holding statute prohibiting wandering at night violated due process where it did not distinguish between “conduct calculated to harm and that which is essentially innocent”
How later courts described this case
- holding statute prohibiting wandering at night violated due process where it did not distinguish between “conduct calculated to harm and that which is essentially innocent”
- Seattle loitering ordinance making it a crime to be “wandering or loitering abroad,” to be “abroad under other suspicious circumstances,” and to “fail to give a satisfactory account of himself upon the demand of any police officer” held invalid for vagueness
- ruling on ordinance very similar to A.C.O. 138.26
- “The right to be let alone is inviolate; interference with that right is to be tolerated only if it is necessary to protect the rights and the welfare of others.”
Written by the judges who cited it.
The opinion
Hale, J.
(concurring specially) — Save for its reference to the Model Penal Code, Proposed Official Draft § 250.6, American Law Institute (1962), I concur in and have, accordingly, signed the majority opinion.
I am reluctant to recommend the quoted section as a model of precision and clarity in defining criminal loitering and prowling, because I think the quoted definition suffers from the same qualities of vagueness and imprecision which we found in the Seattle city ordinance.