Case Title: Oregon v. Jinenez

Citation: 

Docket Number: S062473

State: oregon

Court: Oregon Supreme Court

Date: 2015-07-09T00:00:00Z

Document:
No. 24	
July 9, 2015	
417
IN THE SUPREME COURT OF THE
STATE OF OREGON
STATE OF OREGON,
Petitioner on Review,
v.
JOSEPH LUCIO JIMENEZ,
aka Joseph L. Jimenez,
Respondent on Review.
(CC 110241478; CA A148796; SC S062473)
En Banc
On review from the Court of Appeals.*
Argued and submitted March 12, 2015.
Anna M. Joyce, Solicitor General, Salem, argued the 
cause and filed the brief for petitioner on review. With her 
on the brief was Ellen F. Rosenblum, Attorney General.
Anne Fujita Munsey, Deputy Public Defender, Salem, 
argued the cause and filed the brief for respondent on review. 
With her on the brief was Peter Gartlan, Chief Defender, 
Office of Public Defense Services.
Elizabeth G. Daily, Federal Public Defender’s Office, 
Portland; Shauna M. Curphey, Curphey & Badger, PA, 
Portland; and Jordan R. Silk, Schwabe, Williamson & 
Wyatt, PC, Portland, filed a brief on behalf of amici curiae 
Oregon Justice Resource Center and Oregon Criminal 
Defense Lawyers Association.
WALTERS, J.
The decision of the Court of Appeals is affirmed. The 
judgment of the circuit court is reversed, and the case is 
remanded to the circuit court for further proceedings.
Kistler, J., concurred and filed an opinion in which Linder 
and Landau, JJ., joined.
______________
	
*  Appeal from Multnomah County Circuit Court, Christopher J. Marshall, 
Judge. 263 Or App 150, 326 P3d 1222 (2014).
418	
State v. Jimenez
Case Summary: Defendant moved to suppress evidence obtained when an 
Oregon state trooper stopped him for jaywalking and asked if he had any weap-
ons. The trial court denied the motion and defendant was tried and convicted. The 
Court of Appeals reversed, holding that the facts of the case were not sufficient 
to create a reasonable suspicion in the trooper’s mind that defendant presented 
a risk to the trooper’s safety. Held: (1) A law enforcement officer is not permitted, 
under Article I, section 9, of the Oregon Constitution, to inquire into the presence 
of weapons during a traffic investigation as a matter of routine and in the absence 
of circumstances that indicate danger to the officer or members of the public; (2) 
However, when the officer has probable cause to detain an individual and conduct 
a traffic investigation, and the officer has reasonable, circumstance-specific con-
cerns for the officer’s safety, the officer may inquire into the presence of weapons 
because the officer’s inquiry is reasonably related to the traffic investigation and 
reasonably necessary to effectuate it; (3) Here, the state did not meet its bur-
den to demonstrate that the officer’s weapons inquiry was reasonably related to 
his traffic investigation and reasonably necessary to effectuate it because the 
trooper testified only that he routinely asks about weapons, and he did not testify 
that the facts known to him at the time of his inquiry gave rise to reasonable, 
circumstance-specific safety concerns.
The decision of the Court of Appeals is affirmed. The judgment of the cir-
cuit court is reversed, and the case is remanded to the circuit court for further 
proceedings.
Cite as 357 Or 417 (2015)	
419
	
WALTERS, J.
	
In this criminal case, an Oregon state trooper 
stopped defendant for jaywalking and asked him if he had 
any weapons on him. For the reasons that follow, we conclude 
that Article I, section 9, of the Oregon Constitution1 does not 
permit a law enforcement officer to make such an inquiry 
as a matter of routine and in the absence of circumstances 
that indicate danger to the officer or members of the public. 
In contrast, when an officer has probable cause to detain an 
individual and conduct a traffic investigation, and the offi-
cer has reasonable, circumstance-specific concerns for the 
officer’s safety, the officer may inquire about the presence of 
weapons. In that instance, the officer’s inquiry is reasonably 
related to the traffic investigation and reasonably necessary 
to effectuate it, and therefore does not violate Article I, sec-
tion 9. Because that standard was not met in this case, we 
affirm the decision of the Court of Appeals, State v. Jimenez, 
263 Or App 150, 326 P3d 1222 (2014), and reverse the judg-
ment of the circuit court.
	
The following uncontested facts are taken from 
the trooper’s testimony at the hearing on defendant’s 
motion to suppress evidence that the trooper obtained 
during his encounter with defendant. The trooper drove 
by a busy Portland intersection and noticed that, after he 
did so, defendant crossed the street against a “Don’t Walk” 
sign—a Class D violation under ORS 814.020(1) and (3).2
	
1  Article I, section 9, of the Oregon Constitution provides:
	
“No law shall violate the right of the people to be secure in their persons, 
houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable search, or seizure; and no war-
rant shall issue but upon probable cause, supported by oath, or affirmation, and 
particularly describing the place to be searched, and the person or thing to be 
seized.”
	
2  ORS 814.020 provides:
	
“(1)  A pedestrian commits the offense of pedestrian failure to obey traffic 
control devices if the pedestrian does any of the following:
	
“(a)  Fails to obey any traffic control device specifically applicable to 
the pedestrian.
	
“(b)  Fails to obey any specific traffic control device described in ORS 
814.010 [(Appropriate responses to traffic control devices)] in the manner 
required by that section.
	
