92
Scalia, J., dissenting
61, 63 (majority opinion); ante, at 68 (O'Connor, J., concurring in part and concurring in judgment). The "absolute discretion" statement, however, is nothing more than the Illinois Supreme Court's characterization of what the language achieved—after that court refused (as I do) to read in any limitations that the words do not fairly contain. It is not a construction of the language (to which we are bound) but a legal conclusion (to which we most assuredly are not bound).
The criteria for issuance of a dispersal order under the Chicago ordinance could hardly be clearer. First, the law requires police officers to "reasonably believ[e]" that one of the group to which the order is issued is a "criminal street gang member." This resembles a probable-cause standard, and the Chicago Police Department's General Order 92-4 (1992)—promulgated to govern enforcement of the ordinance—makes the probable-cause requirement explicit.10
Under the Order, officers must have probable cause to believe that an individual is a member of a criminal street gang, to be substantiated by the officer's "experience and knowledge of the alleged offenders" and by "specific, documented and reliable information" such as reliable witness testimony or an individual's admission of gang membership or display of distinctive colors, tattoos, signs, or other markings worn by members of particular criminal street gangs. App. to Pet. for Cert. 67a-69a, 71a-72a.
Second, the ordinance requires that the group be "remain[ing] in any one place with no apparent purpose." Justice O'Connor's assertion that this applies to "any person stand-10 "Administrative interpretation and implementation of a regulation are . . . highly relevant to our [vagueness] analysis, for '[i]n evaluating a facial challenge to a state law, a federal court must . . . consider any limiting construction that a state court or enforcement agency has proffered.' " Ward v. Rock Against Racism, 491 U. S. 781, 795-796 (1989) (emphasis added) (quoting Hoffman Estates, 455 U. S., at 494, n. 5). See also id., at 504 (administrative regulations "will often suffice to clarify a standard with an otherwise uncertain scope").
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