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The Supreme Court's decisions on stop-and-identify laws, specifically Hiibel and Kolender, and their impact on state-level outcomes.
When an individual in the United States must identify themselves to police is not a single, nationwide rule but a patchwork of constitutional principles, state “stop-and-identify” statutes, and federa...
Carrying riot gear or gas masks in the United States is not uniformly illegal, but legal risk varies sharply by state and context: many jurisdictions have anti-mask statutes that criminalize concealin...
Legal protections for refusing to identify oneself during a police stop are a patchwork of constitutional rules and state statutes: the Supreme Court has allowed some “stop-and-identify” laws while re...
to federal agents is not automatically a federal crime, but it can lead to arrest or prosecution in certain circumstances—most commonly when state “stop-and-identify” laws apply, when the refusal occu...
Refusing to show identification to police on a public street produces different legal consequences depending on where the encounter occurs and whether the officer has lawfully detained the person; sev...
The Supreme Court’s decision in established that a state may criminalize refusal to disclose one's name during a lawful stop, provided the statute is sufficiently narrow and the stop rests on reasonab...
The Supreme Court’s core framework governing when citizens can be required to show identification to police flows from Terry v. Ohio, which authorizes brief stops on reasonable suspicion, and from Hii...
and conditionally: with so‑called “stop‑and‑identify” or “failure to identify” laws, an officer can lawfully detain a person long enough to establish identity when there is reasonable suspicion of cri...
Federal guidance and ICE policy generally require agents to carry credentials and identify themselves when legally necessary, but they also cite officer safety reasons for masking; state and local att...
The Supreme Court in Hiibel upheld a Nevada “stop-and-identify” law, ruling that a suspect can be compelled to disclose his name during a Terry investigatory stop when the disclosure is not reasonably...
The short answer: it depends—no single federal rule forces every person on the street to produce ID, but police can compel identification in specific circumstances and many states have “stop‑and‑ident...