“(2)  A pedestrian is not subject to the requirements of this section if the 
pedestrian complies with directions of a police officer.
	
“(3)  The offense described in this section, pedestrian failure to obey traf-
fic control devices, is a Class D traffic violation.”
420	
State v. Jimenez
The trooper turned his car around and drove to a position 
near defendant, who was sitting on a bench at a bus stop. 
When defendant saw the trooper’s car approach, he got up 
and began to walk away. The trooper honked his horn and 
motioned to defendant to come and talk to him, which defen-
dant did.
	
The trooper knew that the intersection was in 
a high-crime area where a lot of recent gang activity had 
occurred. He observed that defendant was wearing an “over-
sized” or “puffy” jacket over a “hoodie sweatshirt,” “oversized 
baggy gray pants,” and “white tennis shoes,” and was car-
rying what could be a green lanyard—garb that the trooper 
thought might indicate gang affiliation.
	
The trooper got out of his car, approached defen-
dant, and began a conversation with him. The encounter 
was recorded by a video camera in the trooper’s car, and the 
video recording, which was played for the trial court at the 
suppression hearing, confirms the following facts to which 
the trooper also testified. The trooper told defendant why he 
had stopped him and asked defendant why he had crossed 
the street against the light. Defendant replied that he had 
seen somebody else doing the same thing and “thought it 
was okay.” The trooper responded that he understood what 
defendant was saying but that the light was red and said 
“Don’t Walk.” Defendant indicated that he knew that but 
that someone else had crossed, so he “thought it was okay as 
well.”
	
At that point, the trooper asked “do you have any 
weapons on you?” Defendant “kind of sighed and closed his 
eyes and said yes.” The trooper asked defendant what he 
had, and defendant answered that he had a gun. Without 
being asked, defendant then separated his feet, leaned for-
ward, separated his hands, and put his hands on the hood 
of the trooper’s car. The trooper put defendant in handcuffs, 
called for backup and continued to question defendant; how-
ever, the trooper did not ask additional questions about the 
jaywalking and did not cite defendant for jaywalking. The 
trooper frisked defendant, located the gun, and learned that 
defendant kept the gun for “protection” and that he was 
indeed a gang member. When backup did not arrive, the 
Cite as 357 Or 417 (2015)	
421
trooper placed defendant in his patrol car and took him to 
the police station. Defendant ultimately was charged with 
one count of unlawful possession of a firearm3 under ORS 
166.250(1)(a).4
	
Before trial, defendant filed a motion to suppress 
“all evidence * 
* 
* obtained during his illegal seizure and the 
illegal search of his person, as well as fruits derived from 
his illegal seizure and/or illegal search of his person.” He 
argued that the trooper had questioned him and discovered 
the gun during an unjustified extension of the traffic stop. 
The state maintained that the trooper’s questioning and dis-
covery were justified by the officer-safety exception to the 
warrant requirement articulated in State v. Bates, 304 Or 
519, 747 P2d 991 (1987), and proffered testimony from the 
trooper that he had asked defendant about weapons “for offi-
cer safety reasons.” The trooper testified that he had asked 
defendant if he had any weapons on him, “which I do with all 
contacts on the street with pedestrians, just for—obviously 
for officer safety reasons.” The trooper explained that “[i]t 
makes [it] a lot easier if we can stand and have a normal 
conversation if there’s no weapons on the person.” The trial 
court denied defendant’s motion to suppress, and defendant 
was subsequently tried and convicted.
	
Defendant appealed to the Court of Appeals, which 
reversed the circuit court judgment. Jimenez, 263 Or App 
at 161. The court reasoned that when a police officer stops 
an individual to investigate a noncriminal traffic offense, 
the officer “must proceed to process the traffic violation, 
and may not launch an investigation into unrelated mat-
ters unless the inquiries are justified by reasonable suspi-
cion of the unrelated matter, the inquiry occurred during 
an unavoidable lull in the citation-writing process, or some 
exception to the warrant requirement applies.” Id. at 157. 
The court noted that the state had not argued on appeal 
	
3  Defendant also was charged with, and acquitted of, one count of possession 
of a loaded firearm in public.	
	
4  ORS 166.250(1) provides, in part:
	
“Except as otherwise provided * 
* 
* a person commits the crime of unlawful 
possession of a firearm if the person knowingly:
	
“(a)  Carries any firearm concealed upon the person.”
422	
State v. Jimenez
that the trooper “had reasonable suspicion of criminal activ-
ity when he asked defendant about weapons, or that there 
was an unavoidable lull.”5 Id. at 158. Rather, the state had 
argued only that the trial court had been correct to con-
clude that the trooper’s inquiry was lawful under the officer-
safety doctrine articulated in Bates. Id. The court rejected 
that argument and reversed, concluding that the facts on 
which the trooper had relied were not comparable to those 
that justified a patdown search in State v. Miglavs, 337 Or 
1, 90 P3d 607 (2004), and therefore were “not sufficient to 
create in [the trooper’s] mind a reasonable suspicion that 
defendant presented a risk to [the trooper’s] safety.” Id. at 
160-61.
	
On review in this court, the state refines the argu-
ment that it made in the Court of Appeals and argues that, 
under State v. Watson, 353 Or 768, 305 P3d 94 (2013), a 
law enforcement officer who stops an individual to investi-
gate a traffic violation is entitled to take actions reasonably 
related to the traffic investigation and reasonably necessary 
to effectuate it. The state’s argument is that a law enforce-
ment officer’s inquiry about whether a detained individual 
possesses weapons always meets that standard because, 
the state contends, “[t]he inherent dangers to an officer in 
a traffic stop are undeniable.” The state urges us to adopt a 
blanket rule permitting such inquiries.
	
