, J., concurring); id.,<\/i> at 509 (Brennan, J., concurring in result).<\/p>\n
Florida<\/i> v. Bostick,<\/i> 501 U.S. 429 (1991), established the framework for determining whether the bus passengers were seized in the constitutional sense. In that case, we rejected the position that police questioning of bus passengers was a per se<\/i> seizure, and held instead that the issue of seizure was to be resolved under an objective test considering all circumstances: whether a reasonable passenger would have felt \u201cfree to decline the officers\u2019 requests or otherwise terminate the encounter,\u201d id.,<\/i> at 436. We thus applied to a bus passenger the more general criterion, whether the person questioned was free \u201cto ignore the police presence and go about his business,\u201d id.,<\/i> at 437 (quoting Michigan<\/i> v. Chesternut,<\/i> 486 U.S. 567, 569 (1988)).<\/p>\n
* * * *<\/p>\n
When the bus in question made its scheduled stop in Tallahassee, the passengers were required to disembark while the vehicle was cleaned and refueled. App. 104. When the passengers returned, they gave their tickets to the driver, who kept them and then left himself, after giving three police officers permission to board the bus in his absence. Id., <\/i>at 77\u201478. Although they were not in uniform, the officers displayed badges and identified themselves as police. One stationed himself in the driver\u2019s seat by the door at the front, facing back to observe the passengers. The two others went to the rear, from which they worked their way forward, with one of them speaking to passengers, the other backing him up. Id., <\/i>at 47\u201448. They necessarily addressed the passengers at very close range; the aisle was only fifteen inches wide, and each seat only eighteen. The quarters were cramped further by the overhead rack, nineteen inches above the top of the passenger seats. The passenger by the window could not have stood up straight, id., <\/i>at 55, and the face of the nearest officer was only a foot or eighteen inches from the face of the nearest passenger being addressed, id., <\/i>at 57. During the exchanges, the officers looked down, and the passengers had to look up if they were to face the police. The officer asking the questions spoke quietly. He prefaced his requests for permission to search luggage and do a body patdown by identifying himself by name as a police investigator \u201cconducting bus interdiction\u201d and saying, \u201c\u2018We would like for your cooperation. Do you have any luggage on the bus?\u2019 \u201d Id., <\/i>at 82.<\/p>\n
Thus, for reasons unexplained, the driver with the tickets entitling the passengers to travel had yielded his custody of the bus and its seated travelers to three police officers, whose authority apparently superseded the driver\u2019s own. The officers took control of the entire passenger compartment, one stationed at the door keeping surveillance of all the occupants, the others working forward from the back. With one officer right behind him and the other one forward, a third officer accosted each passenger at quarters extremely close and so cramped that as many as half the passengers could not even have stood to face the speaker. None was asked whether he was willing to converse with the police or to take part in the enquiry. Instead the officer said the police were \u201cconducting bus interdiction,\u201d in the course of which they \u201cwould like \u2026 cooperation.\u201d Ibid.<\/i> The reasonable inference was that the \u201cinterdiction\u201d was not a consensual exercise, but one the police would carry out whatever the circumstances; that they would prefer \u201ccooperation\u201d but would not let the lack of it stand in their way. There was no contrary indication that day, since no passenger had refused the cooperation requested, and there was no reason for any passenger to believe that the driver would return and the trip resume until the police were satisfied. The scene was set and an atmosphere of obligatory participation was established by this introduction. Later requests to search prefaced with \u201cDo you mind \u2026\u201d would naturally have been understood in the terms with which the encounter began.<\/p>\n
It is very hard to imagine that either Brown or Drayton would have believed that he stood to lose nothing if he refused to cooperate with the police, or that he had any free choice to ignore the police altogether. No reasonable passenger could have believed that, only an uncomprehending one. It is neither here nor there that the interdiction was conducted by three officers, not one, as a safety precaution. See id., <\/i>at 47. The fact was that there were three, and when Brown and Drayton were called upon to respond, each one was presumably conscious of an officer in front watching, one at his side questioning him, and one behind for cover, in case he became unruly, perhaps, or \u201ccooperation\u201d was not forthcoming. The situation is much like the one in the alley, with civilians in close quarters, unable to move effectively, being told their cooperation is expected. While I am not prepared to say that no bus interrogation and search can pass the Bostick<\/i> test without a warning that passengers are free to say no, the facts here surely required more from the officers than a quiet tone of voice. A police officer who is certain to get his way has no need to shout.<\/p>\n
* * * *<\/p>\n
In any event, I am less concerned to parse this case against Delgado<\/i> than to apply Bostick\u2019<\/i>s totality of circumstances test, and to ask whether a passenger would reasonably have felt free to end his encounter with the three officers by saying no and ignoring them thereafter. In my view the answer is clear. The Court\u2019s contrary conclusion tells me that the majority cannot see what Justice Stewart saw, and I respectfully dissent.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":53384,"menu_order":12,"template":"","meta":{"_candela_citation":"[]","CANDELA_OUTCOMES_GUID":"","pb_show_title":"on","pb_short_title":"","pb_subtitle":"","pb_authors":[],"pb_section_license":""},"chapter-type":[],"contributor":[],"license":[],"class_list":["post-183","chapter","type-chapter","status-publish","hentry"],"part":114,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/monroecc-crj103\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/183","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/monroecc-crj103\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/monroecc-crj103\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/chapter"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/monroecc-crj103\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/53384"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/monroecc-crj103\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/183\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":357,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/monroecc-crj103\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/183\/revisions\/357"}],"part":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/monroecc-crj103\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/parts\/114"}],"metadata":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/monroecc-crj103\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/183\/metadata\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/monroecc-crj103\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=183"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"chapter-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/monroecc-crj103\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapter-type?post=183"},{"taxonomy":"contributor","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/monroecc-crj103\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/contributor?post=183"},{"taxonomy":"license","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/monroecc-crj103\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/license?post=183"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}