Justice Jackson Was the Lone Dissenter in This Case, and She Was Not Happy About It

It’s not a major case, but the Supreme Court reversed a lower court decision, which did not sit well with Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson. The ruling was a 7-2 decision, not even controversial. Justice Elena Kagan sided with conservatives in this instance. The case involved a police stop in the District of Columbia in February 2023. “RW” thought his rights were violated after getting slapped with a slew of charges that included “delinquent on counts of unauthorized use of a motor vehicle, felony receipt of stolen property, unlawful entry of a motor vehicle, and operating a vehicle in the District of Columbia without a permit,” according to Courthouse News Service.

The lower court initially ruled that the police lacked reasonable suspicion to stop the defendant. That got settled on Monday. Justice Jackson was the only dissenter. Sotomayor also opposed the ruling but did not join Jackson’s dissent.

Here’s the backstory:

In the wee hours of a winter morning in Washington, D. C., District of Columbia Metropolitan Police Officer Clifford Vanterpool received a radio dispatch call directing him to check out a suspicious vehicle at a specific address. Officer Vanterpool reached the apartment building at that address around 2:00 a.m. As he turned his marked police vehicle into the parking lot, he saw two people immediately flee from a car, “unprovoked,” after “[p]olice had not done anything other than simply pull up.” App. to Pet. for Cert. 48a. The runners left open at least one of the car doors. The driver then began to back out of the parking space, rear door still open. Officer Vanterpool decided to investigate. He parked directly behind the car, left his own vehicle, ordered the driver to put his hands up, and drew his service weapon.

It’s another Fourth Amendment case involving what constitutes a legal stop and reasonable suspicion—things like that. When a police car encounters a reported vehicle acting suspiciously, which leads to two occupants fleeing unprovoked and another trying to back out with the doors open, you’d think that’s a clear example of a reasonable stop. Apparently, there was some dispute about that. Not anymore. Jackson’s dissent accused her seven colleagues of ‘wordsmithing,’ which law professor Jonathan Turley took some exception to, while exposing that Justice Brown might not know what that means, or at least using the phrase improperly:

🚨 The Supreme Court, in a summary reversal, held that police had reasonable suspicion to stop a driver after passengers fled and he began backing away, faulting the lower court for a “divide-and-conquer” analysis of the facts.

Justice Jackson was the sole dissenter. pic.twitter.com/qeBATUM68U
— SCOTUS Wire (@scotus_wire) April 20, 2026

...Jackson wrote that "I cannot fathom" how the seven justices could second-guess the lower court in rejecting the police claims. She accused her colleagues of mere "wordsmithing." Just for the record, it would be useful to review those words...
— Jonathan Turley (@JonathanTurley) April 20, 2026

...Justice Jackson (and Justice Sotomayor, who notably declined to join her dissent) felt that those facts were not sufficient for the requisite suspicion needed for the stop. That seems a tad more than "wordsmithing."
— Jonathan Turley (@JonathanTurley) April 20, 2026

Just brutal.

The rest of the ruling is here.

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