Because Watson is key to the state’s argument, we 
begin with a review of its facts and analysis. In Watson, the 
officer stopped a motorist to investigate whether the motor-
ist had violated a noncriminal traffic law by crossing the 
yellow line that divided the north- and south-bound lanes of 
traffic. The officer questioned the motorist about his driving 
and also requested his driver’s license and verified his driv-
ing privileges. The court concluded that the latter actions 
were reasonably related to the officer’s traffic investigation 
and reasonably necessary to effectuate it, and therefore 
were lawful under Article I, section 9. Id. at 781-82.
	
The court also explained, however, that an offi-
cer who makes a traffic stop is not necessarily limited to 
	
5  The state also had declined to make those arguments in the trial court.
Cite as 357 Or 417 (2015)	
423
investigating the traffic offense and related matters. If 
the officer has or develops a reasonable suspicion that the 
detained individual is engaged in unrelated criminal activ-
ity, the officer may investigate that activity. Id. at 785. In 
Watson, a second officer smelled the odor of marijuana com-
ing from the defendant’s car and informed the first offi-
cer of that fact. The first officer then engaged in criminal 
investigatory activities that were unrelated to the traffic 
investigation—confirming the odor, further questioning the 
defendant, and using a drug-detection dog. The court con-
cluded that the first officer’s activities were constitutionally 
valid because he had developed a reasonable suspicion that 
the defendant was in possession of marijuana and the officer 
therefore had an independent, lawful justification to investi-
gate that crime. Id.
	
An officer also has an independent, lawful justifi-
cation to conduct a warrantless search for weapons when 
“the officer develops a reasonable suspicion, based upon spe-
cific and articulable facts, that [an individual] might pose 
an immediate threat of serious physical injury to the officer 
or to others then present.” Bates, 304 Or at 524. The “officer-
safety” doctrine is necessary because of the unique circum-
stances to which it applies:
	
“A police officer in the field frequently must make life-
or-death decisions in a matter of seconds. There may be 
little or no time in which to weigh the magnitude of a 
potential safety risk against the intrusiveness of protective 
measures. An officer must be allowed considerable latitude 
to take safety precautions in such situations. Our inquiry 
therefore is limited to whether the precautions taken were 
reasonable under the circumstances as they reasonably 
appeared at the time that the decision was made.”
Id. at 524-25.
	
In this case, the Court of Appeals concluded that 
the trooper’s weapons inquiry was unrelated to his traffic 
investigation and was not justified on either of those inde-
pendent grounds. On review in this court, the state does 
not claim that the trooper’s inquiry was independently 
justified by reasonable suspicion that defendant was in 
violation of criminal laws pertaining to the possession of 
424	
State v. Jimenez
weapons.6 Nor does the state argue that the trooper’s inquiry 
in this case was justified by the officer-safety exception artic-
ulated in Bates. Rather, the state takes issue with the Court 
of Appeals’ preliminary conclusion that a weapons inquiry is 
an investigation of an unrelated matter.7 The state argues 
that “questions about the presence of weapons are reasonably 
related to the safe investigation of a traffic violation.” (Italics 
in original.) The state contends that an officer’s inquiry 
about whether a detained individual has a weapon is reason-
ably related to a noncriminal traffic investigation because it 
ensures that the investigation of the traffic violation will be a 
safe investigation. As the state puts it, “Inquiries about weap-
ons are not aimed at ‘launching’ a criminal investigation, as 
the Court of Appeals concluded, but rather [are] related to 
the processing of the traffic stop in a way that maintains the 
integrity of the safety of those involved.”
	
For reasons we will explain, we agree with the state 
that, in appropriate circumstances, an officer’s safety con-
cerns may make the officer’s actions, including questioning 
about weapons, reasonably related and necessary to effec-
tuate a traffic stop. The state’s argument, however, is that, 
regardless of whether an officer reasonably perceives an 
articulable danger, the officer always may inquire about 
weapons because “[t]he inherent dangers to an officer in a 
traffic stop are undeniable.” In support of that position, the 
state cites a United States Supreme Court case, Arizona v. 
Johnson, 555 US 323, 330, 129 S Ct 781, 172 L Ed 2d 694 
(2009), for two propositions: first, that “traffic stops are 
‘especially fraught with danger to police officers,’ 
” Johnson, 
	
6  Several criminal statutes proscribe the possession of firearms and other 
weapons. For example, ORS 166.240 prohibits any person, except those provided 
in subsection (2), from carrying concealed weapons. ORS 166.250 prohibits the 
unlawful possession of a firearm. ORS 166.270 prohibits possession, ownership, 
or control of a firearm by any person who has been convicted of a felony.
	
