Supreme Court of the United States · Official docket →
District of Columbia v. R.W.
Paid petition · District of Columbia Court of Appeals, No. 23-FS-0589 · judgment May 1, 2025
Before the decision, well below the 4.1% base rate, with no standout signals pointing toward a grant.
Questions presented
This Court has long held that the reasonableness of an investigative stop must be assessed using the “totality of the circumstances.” Nevertheless, four circuits and four state supreme courts, including the D.C. Court of Appeals below, permit a reviewing court to exclude certain facts from the “totality”—in conflict with both this Court’s guidance and the majority of jurisdictions. Here, a patrol officer responded to a dispatch reporting a suspicious or stolen vehicle at a specific apartment building around 2:00 a.m. As the officer’s marked cruiser pulled into the parking lot, two people fled into the woods from the back of the only occupied car in the lot. The car’s driver then began reversing out of the parking space with the rear driver’s side door wide open. The officer stopped the driver for roughly two minutes to determine whether the car was stolen. The D.C. Court of Appeals held that the stop violated the Fourth Amendment because the dispatch report and the flight of the vehicle’s passengers had to be excluded from the analysis, and with those two facts out of the picture, the officer lacked reasonable suspicion of potential criminal activity. The questions presented are:
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Whether a court assessing the existence of reasonable suspicion under the Fourth Amendment may exclude a fact known to the officer, or instead must assess all the evidence when weighing the totality of the circumstances.
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Whether, under the totality-of-thecircumstances test, the officer in this case had reasonable suspicion to conduct an investigative stop.
Counsel of record
For petitioner
Caroline Sage Van Zile
Office of the Attorney General
For respondent
Jaclyn S. Frankfurt
Public Defender Service for DC
Proceedings
- May 22 2026Judgment and Mandate Issued.
- Apr 20 2026Motion for leave to proceed in forma pauperis filed by respondent GRANTED.
- Apr 20 2026Petition GRANTED. Judgment REVERSED and case REMANDED for further proceedings not inconsistent with the Opinion of the Court. Justice Sotomayor would deny the petition for a writ of certiorari. Opinion per curiam. (Detached Opinion) Justice Jackson, dissenting. (Detached Opinion)
- Apr 13 2026DISTRIBUTED for Conference of 4/17/2026.
- Mar 30 2026DISTRIBUTED for Conference of 4/2/2026.
- Mar 23 2026DISTRIBUTED for Conference of 3/27/2026.
- Mar 16 2026DISTRIBUTED for Conference of 3/20/2026.
- Mar 02 2026DISTRIBUTED for Conference of 3/6/2026.
- Feb 23 2026DISTRIBUTED for Conference of 2/27/2026.
- Feb 13 2026DISTRIBUTED for Conference of 2/20/2026.
- Jan 20 2026DISTRIBUTED for Conference of 1/23/2026.
- Jan 12 2026DISTRIBUTED for Conference of 1/16/2026.
- Dec 23 2025DISTRIBUTED for Conference of 1/9/2026.
- Dec 22 2025Reply of petitioner District of Columbia filed. (Distributed)
- Dec 08 2025Motion for leave to proceed in forma pauperis filed by respondent R.W.
- Dec 08 2025Brief of respondent R.W. in opposition filed.
- Nov 03 2025Motion to extend the time to file a response is granted and the time is further extended to and including December 8, 2025.
- Oct 31 2025Motion to extend the time to file a response from November 17, 2025 to December 8, 2025, submitted to The Clerk.
- Oct 16 2025Brief amici curiae of Oklahoma, et al. filed.
- Oct 09 2025Brief amicus curiae of National Fraternal Order of Police filed.
- Sep 30 2025Motion to extend the time to file a response is granted and the time is extended to and including November 17, 2025.
- Sep 29 2025Motion to extend the time to file a response from October 16, 2025 to November 17, 2025, submitted to The Clerk.
- Sep 16 2025Response Requested. (Due October 16, 2025)
- Sep 10 2025DISTRIBUTED for Conference of 9/29/2025.
- Sep 03 2025Waiver of right of respondent R.W. to respond filed.
- Aug 29 2025Petition for a writ of certiorari filed. (Response due October 3, 2025)
- Jul 21 2025Application (25A63) granted by The Chief Justice extending the time to file until August 29, 2025.
- Jul 03 2025Application (25A63) to extend the time to file a petition for a writ of certiorari from July 30, 2025 to August 29, 2025, submitted to The Chief Justice.