Case Title: State of Florida v. Creller

Citation: 

Docket Number: SC2022-0524

State: florida

Court: Florida Supreme Court

Date: 2024-05-23T00:00:00Z

Document:
Supreme Court of Florida 
 
____________ 
 
No. SC2022-0524 
____________ 
 
STATE OF FLORIDA, 
Petitioner, 
 
vs. 
 
JOSHUA LYLE CRELLER, 
Respondent. 
 
May 23, 2024 
 
FRANCIS, J. 
 
It is well-settled that once a driver has been lawfully stopped 
for a traffic violation, police officers may order the driver out of the 
vehicle for officer safety reasons without violating the Fourth 
Amendment’s prohibition of unreasonable searches and seizures.  
See Pennsylvania v. Mimms, 434 U.S. 106, 110, 111 n.6 (1977); 
Maryland v. Wilson, 519 U.S. 408, 413 n.1 (1997) (“[T]hat we 
typically avoid per se rules concerning searches and seizures does 
not mean that we have always done so; Mimms itself drew a bright 
line . . . .”).  The issue here is whether this well-settled rule applies 
 
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to a K-9 officer who arrives midway through a lawful traffic stop to 
perform a dog sniff sweep of a vehicle’s exterior.  The Second 
District Court of Appeal said “no,” certifying conflict with the Fifth 
District Court of Appeal in State v. Benjamin, 229 So. 3d 442 (Fla. 
5th DCA 2017), which reached the opposite conclusion.  Creller v. 
State, 336 So. 3d 817, 825 (Fla. 2d DCA 2022).   
We have jurisdiction.  Art. V, § 3(b)(4), Fla. Const.1  For the 
reasons that follow, we quash Creller and approve Benjamin. 
I. Background 
Police charged Joshua Lyle Creller (“Creller”) with resisting an 
officer without violence following a 2018 traffic stop when he 
refused to comply with a K-9 officer’s mid-stop command to exit his 
vehicle for officer safety.  Following a search incident to arrest, 
Creller was also charged with possession of a controlled substance, 
methamphetamine; he moved to suppress the evidence of its 
discovery. 
 
 
1.  The State of Florida petitioned for review based on Creller’s 
certified conflict with Benjamin.  In response, Creller also asked this 
Court to accept jurisdiction.  
 
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At the suppression hearing, the trial court found the State’s 
evidence credible, which established the following: on the date in 
question, Officer Diaz, a plain-clothes, undercover officer with the 
Tampa Police Department’s Tactical Narcotics Team (TNT), was 
surveilling an area known for illegal narcotics activity.  While doing 
so, he observed Creller commit a traffic infraction,2 so he followed 
Creller’s truck for several blocks.  He didn’t stop Creller’s vehicle 
himself; instead, he radioed for a marked car with sirens and lights 
to initiate the stop. 
After the marked car stopped Creller’s truck, Officer Diaz and 
the uniformed officer, Sergeant Covais,3 approached Creller at his 
window to speak with him.  Fairly quickly into their encounter, 
Officer Diaz asked Creller if he could search the vehicle.  Creller 
said no, at which point Officer Diaz called for a K-9 unit. 
 
 
2.  He cut through the parking lot of a gas station to avoid a 
red light in violation of section 316.074(2), Florida Statutes (2018).  
Creller, 336 So. 3d at 819. 
 
3.  Sergeant Covais was not present at the suppression 
hearing to testify. 
 
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Officer Diaz also called for another backup officer to write the 
traffic citation because he did not have the citation software on his 
computer.4  TNT member Officer Norman responded to the call and 
quickly arrived on the scene.  Officer Norman was tasked with 
preparing Creller’s traffic citation. 
Meanwhile, TNT member K-9 Officer Simmonds responded to 
Officer Diaz’s call and arrived on scene several minutes later.  After 
identifying himself, Officer Simmonds asked Creller if he had 
anything illegal in his possession.  Creller said no.  He then asked 
Creller for permission to search the vehicle and Creller, again, said 
no.  At that point, he told Creller, “I need you to exit the vehicle for 
my safety.  You’re going to stand on the side of the sidewalk while I 
get my dog to do a narcotic sweep . . . .”  Officer Simmonds 
explained that this was necessary because Creller was in control of 
the vehicle, and Officer Simmonds did not want Creller to use his 
vehicle to hit him or his dog. 
 