7  As noted, the state did not argue in the trial court or the Court of Appeals 
that the trooper’s inquiry occurred during an “unavoidable lull” in the traffic 
investigation. In this court, the state assumes that the trooper’s inquiry did not 
measurably extend the duration of the traffic stop, but does not contend that that 
fact alone permitted the trooper’s inquiry. We therefore do not consider or decide 
the factual validity or legal significance of the state’s assumption, nor do we con-
sider or decide whether an officer’s inquiries made during the pendency of a valid 
seizure implicate Article I, section 9. See Watson, 353 Or at 784 n 18 (reserving 
same issue).
Cite as 357 Or 417 (2015)	
425
555 US at 330 (citing Michigan v. Long, 463 US 1032, 1047, 
103 S Ct 3469, 77 L Ed 2d 1201 (1983)); and second, that 
“ 
‘[t]he risk of harm to both the police and the occupants [of 
a stopped vehicle] is minimized * 
* 
* if the officers routinely 
exercise unquestioned command of the situation.’ 
” Id. (citing 
Maryland v. Wilson, 519 US 408, 414, 117 S Ct 882, 137 L Ed 
2d 41 (1997)). In Long, the Court cited one study that indi-
cated that approximately 30 percent of police shootings 
occurred when a police officer approached a suspect seated 
in an automobile. 463 US at 1048 n 13. In Wilson, the Court 
cited a report by the Federal Bureau of Investigation that 
showed that in 1994 alone, there were 5,762 officer assaults 
and 11 officers killed during traffic pursuits and stops. 519 
US at 413.
	
The state does not ask that we take judicial notice of 
those statistics, nor does it suggest another basis on which we 
can conclude that Portland police officers face equally danger-
ous risks when they patrol its streets. Furthermore, the sta-
tistics cited by the Court do not indicate the number of stops 
in which officers were assaulted by pedestrians,8 nor do they 
include the total number of stops that the officers conducted 
or the number of stops that the officers conducted without 
	
8  Recognizing that the stops at issue in Johnson, Long, and Wilson were stops 
of motorists and not of pedestrians, the state asserts, in a footnote, that “parallel 
dangers inhere to officers stopping a pedestrian for a traffic violation,” citing 
Maryland v. Buie, 494 US 325, 334, 110 S Ct 1093, 108 L Ed 2d 276 (1990), for 
that proposition. Buie does not convince us that the United States Supreme Court 
would consider the dangers that police officers face in encounters with motor-
ists to be equivalent to those they face in encounters with pedestrians. In Buie, 
police officers relied on safety concerns to conduct an in-home search, and the 
state argued for a rule permitting such searches without requiring that there be 
an articulable reasonable suspicion of danger. The state asserted that “[o]fficers 
facing the life threatening situation of arresting a violent criminal in the home 
should not be forced to pause and ponder the legal subtleties associated with a 
quantum of proof analysis.” Id. at 334 n 2. Relying on its decision in Terry v. Ohio, 
392 US 1, 88 S Ct 1868, 20 L Ed 2d 889 (1968), the Court rejected the state’s 
argument. The Court explained:
“[D]espite the danger that inheres in on-the-street encounters and the need 
for police to act quickly for their own safety, the Court in Terry did not adopt a 
bright-line rule authorizing frisks for weapons in all confrontational encoun-
ters. Even in high crime areas, where the possibility that any given individ-
ual is armed is significant, Terry requires reasonable, individualized suspi-
cion before a frisk for weapons can be conducted. That approach is applied to 
the protective sweep of a house.”
Id. 
426	
State v. Jimenez
incident.9 We are therefore unwilling to base our decision in 
this case on the “legislative facts” to which the state points 
us, see State v. Lawson/James, 352 Or 724, 740, 291 P3d 673 
(2012) (court may take judicial notice of “legislative facts” to 
assist court in deciding legal issue), or on the conclusions that 
the Supreme Court reached based on those facts.
	
When an officer does not reasonably perceive a 
danger, we will not presume that such danger neverthe-
less exists or that the officer’s inquiry about weapons would 
address such danger. When an officer does not reasonably 
suspect that the officer’s safety or the safety of the public 
is threatened, safety concerns do not provide a connection 
between the officer’s traffic and weapons investigations, and 
therefore, the two investigations are not reasonably related 
under Watson.
	
Our conclusion that Article I, section 9, does not per-
mit a routine weapons inquiry whenever an officer makes a 
traffic stop answers the state’s argument for a per se rule.10 
However, the parties’ arguments do raise another question: 
When an officer stops an individual to conduct a traffic 
investigation and does have cognizable safety concerns, 
does Article I, section 9, preclude the officer from asking the 
detained individual about weapons?
	
90  In his dissent in Wilson, Justice Stevens observed that “the number of 
stops in which an officer is actually at risk is dwarfed by the far greater number 
of routine stops.” 519 US at 418 (Stevens, J., dissenting). In this case, amici curiae 
call our attention to a 2001 study analyzing the number of incidents of violence 
during traffic stops in relation to the millions of routine traffic stops that occur 
annually. According to the study, on average over a ten-year period, “the risk 
of homicide to a police officer during a traffic encounter was one in 6.7 million” 
stops and “the risk of assault to a police officer was one in 10,256 stops.” Illya D. 
Lichtenberg and Alisa Smith, How Dangerous Are Routine Police-Citizen Traffic 
Stops? A Research Note, 29 J Crim Just 419, 420 (2001). Amici caution against 
a per se expansion of police powers based on anecdotal evidence of dangers to 
police officers in the absence of scientific data supporting a need for wider police 
latitude. 
	
