How has the Attorney General argued that there was reasonable cause to arrest appellant because he happened to be with a group of boys in a parking lot in which a single firecracker may have been discharged?

I find these facts, and the officer's lastquoted explanation insufficient to establish reasonable cause to believe that any of these boys had committed a public offense. When initially questioned about the sound, the youths gave a comprehensible explanation that on its face was not misleading [10 Cal.3d 690] (contrast People v. Lyles (1968) 260 Cal.App.2d 62, 65, 66 Cal.Rptr. 799) nor inherently implausible (contrast People v. Sandoval (1966) 65 Cal.2d 303, 310, 54 Cal.Rptr. 123, 419 P.2d 187). Nor was the group's mere presence in the vicinity of a recent

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In sum, although the boys' conduct was completely consistent with lawful activity, the Attorney General urges us to hold that there was reasonable cause to arrest appellant because he happened to be with a group of boys in a parking lot in which a single firecracker may have been discharged. I fail to see how this state of facts would lead a man of ordinary care to conscientiously entertain an honest and strong suspicion that appellant had committed a public offense in the presence of the officers. Indeed, contrary to the position now taken before us by the Attorney General, the record clearly shows that the sheriff's officers had no intention to arrest the four boys at the time of their initial confrontation but that they were merely detaining the boys for the purpose of questioning. (People v. Mickelson (1963) 59 Cal.2d 448, 450, 30 Cal.Rptr. 18, 380 P.2d 658.) ⁶ We conclude that the attempted search stemming from the officers' direction [10 Cal.3d 691] that the boys empty their pockets cannot be justified as a search incidental to a lawful arrest.