 
4.  At the hearing, Officer Diaz could not say whether Sergeant 
Covais had the ability to write the ticket. 
 
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Creller refused.  So Officer Simmonds warned him that 
continued refusal could result in his arrest for obstruction.  Creller 
continued to refuse, even after Officer Simmonds explained that 
exiting the vehicle was for officer safety. 
After a final warning, Creller, now argumentative and 
continuing to refuse to come out of the vehicle, was forcefully 
removed.  Officer Norman, who was still in the process of preparing 
the citation, observed the struggle at Creller’s door and left his 
computer to assist the other officers.  Creller was subsequently 
charged with resisting without violence and possession of 
methamphetamine, the latter of which was discovered during a 
search of his person when he was removed from his car. 
 
At the conclusion of the evidence at the suppression hearing, 
the parties and the trial court discussed, at length, Mimms, 434 
U.S. 106 (holding that an officer may direct a driver to exit a vehicle 
during a lawful traffic stop for officer safety), and Rodriguez v. 
United States, 575 U.S. 348 (2015) (holding that a lawful traffic stop 
may not be prolonged to conduct a dog sniff sweep after the traffic 
citation has been issued unless separately supported by reasonable, 
articulable suspicion).  Following this discussion, and expressly 
 
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finding that Rodriguez did not apply, the trial court denied Creller’s 
motion to suppress.  A jury convicted him, but the Second District 
reversed on appeal.  Creller, 336 So. 3d at 819. 
The Second District’s Decision in Creller 
The Second District held that Creller was unlawfully seized in 
violation of the Fourth Amendment when the initial traffic stop 
transformed into a narcotics investigation for which no prior 
probable cause existed.  Id. at 822-25.  According to the Creller 
court, the K-9 unit’s exit command for officer safety, the refusal of 
which led to Creller’s forcible removal and arrest, was something 
the trial court should have addressed.  Id. at 822. 
Discussing the inapplicability of Mimms and its progeny, 
Wilson, 519 U.S. 408, to Creller’s case, the Second District 
explained that the rule in both cases—that concerns for officer 
safety meant an officer could lawfully order the occupant of a 
vehicle out of it during a traffic stop—was conditioned on there 
being an actual and continuing traffic stop.  Id. at 822.  But in 
Creller’s case, the court opined the testimony established that the 
necessity of ordering Creller out of the vehicle wasn’t realized until 
after the attempted vehicle sweep.  Id.  This demonstrated that the 
 
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traffic stop had detoured into a narcotics investigation.  Id. at 822-
23.  And such a scenario brought Creller’s case squarely in line 
with Rodriguez rather than Mimms.  Id. 
In reversing the judgment and sentence, the Second District 
certified conflict with Benjamin, 229 So. 3d 442.  Benjamin held, on 
facts similar to Creller’s, that a mid-stop exit command for the 
safety of the arriving K-9 officer was lawful.  Creller, 336 So. 3d at 
823, 825.  There, the traffic officer pulled over a driver in a parking 
lot and requested a K-9 unit.  Benjamin, 229 So. 3d at 442.  While 
writing the citation, the K-9 unit arrived and asked the traffic officer 
to issue the exit command.  Id.  When the driver exited, the officer 
saw that a firearm had been concealed behind the driver’s leg.  Id.  
The driver moved to suppress the firearm, which the trial court 
granted, but the Fifth District reversed.  Id. at 443-44. 
In the ensuing decision that only expressly discussed Mimms, 
the Fifth District held that Benjamin was lawfully detained.  Id. at 
444.  “As a result, the police officer could properly order Benjamin 
to exit his vehicle, even if the officer did not have a particularized 
basis to believe that Benjamin was a threat to the officer’s safety.”  
Id. 
 