10  That conclusion also answers the state’s alternative argument that, even if 
an officer’s weapons inquiry is not always reasonably related to a traffic investiga-
tion, it is always “reasonable” under Article I, section 9, and therefore valid. The 
state posits that all weapons inquiries are constitutionally “reasonable” because 
they are brief, minimally invasive, and serve to protect officer safety. Because 
the state’s alternative argument depends on a conclusion that we reject—that 
a weapons inquiry invariably serves to protect officer safety—we do not find it 
necessary to consider the legal framework for which the state argues or its appli-
cation in this case.
Cite as 357 Or 417 (2015)	
427
	
The court answered that question affirmatively 
in State v. Amaya, 336 Or 616, 631, 89 P3d 1163 (2004), 
explaining that an officer who has temporarily restrained 
an individual’s liberty and “seized” the individual under 
Article I, section 9, may make inquiries based on the offi-
cer’s “reasonable suspicion that [the detained individual] 
pose[s] an immediate threat of serious injury” to the officer 
under Bates. The Court of Appeals applied that principle in 
this case, but concluded that the trooper’s safety concerns 
did not meet the Bates standard. Jimenez, 263 Or App at 
161. In reaching that conclusion, the Court of Appeals com-
pared the facts in this case to the facts that the Supreme 
Court held sufficient to satisfy the Bates standard and jus-
tify a police officer’s precautionary patdown of the defendant 
in Miglavs. Id. at 159 (citing Miglavs, 337 Or at 13). The 
Court of Appeals noted that, in this case, the encounter had 
occurred at mid-day and at a busy commercial intersection, 
whereas in Miglavs, the encounter had occurred at a late 
hour and in a darkened area where “[h]igh crime areas 
take on significance.” Id. The court also explained that, in 
Miglavs, the defendant’s clothing had created reasonable 
officer-safety concerns, not because it announced some pos-
sible gang affiliation, but because the defendant’s shirt bore 
the name of what the officer knew to be a local gang, and 
one of the defendant’s companions had what the officer rec-
ognized as a gang tattoo. Id. at 160. Those circumstances 
were not present in this case.11 Consequently, the Court of 
Appeals reasoned that, under Bates and Miglavs, the cir-
cumstances known to the trooper were insufficient to create 
a reasonable suspicion that defendant presented a risk to 
the trooper’s safety. Id. at 161. The state does not quarrel 
with that conclusion, and neither do we. Because the trooper 
did not have sufficient information to identify defendant as 
a gang member or a person who might be carrying a weapon 
for other reasons, the circumstances present in this case 
	
11  The Court of Appeals also declined to consider the bagginess of defendant’s 
clothing, reasoning that the trooper had developed a concern about the nature 
of defendant’s clothing only after he had learned, as a result of his inquiry, that 
defendant had a gun. Jimenez, 263 Or App at 161. It is true that, when the trooper 
was asked to explain why he put defendant in handcuffs, the trooper focused on 
the fact that defendant’s clothes were big and baggy and could contain more than 
one firearm. However, we do not read that exchange to mean that the officer had 
not observed the baggy nature of defendant’s clothing earlier in the encounter.
428	
State v. Jimenez
were not sufficiently particularized to justify a search or 
patdown search under Bates and Miglavs.
	
That does not mean, however, that the trooper’s 
weapons inquiry was not reasonably related to and rea-
sonably necessary to effectuate his traffic investigation, as 
Watson requires in this context.12 In Watson, the officer had 
probable cause to believe that the defendant motorist had 
committed a traffic violation and had authority to stop and 
seize the defendant. 353 Or at 781. Therefore, the officer 
acted within constitutional bounds when he investigated the 
traffic offense. The officer also acted within constitutional 
bounds when he requested the motorist’s license and verified 
his driving privileges, because those actions were reasonably 
related to his investigation of the traffic violation and rea-
sonably necessary to effectuate it. Id. at 785. Under that rea-
soning, the question presented in this case is not limited to 
whether the particularity requirements of Bates and Miglavs 
were met. The trooper did not search defendant or conduct 
a precautionary patdown search. Instead, the trooper asked 
defendant whether he had any weapons on him. As the state 
presents it, the question before us is whether the trooper’s 
inquiry was reasonably related to his traffic investigation 
and reasonably necessary to effectuate it.
	
In considering that question, we are cognizant that, 
although we cannot precisely determine the number of indi-
viduals who have guns and use them to assault officers who 
stop and detain them, such assaults do in fact occur and the 
resulting harm has been and can be tragic. Although Article I, 
section 9, does not permit a blanket assumption that all 
encounters between police officers and detained individuals 
pose dangers that permit routine weapons inquiries, it also 
does not per se preclude all such inquiries. When an officer 
is legally conducting a traffic investigation, the officer is per-
forming an official duty, and Article I, section 9, does not fore-
close reasonable steps necessary to do so in safety. Although 
the particularity requirements of Bates and Miglavs must 
	
12  In Amaya, the court clarified that “some encounters between a police offi-
cer and a citizen are ‘mere conversation,’ involving no restraint on [a] citizen’s 
liberty,” and that such noncoercive encounters are not “seizures” under Article I, 
section 9. 336 Or at 626. In this case, we address the constitutionality of a weap-
ons inquiry in the context of an acknowledged seizure of defendant.
Cite as 357 Or 417 (2015)	
429
be met before an officer may conduct a search or a patdown 
search for weapons, those requirements do not apply when an 
officer has seized an individual and has a constitutional basis 
to continue to temporarily detain and question him or her. 
In that circumstance, if the officer’s weapons inquiry is rea-
sonably related to and reasonably necessary to effectuate the 
officer’s traffic investigation, then, under Watson, it is lawful.
	
