In Steven Hicks v. State of Maryland, the Appellate Court of Maryland delivered a post-Bruen warning to police and prosecutors: the mere sight of a gun is not a blank check to stop, handcuff, disarm, and search a citizen.
The Appellate Court of Maryland, sitting en banc, reversed the conviction of Steven Hicks after ruling that Baltimore police violated his constitutional rights when they stopped and searched him based on the alleged sight of a handgun “printing” through his shirt. The Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms is applauding the ruling as another post-Bruen sign that courts are starting to understand a basic point: exercising a constitutional right is not suspicious behavior.
CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb called the Hicks ruling a “wake-up call” for Maryland police and said officers can no longer treat a constitutional right like a “regulated privilege.”
On July 5, 2023, Baltimore City police were in the area of St. Charles and Belvedere for an investigation unrelated to Hicks. Detective Mitchell Ramsey, a member of the department’s Group Violence Unit, was riding in an unmarked vehicle when he saw a group of people congregating. Hicks began walking away as the vehicle approached.
Hicks was wearing a satchel across the front of his body. According to the court opinion, Detective Ramsey said he saw the rear handle of a handgun in Hicks’ waistband and could see the angular outline of the firearm “physically printing” through Hicks’ shirt.
Ramsey got out, activated his body-worn camera, and ordered Hicks to put his hands up. Hicks asked why and immediately said he had a license. Ramsey told him he was being stopped because a firearm was printing in his waistband. Hicks was handcuffed. He repeated that he had a permit and asked if he could retrieve it.
Hicks was not a prohibited person in this case. The permit later produced had an expiration date of February 28, 2026, and no restrictions. The State stipulated that it was the permit recovered that day.
Police removed a holstered handgun from Hicks’ waistband. Officers then continued searching. A second firearm was found in Hicks’ satchel, and suspected cocaine was recovered from his pants pocket. Hicks was charged with multiple firearm and drug offenses. After the trial court denied his suppression motion, he entered a conditional guilty plea to possession of a firearm with a nexus to drug trafficking and received a five-year sentence without parole. The appellate court reversed.
The key question was not whether police can protect themselves during a lawful stop. The court said they can. The problem was more fundamental: police need a lawful basis for the stop in the first place.
Before New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen, Maryland courts routinely treated gun possession as enough to justify a stop. That was easier for the state under the old anti-carry regime, when Maryland made ordinary people prove a “good and substantial reason” before they could exercise the right to carry a handgun in public.
Bruen changed the landscape. The Supreme Court made clear that the Second and Fourteenth Amendments protect the right to carry a handgun outside the home for self-defense. Maryland was forced to abandon its “good and substantial reason” requirement and move into a shall-issue world.
If public carry is presumptively lawful, police cannot automatically treat the sight of a gun as evidence of a crime. The Appellate Court of Maryland said the mere possibility that someone with a gun might not have a permit is not enough. Officers need reasonable suspicion that the person is illegally possessing the firearm or is otherwise involved in criminal activity.
Hicks was licensed to carry, and the search went beyond what the Constitution allows. Armed citizens do not lose their Fourth Amendment rights simply because they are carrying a firearm.
The court did not leave much room for Maryland to spin what happened. This was not a case where police had a report of a crime, recognized Hicks as a prohibited person, or had some independent reason to believe he was carrying illegally. The State defended the stop as a gun-possession stop, and the appellate court addressed it that way.
As noted by the Appeals Court, “The case was presented…as a stop justified solely on the possession of a gun, and it was presented in the briefs on appeal the same way. That is the argument that we have addressed, and it is the basis for our conclusion that the stop was unconstitutional.”
Judge Kathryn Grill Graeff put the rule plainly.
“The police must have reasonable suspicion that the person is possessing the gun illegally or otherwise engaged in criminal activity,” Graeff wrote. “Because the officers here stopped appellant based solely on his possession of a gun, without reasonable suspicion that he was possessing the gun illegally or otherwise involved in criminal activity, they did not have reasonable suspicion to stop him. The stop, therefore, violated appellant’s Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable seizures.”
A firearm is not probable cause and a citizen exercising the right to bear arms does not automatically become a criminal suspect.
The ruling is not a blanket statement that armed people can never be frisked. If police lawfully stop someone for another reason and know the person is armed, the court said officers may conduct a protective frisk for safety. Gun owners should understand that distinction.
What police cannot do, at least under this ruling, is treat a gun as an automatic reasonable suspicion.
A right is not much of a right if exercising it gives the government permission to seize you. That is true for speech, religion, travel, and self-defense. The government does not get to say, “You may carry, but the moment we notice it, we can handcuff you, disarm you, search your bag, and rummage through your pockets.”
Maryland presented this case as a stop justified solely by possession of a gun, and the court rejected that theory.
Maryland officials may not like it, but the Constitution is not suspended because a citizen is armed. If the state wants to stop and search someone, it needs more than anti-gun assumptions. It needs actual reasonable suspicion.
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About Duncan Johnson:
Duncan Johnson is a lifelong firearms enthusiast and unwavering defender of the Second Amendment—where “shall not be infringed” means exactly what it says. A graduate of George Mason University, he enjoys competing in local USPSA and multi-gun competitions whenever he’s not covering the latest in gun rights and firearm policy. Duncan is a regular contributor to AmmoLand News and serves as part of the editorial team responsible for AmmoLand’s daily gun-rights reporting and industry coverage.
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