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Explaining why it disagreed with the Fifth District, the Creller 
court opined that the Benjamin court improperly stacked Mimms 
and Rodriguez:5 
The rationale relied upon by the Fifth District in 
Benjamin and applied by the trial court in this case 
essentially stacks the holdings in Rodriguez and Mimms: 
(1) vehicle sweeps are permissible when they do not 
prolong a valid traffic investigation; (2) officers may ask 
drivers to exit their vehicles during a valid traffic 
investigation; (3) therefore, as long as it does not prolong 
the traffic investigation, officers may order drivers to exit 
their vehicles for the vehicle sweep.  However, this 
reasoning appears to be an erroneous extension of the 
carveouts in Mimms and Rodriguez: The Supreme Court 
in Rodriguez expressly indicated that a deviation from the 
mission of the traffic stop such as the K-9 unit officer’s 
attempted vehicle sweep enjoys no support from Mimms 
because “safety precautions taken in order to facilitate 
such detours” cannot “be justified on the same basis” as 
those taken to ensure officer safety for the purpose of 
conducting the traffic stop itself.  See Rodriguez, 575 U.S. 
at 356-57. 
Creller, 336 So. 3d at 823. 
 
This case follows. 
 
 
5.  Yet, nowhere in the Benjamin opinion does the Fifth 
District discuss the Rodriguez case. 
 
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II. Analysis 
In Fourth Amendment suppression cases, we review legal 
issues de novo and will sustain factual findings that are supported 
by competent, substantial evidence.  See Presley v. State, 227 So. 
3d 95, 99 (Fla. 2017) (citing Twilegar v. State, 42 So. 3d 177, 192 
(Fla. 2010)).  We are constitutionally bound on search and seizure 
issues to follow the decisions of the United States Supreme Court.  
See art. I, § 12, Fla. Const. (“The right of the people to be secure in 
their persons, houses, papers and effects against unreasonable 
searches and seizures . . . shall be construed in conformity with the 
4th Amendment to the United States Constitution, as interpreted by 
the United States Supreme Court.”).  
We first examine the specific United States Supreme Court 
precedent at issue here: the officer safety rule under Mimms and 
Wilson, followed by the dog sweep rule under Rodriguez’s 
predecessor, Illinois v. Caballes, 543 U.S. 405 (2005), and 
Rodriguez.  From our examination of these cases, we conclude that 
Creller misreads Rodriquez—which does not modify, much less 
address the officer safety rule in Mimms—to hold that the officer 
safety rule only applies to officers completing the mission of the 
 
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traffic stop.  We also conclude that Rodriguez does not apply 
because the K-9 officer here attempted a sweep during a lawful 
traffic stop, not after. 
We therefore agree with Benjamin that Mimms applies, and we 
conclude that a K-9 officer may order a driver to exit a vehicle 
during a lawful traffic stop for officer safety reasons.  Accordingly, 
we quash Creller and approve Benjamin. 
The Officer Safety Rule Under Mimms and Wilson 
In Mimms, the United States Supreme Court held that an exit 
command given by an officer during a lawful traffic stop is not 
unusually harmful to an individual’s privacy; it is, instead, a “mere 
inconvenience” because the driver is lawfully detained whether 
inside the car or out.  434 U.S. at 109-11. 
Mimms involved a traffic officer who had no particular 
suspicion about the driver’s behavior but had a practice of asking 
drivers to exit their vehicles as a “precautionary measure to afford a 
degree of protection to the officer.”  Id. at 109-10.  Balancing the 
officer’s safety against the driver’s privacy interests, the Supreme 
Court found it “too plain for argument” that officer safety “is both 
legitimate and weighty.”  Id. at 110.  The Supreme Court explained 
 
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that “we have specifically recognized the inordinate risk confronting 
an officer as he approaches a person seated in an automobile,” 
including the risk of being assaulted or shot, as well as the “hazard 
of accidental injury from passing traffic.”  Id. at 110-11.  On the 
other hand, any intrusion into the driver’s privacy is de minimis and 
a “mere inconvenience” given that the driver is already lawfully 
detained whether inside the car or out.  Id. at 111.  Wilson later 
established that Mimms’ holding was a “bright line” rule.  519 U.S. 
at 413 n.1.6 
Dog Sniff Sweeps Under Caballes and Rodriguez 
In Caballes, the Supreme Court held that a dog sniff sweep 
could be conducted during a lawful traffic stop without offending 
the Fourth Amendment.  543 U.S. at 410.  In so holding, the 
Supreme Court rejected reasoning that a sweep turns a stop into a 
narcotics investigation that must be independently supported by 
 
 
6.  Mimms was extended in Wilson, 519 U.S. 408, to permit 
officers to also command vehicle passengers to exit during a lawful 
traffic stop.  The Supreme Court reasoned in Wilson that “the 
motivation of a passenger to employ violence to prevent 
apprehension of [a more serious] crime is every bit as great as that 
of the driver.”  Id. at 414. 
 