For a weapons inquiry conducted in the course of a 
traffic investigation to be reasonably related to that investi-
gation and reasonably necessary to effectuate it, an officer 
must have reasonable, circumstance-specific concerns for 
the officer’s safety or the safety of other persons who are 
present. To justify an officer’s weapons inquiry, the offi-
cer’s safety concerns need not arise from facts particular 
to the detained individual; they can arise from the totality 
of the circumstances that the officer faces. However, if the 
officer does not have at least a circumstance-specific safety 
concern, then the officer’s weapons inquiry has no logical 
relationship to the traffic investigation. And, if the officer’s 
circumstance-specific safety concerns are not reasonable, 
then an officer who acts on those concerns violates Article I, 
section 9, which protects the people from an “unreasonable 
search, or seizure.”13
	
The remaining question is whether the trooper’s 
inquiry in this case met that standard. Again, the trooper 
was alone in a high crime area where recent gang activ-
ity had occurred. The trooper observed that defendant was 
wearing an “oversized” or “puffy” jacket over a “hoodie 
sweatshirt,” “oversized baggy gray pants,” and “white ten-
nis shoes.” Defendant also was carrying what the trooper 
thought could be a green lanyard. Although the trooper was 
not certain that defendant was a gang member, the trooper 
also knew that gang members often will wear such pants 
	
13  ORS 810.410(3)(d) provides that a police officer “[m]ay make an inquiry 
to ensure the safety of the officer, the person stopped or other persons present, 
including an inquiry regarding the presence of weapons.” However, in this case, 
the issue that the lower courts addressed and that the parties raise on review is a 
constitutional one. See Amaya, 336 Or at 631 (considering whether officer’s valid 
inquiry under ORS 810.410(3)(d) nevertheless violated Article I, section 9). The 
parties do not address how our resolution of the constitutional issue that this case 
presents may affect the application of ORS 810.410(3)(d) in this or future cases, 
and we also decline to conduct such an analysis.
430	
State v. Jimenez
and shoes, that the color green is associated with a specific 
gang, and that baggy clothing can conceal the presence of 
weapons. Given those facts, the trooper may have been con-
cerned for his safety or the safety of others and may have 
determined that a weapons inquiry was a reasonable step 
to address those concerns. But we cannot presume that the 
trooper actually had those concerns or made that determi-
nation. To demonstrate that an officer’s weapons inquiry is 
reasonably related to a traffic investigation and reasonably 
necessary to effectuate it, the state must present evidence 
that (1) the officer perceived a circumstance-specific danger 
and decided that an inquiry about weapons was necessary 
to address that danger; and (2) the officer’s perception and 
decision were objectively reasonable. To determine whether 
that standard is met, a court must consider not only the fac-
tual circumstances that existed when the officer acted, but 
also the officer’s articulation of the danger that the officer 
perceived and the reason for the officer’s inquiry.
	
In this case, the trooper testified that when he got 
out of his car to talk with defendant, he conversed with him 
without asking about weapons and continued his conversa-
tion long enough to obtain defendant’s admission that he 
knew he had crossed the street against a “Don’t Walk” sig-
nal. The trooper then asked defendant if he had any weap-
ons. The trooper testified that he did so because he asks the 
same question “with all contacts on the street with pedestri-
ans, just for—obviously for officer safety reasons,” and that 
“[i]t makes [it] a lot easier if we can stand and have a nor-
mal conversation if there’s no weapons on the person.”
	
On that record, we conclude that the state did not 
meet its burden to demonstrate that the officer’s weapons 
inquiry was reasonably related to his traffic investigation 
and reasonably necessary to effectuate it. First, for reasons 
we have expressed, Article I, section 9, does not permit offi-
cers to make routine weapons inquiries in all traffic inves-
tigations. Second, the trooper explained that he routinely 
asks questions about weapons to make it easier to have a 
“normal conversation,” yet, in this case, the trooper made 
the weapons inquiry after he already had engaged in “nor-
mal conversation” with defendant. Although the facts known 
to the trooper at the time that he inquired about weapons 
Cite as 357 Or 417 (2015)	
431
might have given rise to reasonable, circumstance-specific 
safety concerns, the trooper did not so testify.
	
An officer who stops an individual to conduct a 
traffic investigation and who has reasonable, circumstance-
specific concerns for his or her safety is not required to ask, 
as the first question in the traffic investigation, whether the 
detained individual has a weapon. An officer may have rea-
sonable safety concerns from the outset of a traffic investi-
gation but decide, for various reasons, not to act on those 
concerns immediately. Or an officer may reevaluate the sig-
nificance of existing facts or learn new ones that may give 
rise to reasonable safety concerns and reasonably necessitate 
a weapons inquiry. But we cannot infer those facts in every 
case or in this case in particular. Here, the trooper did not 
testify, for instance, that defendant’s demeanor or motions 
during the jaywalking investigation gave rise to safety con-
cerns; or that, as he talked with defendant, the trooper con-
sidered the setting and the potential for gang violence and 
decided that, given the tasks that remained, he had safety 
concerns that could be addressed by asking about weapons.14 
On this record, the state did not establish that the trooper’s 
weapons inquiry was reasonably related to his traffic inves-
tigation and reasonably necessary to effectuate it.15
	
The decision of the Court of Appeals is affirmed. 
The judgment of the circuit court is reversed, and the case 
is remanded to the circuit court for further proceedings.
	
