2023 Lesson 9: Caselaw Update

This is an online legal studies course. The lesson addresses recent court decisions providing guidance to law enforcement officers regarding: the amount of evidence an officer needs in order to establish probable cause or arguable probable cause to make a stop of a suspect; whether officers need any level of suspicion, including reasonable suspicion, to search a probationer’s residence pursuant to a condition of probation; whether reasonable suspicion is established when a motor vehicle’s license plate shows it being registered to vehicle of the same make and model but a different color than the vehicle to which it is attached; the source and scope of Missouri law enforcement officers’ power to make arrests, including the powers under the common law, general constitutional restrictions, and specific statutes granting different powers of arrest for differently commissioned and certified officers, different jurisdictions, and different situations.