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probable cause.  Id. at 408.  The Supreme Court explained that a 
dog sniff sweep’s potential to sniff out drugs in the vehicle is not 
even a search under the Fourth Amendment because it affects no 
constitutionally protected interest in the driver’s privacy.  Id. at 
408-10.7 
 
 
7.  As explained in Caballes:  
Official conduct that does not “compromise any 
legitimate interest in privacy” is not a search subject to 
the Fourth Amendment.  [United States v. Jacobsen, 466 
U.S. 109, 123 (1984)].  We have held that any interest in 
possessing contraband cannot be deemed “legitimate,” 
and thus, governmental conduct that only reveals the 
possession of contraband “compromises no legitimate 
privacy interest.”  Ibid.  This is because the expectation 
“that certain facts will not come to the attention of the 
authorities” is not the same as an interest in “privacy 
that society is prepared to consider reasonable.”  Id. at 
122 (punctuation omitted).  In United States v. Place, 462 
U.S. 696 (1983), we treated a canine sniff by a well-
trained narcotics-detection dog as “sui generis” because it 
“discloses only the presence or absence of narcotics, a 
contraband item.”  Id. at 707; see also [Indianapolis v. 
Edmond, 531 U.S. 32, 40 (2000)]. . . .  
  
. . . . 
. . . A dog sniff conducted during a concededly 
lawful traffic stop that reveals no information other than 
the location of a substance that no individual has any 
right to possess does not violate the Fourth Amendment. 
 
534 U.S. at 408-10. 
 
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Expressly adhering to and reaffirming its decision in Caballes, 
Rodriguez held that “a police stop exceeding the time needed to 
handle the matter for which the stop was made violates the 
Constitution’s shield against unreasonable seizures.”  575 U.S. at 
350. 
In Rodriguez, after the traffic citation was issued by the 
officer—a K-9 officer—the driver was detained several more minutes 
for the officer to conduct a dog sniff sweep.  Id. at 351-52.  
Rodriguez characterized the dog sniff sweep performed after 
issuance of the traffic citation as a separate investigation unrelated 
to the primary “mission” of the traffic stop.  Id. at 355-56.  Though 
Rodriguez recognized that an officer may also “conduct certain 
unrelated checks during an otherwise lawful traffic stop,” the officer 
“may not do so in a way that prolongs the stop, absent the 
reasonable suspicion ordinarily demanded to justify detaining an 
individual.”  Id. at 355. 
For these reasons, “[a] seizure justified only by a police-
observed traffic violation . . . ‘become[s] unlawful if it is prolonged 
beyond the time reasonably required to complete th[e] mission’ of 
issuing a ticket for the violation.”  Id. at 350-51 (alteration in 
 
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original) (quoting Caballes, 543 U.S. at 407).  “The Court so 
recognized in Caballes, and [the Supreme Court] adhere[d] to the 
line drawn in that decision.”  Id. at 351. 
Rodriguez Does Not Modify Mimms  
 
Based on our review of Rodriguez and Mimms, we conclude 
that Rodriguez neither analyzed the lawfulness of an exit command 
nor directly addressed the central holding of Mimms.  It analyzed 
instead whether a traffic stop may be reasonably prolonged and the 
driver further detained by several minutes after the traffic citation is 
issued for a K-9 unit to perform a sweep. 
Rodriguez distinguished the analogy to “officer safety interests” 
in Mimms as being “different in kind from the Government’s 
endeavor to detect crime in general or drug trafficking in 
particular.”  575 U.S. at 356-57.  Rodriguez noted that even if, by 
analogy, “the imposition” of detaining the driver a few more minutes 
for the K-9 sweep “was no more intrusive than the exit order in 
Mimms, the dog sniff,” which Rodriguez observed is for the detection 
of crime, “could not be justified on the same basis” as a de minimis 
privacy intrusion.  Id.  In other words, Rodriguez said that the 
traffic stop ended once the citation issued, and, even under the 
 
