What's In A Name?

A good, old-fashioned Nevada cowboy stops along the side of a highway, gets out to stretch the legs, kicks back against the side of his pickup and lights one up (cigarette, that is).

At some point, a police officer stops and asks this cowboy who he is. The cowboy is in no mood to conversate. As a matter of fact, he encourages the officer to take him to jail, expressing confidence that the city's finest, wouldn't. He does. The crime? The cowboy refusing to identify himself.

The conviction, worth a $250 fine under Nevada law, is upheld by all Nevada courts, including the state's highest judicial forum. It's now pending before the country's highest court. What will those nine fair -- well, some of them -- ladies and gents do?

What would you have done had you been in the cowboy's shoes? It's an interesting one to mull over. There are quite a few states carrying failure to identify-type laws in their statutes; including the Lone Star State. And it is readily apparent to see at least one advantage of passing such legislation. Perhaps the individual is a wanted suspect in some unsolved felony offense. A quick computer check would confirm that. Of course, one could also give a false name or a relative's name...you get the picture.

Plusses and minuses have been asserted on both sides as to the merits of using failure to identify as a law enforcement tool. Yet the more pressing question, particularly in light of the new world order in which we live, read: our "war on terror," is the constitutionality of requiring an individual to give his name to a law enforcement official. Especially in the absence of any suspicious behavior.

In general, I would suggest that the vast number of police officers resist subverting such a law for malicious purposes. But in this new era, one can reasonably argue that some in the crime prevention community feel emboldened to move beyond ethical, reasonable and even constitutional boundaries.

I would imagine that not very many 'I'm-not-gonna-tell-you-my-name'type charges are filed across the country; notable exception? See above. And this was long before the new world order. Good ole Friendship State; pioneering in the grandest of ways....

Proponents make the argument that requiring an individual to give her name might prevent an act of terror, or perhaps find a wanted one. But what if you're simply walking down the sidewalk downtown, window-shopping perhaps, and a passing police officer stops you and asks for your name. Should you have to give it? Certainly, prudence might dictate that you do so, to prevent further law enforcement action.

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