14  The trooper did testify that, after he learned that defendant had a gun and 
that defendant was indeed a gang member, he became concerned for his safety 
and the safety of others in the area. More specifically, the trooper testified that 
after he handcuffed defendant, he noticed that a number of people had come to 
the bus stop and he was afraid of being attacked or caught in crossfire. However, 
the record does not indicate that those safety concerns were present when the 
trooper made his weapons inquiry.
	
15  For similar reasons, we also reject the state’s argument that, even if the 
trooper’s inquiry was unrelated to his jaywalking investigation, it was neverthe-
less “reasonable” under Article I, section 9. The state posits that the trooper’s 
inquiry was constitutionally “reasonable” because “[i]t was a single question asked 
at the outset of the traffic stop, and for the purpose of protecting the trooper’s 
safety.” The state’s argument depends on a conclusion that the trooper made his 
inquiry based on constitutionally valid safety concerns. However, the record in 
this case does not support that conclusion, and we therefore do not find it neces-
sary to consider the alternative legal framework for which the state argues or its 
application in this case.
432	
State v. Jimenez
	
KISTLER, J., concurring.
	
During a traffic stop, an officer asked defendant if 
he had a weapon. The majority holds that the officer’s ques-
tion was not reasonably related to the stop and, as a result, 
violated Article I, section 9, of the Oregon Constitution. I 
concur in the majority’s opinion but write separately for two 
reasons. First, whether the officer’s question was reasonably 
related to the stop matters in this case because, if it were 
not, then asking the question extended the stop in violation 
of the Article I, section 9. See State v. Rodgers/Kirkeby, 347 
Or 610, 227 P3d 695 (2010) (considering a similar issue). 
Second, the problem in this case is not that the evidence 
was insufficient to justify the officer’s question. Rather, the 
problem, as I understand the majority opinion, is that the 
officer testified that he asks the same question for officer-
safety reasons in every pedestrian stop without regard to 
the circumstances of stop, and he did not explain why the 
circumstances of this stop caused him to be concerned for 
his or anyone else’s safety. With that understanding, I con-
cur in the majority’s opinion.
	
Throughout this litigation, defendant has argued 
that the officer’s question unconstitutionally extended the 
stop. The state, for its part, does not dispute that, as a tem-
poral matter, the question did extend the stop, and it also 
does not dispute that extending a stop beyond the time rea-
sonably necessary to complete it violates Article I, section 9. 
See Rodgers/Kirkeby, 347 Or at 627-28 (explaining that the 
officers’ questions in both cases extended the stops because 
their questions occurred after the traffic stops had been 
completed, were unrelated to the stop, and were not inde-
pendently justified).1 The state argues, however, that the offi-
cer’s question about a weapon was reasonably related to the 
stop and, as a result, did not extend it. Specifically, relying 
	
1  The Court of Appeals observed that Rodgers/Kirkeby is ambiguous as to 
when an unrelated question that occurs during a stop will extend the stop in 
violation of Article I, section 9. State v. Jimenez, 263 Or App 150, 154-55, 326 P3d 
1222 (2014). As I read the opinion in Rodgers/Kirkeby, it holds unsurprisingly 
that a stop will continue as long as the officer exercises authority over the suspect 
to detain him or her. 347 Or at 628. It also holds that, if an officer asks a question 
during a stop that is unrelated to the stop and thus extends the stop beyond the 
time reasonably necessary to complete it, extending the stop violates Article I, 
section 9. Id. at 627-28.
Cite as 357 Or 417 (2015)	
433
on State v. Watson, 353 Or 768, 305 P3d 94 (2013), the state 
reasons that questions that are reasonably related to a stop, 
by definition, do not extend the stop in violation of Article I, 
section 9. See id. at 779-80 (describing reasoning in State v. 
Fair, 353 Or 588, 614, 302 P3d 417 (2013)). Rather, questions 
that are reasonably related to a stop are part and parcel of 
the stop.2 It follows that this case does not require the court 
to decide, and the majority does not decide, whether unre-
lated questions that occur during the course of a stop but 
that do not extend it—unrelated questions that, as the Court 
of Appeals puts it, occur during an “unavoidable lull”—are 
permissible under Article I, section 9. Rather, all that the 
majority decides is whether the officer’s question was “rea-
sonably related” to the stop. And, because the question was 
not reasonably related, it extended the stop in violation of 
Article I, section 9. See Rodgers/Kirkeby, 347 Or at 627-28.
	
In considering whether the officer’s question was 
reasonably related to the stop, I agree with the majority that 
questions regarding weapons that occur during a stop are 
not always reasonably related to the stop. Most stops end 
without incident, and many stops do not provide a basis for 
asking about weapons. In saying that, I do not discount the 
risks that officers face in approaching a stopped car whose 
occupants are unknown or in stopping pedestrians who 
may, for all the officer knows, pose a risk of harm. After all, 
a stop is an exercise of coercive authority, and a person who 
is stopped may respond aggressively (and unexpectedly) for 
that reason alone. The risk increases when the stop occurs at 
night, in an isolated place, or in a high-crime area. However, 
to say, as the state does, that every stop poses a sufficient 
risk of injury to ask about weapons without regard to the 
circumstances is a proposition that is difficult to sustain.
	