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Mimms balancing analysis, a brief further detention for a dog sniff 
sweep is not a mere inconvenience to the driver.8 
Rodriguez Does Not Apply; Mimms Does 
Rodriguez centered on a traffic stop that was prolonged for a 
dog sniff sweep after the citation had been issued.  This observation 
leads us to two conclusions for purposes of our analysis here. 
First, Rodriguez does not apply to this case.  In this case, the 
attempted sweep occurred during a lawful traffic stop, not after a 
traffic citation was issued.  The Second District itself set forth these 
facts, concluding both that the attempted K-9 sweep occurred 
 
 
8.  Mimms came up in Rodriguez in the context of rejecting the 
United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit’s de minimis 
rule permitting dog sniff sweeps after a traffic citation had been 
issued—a rule the Eighth Circuit developed by analogy to the 
balancing test performed in Mimms.  Rodriguez, 575 U.S. at 353, 
356.  The Eighth Circuit held that detaining a driver a few more 
minutes after a traffic citation issued was a de minimis intrusion to 
the driver’s privacy when balanced against the government’s “strong 
interest in interdicting the flow of illegal drugs along the nation’s 
highways.”  United States v. $404,905.00 in U.S. Currency, 182 F.3d 
643, 649 (8th Cir. 1999), abrogated by Rodriguez, 575 U.S. 348.  
Just as the Second District did in Creller, the dissent either 
overlooks or ignores this context. 
 
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during and did not prolong the traffic stop, and that the stop was 
supported by probable cause.  See Creller, 336 So. 3d at 821, 824.9 
Second, Mimms does apply, and it permits a K-9 officer 
attempting a sweep during a lawful traffic stop to issue an exit 
command for officer safety.  The exit command still only causes a 
de minimis intrusion to the driver during a stop, while the K-9 
officer’s safety far outweighs the driver’s interest in his location 
 
9.  In concluding that Rodriguez applies here, see dissenting 
op. at 20, the dissent misses the point.  Rodriguez involved a 
completed traffic stop, not an ongoing one like the one at issue here.  
Having completed the mission of the stop, and issued the ticket, any 
further delay in Rodriguez was illegal absent some other 
independent, probable cause basis. 
Beyond that, the dissent’s footnote 12 quotation of language 
from Rodriguez, dissenting op. at 20, is missing critical context that 
further supports, rather than contradicts, our holding today.  In 
full, the Rodriguez court was responding to criticism from Justice 
Alito’s dissenting opinion by reiterating that what was essential to 
any analysis of the lawfulness of the stop was whether it was 
prolonged by the dog sweep.  See Rodriguez, 575 U.S. at 357 (“As we 
said in Caballes and reiterate today, a traffic stop ‘prolonged 
beyond’ that point [the amount of ‘time reasonably required to 
complete [the stop’s] mission’] is ‘unlawful.’  The critical question, 
then, is not whether the dog sniff occurs before or after the officer 
issues a ticket, as Justice Alito supposes, but whether conducting 
the sniff ‘prolongs’—i.e., adds time to—‘the stop.’ ” (quoting 
Caballes, 543 U.S. at 407)) (citations omitted); see also id. at 370-
72 (Alito, J., dissenting).  And the Second District in Creller 
specifically concluded that the stop here was not prolonged.  336 
So. 3d at 821. 
 
