Please join CCR and partners in court as  Angelo Guisado and Britney Wilson argue in Furlow v Belmar, a case pending in United States District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri, that challenges the so-called “wanted” system as used in St. Louis County, Missouri because it routinely leads to unconstitutional arrests of area residents, the majority of whom are Black. For many years, St. Louis and surrounding Missouri counties have permitted police officers to issue the equivalent of a statewide arrest warrant into an electronic database, designating an individual for immediate summary arrest for up to 24 hours at a time, without ever seeking a judicial determination of probable cause. This practice is known in St. Louis as issuing a “wanted.” Wanteds are used for serious state-level crimes and minor code violations alike, including traffic offenses. The wanted system operates in St. Louis with no judicial oversight, despite the widespread nature of the practice. It appears that there are approximately two million wanteds in the statewide database.

The case raises several claims based on foundational constitutional provisions, including violation of the plaintiffs’ Fourth Amendment rights stemming from their wrongful seizure and arrest; violation of their Fifth Amendment right to remain silent under unwanted police questioning, and violations of their Fourteenth Amendment rights for depriving plaintiffs of their liberty without due process of law.