Kaufman v. Higgs, et al, No. 11-1390 (10th Cir. 2012)
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Plaintiff-Appellant Richard Kaufman brought a 42 U.S.C. 1983 action alleging that the Defendants, all Colorado police officers, had violated his constitutional rights by arresting him without probable cause. In 2009, a vehicle driven by an unnamed female driver hit an unoccupied car in a jewelry store parking lot. Someone witnessed the incident, took down the car's license plate number and reported it to the Colorado State Patrol. Officers investigating the report learned that Plaintiff owned the car and had made a purchase at the store moments before the accident. Plaintiff cited "privilege" in refusing to tell the officers the name of the female driver. Frustrated, the officers advised Plaintiff that refusing to tell them the name of the driver could end in an arrest for obstruction of justice. Plaintiff refused and he was arrested. The district court granted the Defendants' motion for summary judgment. As to a Fourth Amendment claim, the court concluded that there was no false arrest because the troopers had probable cause to believe Plaintiff's silence, accompanied by assertion of privilege, constituted a violation of the obstruction statute. The Tenth Circuit disagreed and reversed. The Defendants never contended that their encounter with Plaintiff was other than consensual; the law was well established that a citizen has no obligation to answer an officer's questions during a consensual encounter; and the Colorado Supreme Court had made it clear that the Colorado obstruction statute is not violated by mere verbal opposition to an officer's questioning. "It follows that the Defendants could not have reasonably thought that they were justified in arresting Plaintiff and their motion for summary judgment on the ground of qualified immunity should have been denied."
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