From yesterday's Second Circuit decision in Soukaneh v. Andrzejewski, decided by Judge Eunice Lee, joined by Judges Gerard Lynch and Beth Robinson:
The evidence, taken in the light most favorable to Plaintiff-Appellee Basel Soukaneh, would permit a reasonable jury to find that in the course of a routine traffic stop, [Nicholas Andrzejewski, a Waterbury, Connecticut police officer] unlawfully and violently handcuffed and detained Soukaneh in the back of a police vehicle for over half an hour and conducted a warrantless search of Soukaneh's vehicle after Soukaneh presented a facially valid firearms permit and disclosed that he possessed a firearm pursuant to the permit. On appeal, Andrzejewski argues that we should reverse the district court's denial of qualified immunity because the presence of the lawfully owned firearm in the vehicle gave him the requisite probable cause to detain Soukaneh, search the interior of his car, and search his trunk….
Andrzejewski argues that … his actions … were justified because he had both "a reasonable suspicion of possible criminal activity" and "probable cause to detain [Soukaneh] and search his person and his vehicle" once he was made aware of the presence of a gun in the vehicle—even absent any articulable basis to question the permit's validity….
The desire to confirm the legitimacy of the facially valid firearms permit that Soukaneh presented did not—with nothing more—provide Andrzejewski with probable cause for the half-hour or longer handcuffed detention that occurred. It is uncontested that Soukaneh presented Andrzejewski with a gun license, the legitimacy of which Andrzejewski himself admits he had no reason to question. Moreover, Andrzejewski concedes that he was informed of the facially valid license before Soukaneh told him that he had a gun and specified its location.