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during a lawful traffic stop: in his car or out.  Further, the potential 
for detecting criminal activity places a K-9 officer at an even greater 
risk of danger.  See Wilson, 519 U.S. at 414 (“It would seem that the 
possibility of a violent encounter stems not from the ordinary 
reaction of a motorist stopped for a speeding violation, but from the 
fact that evidence of a more serious crime might be uncovered 
during the stop.”).  And as a practical matter, it makes little sense 
why Mimms would not apply to a K-9 officer, because a K-9 officer 
may be the officer initiating the stop.  See, e.g., Rodriguez, 575 U.S. 
at 351-52 (traffic stop initiated by a K-9 officer, who also conducted 
the dog sniff sweep); Florida v. Harris, 568 U.S. 237, 240 (2013) 
(same).10 
This Case 
There is no question here that Creller was lawfully stopped, or 
that Officer Simmonds’ attempted sweep did not prolong the stop.  
See Creller, 336 So. 3d at 821, 824.  When Officer Simmonds 
 
 
10.  The dissent’s assertion that we “stacked” Mimms and 
Rodriguez, see dissenting op. at 21, is easily rebuffed by our 
analysis above, where we not only analyzed each case separately, 
but clearly concluded that Rodriguez does not apply to this case.  If 
Rodriguez doesn’t apply in the first instance, it strains credulity to 
then conclude that its “carve-out” applies. 
 
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arrived on scene, Officer Norman was still writing the ticket.  Officer 
Simmonds issued an exit command to Creller several times, 
repeatedly explaining that it was for the safety of himself and his 
dog.  The fact that Creller was still in control of his vehicle made the 
situation more dangerous to Officer Simmonds and his dog.  
Because the weighty interests in protecting the K-9 unit during this 
lawful traffic stop outweighed the de minimis temporary interference 
with Creller’s interest in remaining inside his vehicle, Officer 
Simmonds’ exit command to Creller was reasonable under Mimms.  
Officer Simmonds gave that command midway through the lawful 
traffic stop, and his doing so did not convert the stop into a 
narcotics investigation, even though narcotics were discovered.   
III. Conclusion 
Based on the foregoing, we quash the Second District’s 
decision in Creller and approve the Fifth District’s decision in 
Benjamin.  We hold that binding Fourth Amendment precedent 
permits a K-9 officer arriving midway through a lawful traffic stop to 
command the driver to exit the vehicle for officer safety before 
conducting a lawful vehicle sweep. 
It is so ordered. 
 
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MUÑIZ, C.J., and CANADY, COURIEL, and GROSSHANS, JJ., 
concur. 
LABARGA, J., dissents with an opinion. 
SASSO, J., did not participate. 
 
NOT FINAL UNTIL TIME EXPIRES TO FILE REHEARING MOTION 
AND, IF FILED, DETERMINED. 
 
LABARGA, J., dissenting. 
Whether a law enforcement exit order is a constitutional 
seizure depends on the reasonableness of the order given its unique 
circumstances.  See Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 19 (1968).  
Reasonableness “depends on a balance between the public interest 
and the individual’s right to personal security free from arbitrary 
interference by law officers.”  United States v. Brignoni-Ponce, 422 
U.S. 873, 878 (1975). 
In this case, the majority holds that under the Fourth 
Amendment, “a K-9 officer arriving midway through a lawful traffic 
stop [may] command the driver to exit the vehicle for officer safety 
before conducting a lawful vehicle sweep.”  Majority op. at 18.  
However, the arbitrariness of the vehicle sweep here, along with the 
evidence that removal was not necessary to ensure officer safety 
 
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during issuance of the traffic citation, calls for us to apply 
Rodriguez.11  I respectfully dissent. 
The Second District correctly applied Rodriguez to conclude 
that on balance, there was no justification to outweigh Creller’s 
right to personal security.  See Creller v. State, 336 So. 3d 817, 824 
(Fla. 2d DCA 2022).  In Rodriguez, the United States Supreme Court 
explained that on-scene investigation of other crimes “detours from 
th[e] mission” of the traffic stop.  See 575 U.S. at 356.  The Court 
reasoned that such investigation and its related safety precautions 
cannot be justified by officer safety, an interest that “stems from the 
mission of the stop itself.”  See id. at 356-57.  The Court thus held 
that the government’s interest in detecting drug trafficking was 
outweighed by the driver’s right to personal security when an 
arbitrary vehicle sweep prolongs a traffic stop that reasonably 
should have been completed.  See id.12 
 
 
11.  Rodriguez v. United States, 575 U.S. 348, 356 (2015). 
 
12.  Notably, the Court reasoned that “[t]he critical question, 
then, is not whether the dog sniff occurs before or after the officer 
issues a ticket . . . .”  Id. at 357. 
 
