Chicago v. Morales

NAME:	Chicago (“P”) v. Morales (“R”)	119 S. Ct. 1849	1999
FACTS:	· In 1992, the Chicago City Council enacted the Gang Congregation Ordinance, which prohibits “criminal street gang members” from “loitering” with one another or with other persons in any public place. · The council found that a continuing increase in criminal street gang activity was largely responsible for the city’s rising murder rate, as well as an escalation of violent…crimes. It further found that “loitering in public places by criminal street gang members creates a justifiable fear for the safety of persons…[and] aggressive action is necessary to preserve the city’s streets and other public places so that the public may use such places without fear.” · Ordinance involves 4 predicates: (1) the police officer must reasonably believe that at least one of the persons present in a “public place” is a “criminal street gang member;” (2) person must be “loitering,” which the ordinance defines as “remain[ing] in any one place with no apparent purpose;” (3) officer must then order “all” of the persons to disperse and remove themselves “from the area;” and (4) must obey the police officer’s order. · The Chicago P.D. promulgated General Order 92-4 to provide guidelines to govern its enforcement.
PROCEDURE:	Two trial judges upheld the constitutionality of the ordinance, but eleven others ruled that it was invalid.
ISSUE:	Did the Supreme Court of Illinois correctly hold that the ordinance violates the Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment to the Federal Constitution?
HOLDING:	YES. The Illinois Supreme Court correctly concluded that the ordinance does not provide sufficiently specific limits on the enforcement discretion of the police “to meet constitutional standards for definiteness and clarity.”
REASONING:	· (RULE): It is established that a law fails to meet the requirements of the Due Process Clause if it is so vague and standardless that it leaves the public uncertain as to the conduct it prohibits…” · The vagueness that dooms this ordinance is not the product of uncertainty about the normal meaning of “loitering,” but rather about what loitering is covered by the ordinance and what is not. A number of state courts have upheld ordinances that criminalize loitering combined with some other overt act or evidence of criminal intent. Conversely, courts have invalidated laws that do not join the term “loitering” with a second specific element of the crime. · (RULE): The purpose of the fair notice requirement is to enable the ordinary citizen to conform his or her conduct to the law. “No one may be required at peril of life, liberty, or property to speculate as to the meaning of penal statutes.” – Lanzetta v. New Jersey · Loitering is the conduct that the ordinance is designated to prohibit. If the loitering is in fact harmless and innocent, the dispersal order itself is an unjustified impairment of liberty. · Lack of clarity in the description of the loiterer’s duty to obey a dispersal order might not render the ordinance unconstitutionally vague if the definition of the forbidden conduct were clear, but it does support our conclusion that the entire ordinance fails to give the ordinary citizen adequate notice of what is forbidden and what is permitted. · Also, the broad sweep of the ordinance also violates “’the requirement that a legislature establish minimal guidelines to govern law enforcement.’” There are no such guidelines in the ordinance. The principal source of the vast discretion conferred on the police in this case is the definition of loitering as “to remain in any one place with no apparent purpose.” The Illinois Supreme Court interprets that definition to “provide absolute discretion to police officers to determine what activities constitute loitering.”
DISPOSITION:	Judgment affirmed