People v. Johnson

OPINION OF THE COURT

Memorandum.

The order of the Appellate Division should be reversed, defendant’s motion to suppress granted and the indictment dismissed.

The flaw in the People’s case is that nothing preceding the encounter with defendant justified a founded suspicion that he was engaged in or about to be engaged in criminal conduct. The officer testified to no more than that he had known defendant for six years and had “arrested him on several occasions for burglary” and that, “He was just walking through the Corn Hill area. We had a rash of burglaries in the area the last few weeks and…