I also agree with the majority that an officer’s 
safety concerns need not be sufficient to justify a search for 
weapons under State v. Bates, 304 Or 519, 524, 747 P2d 991 
	
2  Of course, questions unrelated to a stop are permissible if the officer rea-
sonably suspects that the suspect has committed another offense and asks about 
that offense. See Watson, 353 Or at 785. Additionally, if the encounter does not 
rise to the level of a stop, no justification is needed for an “unrelated” question. 
See State v. Ashbaugh, 349 Or 297, 308, 244 P3d 360 (2010) (no Article I, section 9, 
implications for “mere conversation”).
434	
State v. Jimenez
(1987), before an officer can ask a question about weapons. A 
question is not a search. To require the same justification for 
both, as defendant would, fails to recognize the difference. 
The issue accordingly reduces to when the circumstances 
of a particular stop will pose a sufficient risk of harm to 
the officer or others present for the officer to conclude that 
asking about weapons is reasonably related to the stop. The 
answer to that issue will vary with the facts and circum-
stances of each case. Ordinarily, a traffic stop on a freeway 
in broad daylight will not provide a reason for an officer 
to inquire, as part of the stop, about weapons. However, a 
driver may make a furtive gesture, reach under the seat, or 
pull over slowly so that the driver or a passenger can secrete 
something. See State v. Morgan, 348 Or 283, 290, 230 P3d 
928 (2010) (explaining that the officer reasonably seized and 
searched the passenger’s purse when she unexpectedly got 
out of the car, began acting nervous, and reached into her 
purse). Those circumstances can justify, at a minimum, a 
question regarding weapons when the officer explains what 
it was about the driver’s or passenger’s behavior that was 
concerning. See id.
	
In this case, the officer did not stop defendant while 
he was driving on the freeway. Rather, defendant was a 
pedestrian, and the stop occurred in a part of Portland—
SE 122nd and Division—that the officer testified is “a high 
crime area [where] there has been—recently over the past, 
there’s been a lot of gang activity,” an assessment that defen-
dant himself confirmed.3 Additionally, defendant’s clothing 
was “indicative” of gang affiliation, although the officer could 
not say “for sure” that that was case.4 Finally, the baggy 
clothes that defendant was wearing were the sort of clothes 
in which weapons could be “easily concealed,” and defendant 
had taken steps to avoid the officer when he pulled his patrol 
	
3  When asked why he was carrying a gun, defendant replied that it “was for 
protection.” When asked why he needed protection, defendant said “something 
to the effect of the streets are very dangerous or the streets are crazy.” Those 
statements are relevant, not because the officer relied on them in assessing the 
danger that the area posed, but because defendant’s own statements confirmed 
the officer’s independent assessment of the danger.
	
4  The officer explained that he knew that “gang members often will wear a 
gray baggy pant and the white shoes,” as defendant was, and he saw “what [he] 
thought was a green lanyard, [and he] knew that also to be indicative of some 
faction of the Bloods gang.”
Cite as 357 Or 417 (2015)	
435
car into a gas station next to the bus stop where defendant 
was sitting.5
	
In my view, those circumstances were sufficient to 
warrant asking defendant if he had a weapon and did not 
depend on impermissible stereotyping.6 The majority does 
not hold otherwise. Rather, as I read its opinion, its hold-
ing rests on the absence of any explanation from the officer 
why the circumstances of this particular stop raised a safety 
concern and why the officer asked about weapons when he 
did. On that issue, the officer testified only that he asked 
defendant “if he had any weapons on him, which I do for all 
contacts on the street with pedestrians, just for—obviously 
officer safety reasons.”
	
The officer’s testimony is lacking for two reasons. 
First, not only did the officer not explain why the circum-
stances of this stop concerned him, but he explained that he 
always asks about weapons in every pedestrian stop without 
regard to the circumstances of the stop. Second, the officer 
testified that he asked the question “obviously for officer 
safety reasons.” “Officer safety” explains the nature of the 
officer’s concern. It does not identify the facts that, in his 
mind, gave rise to that concern.
	
As I read the majority’s opinion, it holds that, for a 
question regarding weapons to be reasonably related to a 
stop, an officer must explain why the facts or circumstances 
surrounding a stop caused the officer to have reasonable 
concerns for the officer’s or other persons’ safety.7 I do not 
	
5  The officer testified that he saw defendant cross an intersection “on the 
Don’t Walk sign,” turned his car around, and approached a bus stop where defen-
dant was sitting after having crossed the street illegally. The officer testified 
that, “[w]hen I pulled in [to the gas station next to the bus stop], he looked over 
at me, and immediately got up and began to walk away.”
	
6  Some commentators have noted that the line between profiling and rea-
sonable officer safety concerns can be a fine one. See Caleb Mason, Jay-Z’s 99 
Problems, Verse 2: A Close Reading with Fourth Amendment Guidance for Cops 
and Perps, 56 St Louis U LJ 567, 577 (2012) (discussing officer’s question about 
weapons). In my view, the facts that the officer described in this case reasonably 
gave rise to legitimate concerns for officer safety. It may be that lesser facts also 
would be sufficient to justify a question concerning weapons, but this case pro-
vides no occasion to decide that issue.
	
7  In Watson, the court explained that, as a statutory matter, a question must 
be reasonably related to the stop and reasonably necessary to carry it out. 353 
Or at 777. If a question about weapons is reasonably related to a stop—if the 
facts give rise to a sufficient safety concern to ask about weapons—then it almost 
436	
State v. Jimenez
disagree with that requirement, and I cannot say that, in 
light of the way that the parties argued this case before the 
trial court, the trial court’s implicit factual findings provide 
that link. On that basis, I concur in the majority’s opinion.
	
Linder and Landau, JJ., join in this concurring 
opinion.
automatically follows that the question also will be reasonably necessary to car-
rying out the stop.