 
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The majority “stacks” the holdings of Mimms13 and Rodriguez 
by overlooking the important Rodriguez carveout: “ ‘[S]afety 
precautions taken in order to facilitate such detours [from the 
traffic mission]’ cannot ‘be justified on the same basis’ as those 
taken to ensure officer safety for the purpose of conducting the 
traffic stop itself.”  See Creller, 336 So. 3d at 823 (quoting 
Rodriguez, 575 U.S. at 356-57). 
In the present case, there was probable cause to support 
Creller’s traffic infraction.  Id. at 824.  However, the vehicle sweep 
was arbitrary.  The record establishes that the K-9 officer was 
conducting a random vehicle sweep “admittedly based on no 
suspicion of criminal activity whatsoever.”  Id.  The record also 
establishes that “[t]he first point in time at which an officer asked 
Creller to exit the vehicle was when the K-9 unit officer asked him 
to do so out of concern for the officer’s safety and that of his dog so 
that he could conduct the vehicle sweep.”  Id. at 822. 
Like the vehicle sweep in Rodriguez, the exit order given by the 
K-9 officer here was an “additional intrusion” into Creller’s right to 
 
 
13.  Pennsylvania v. Mimms, 434 U.S. 106, 110-11 (1977). 
 
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personal security that detoured from the mission of the traffic stop.  
See Rodriguez, 575 U.S. at 356 (citing Mimms, 434 U.S. at 110-11).  
The lack of probable cause to support a belief that there was 
contraband in Creller’s vehicle—coupled with the record evidence 
that his removal was not necessary for officer safety in issuing the 
traffic citation—leaves the government without a justification for the 
exit order. 
Moreover, Creller’s right to personal security carries more 
weight than the majority affords it.  An exit order is not an 
innocuous request.  While police search the vehicle, the driver must 
stand on the side of the road in view of all passersby.  The 
implications heighten when, as in Creller’s case, the scene involves 
two or more police cars with lights glaring and with an active K-9 
unit.  To put it simply, this intrusion cannot be characterized as 
“de minimis.”  See majority op. at 16-17.  The stigma associated 
with the exit order jeopardizes the driver’s reputation in the 
community.  This is especially the case in our contemporary social 
media environment in which videos are constantly uploaded with 
little or no context given.  A driver forced to exit the vehicle for a K-9 
 
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sweep may be viewed not only by passersby, but also by anyone 
around the world. 
Thus, I disagree with the majority that an exit order merely 
affects “the driver’s interest in his location during a lawful traffic 
stop: in his car or out.”  See id.  The exit command is an additional, 
significant intrusion into the driver’s right to personal security.  The 
majority’s ends-justify-the-means emphasis on the presence of 
contraband cannot justify the fact that innocent law-abiding people, 
whose only misdeed may have been the unwitting commission of a 
slight traffic infraction (e.g., failure to use a seat belt), may be 
commanded to exit the vehicle or face the very real prospect of 
forced removal. 
In sum, the forced removal of a driver from the vehicle before 
probable cause of the existence of contraband has been 
established—and without any evidence that such seizure is 
necessary to ensure officer safety during issuance of a traffic 
citation—constitutes an unreasonable seizure without any 
justification under the Fourth Amendment.  For these reasons, I 
dissent. 
 
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Application for Review of the Decision of the District Court of Appeal 
Certified Direct Conflict of Decisions 
 
 
Second District - Case No. 2D2019-3085 
 
 
(Hillsborough County) 
 
Ashley Moody, Attorney General, Henry C. Whitaker, Solicitor 
General, Jeffrey Paul DeSousa, Chief Deputy Solicitor General, 
David M. Costello, Deputy Solicitor General, and Robert Scott 
Schenck, Solicitor General Fellow, Tallahassee, Florida, and C. 
Suzanne Bechard, Chief Assistant Attorney General, and Linsey 
Sims-Bohnenstiehl, Assistant Attorney General, Tampa, Florida, 
 
 
for Petitioner 
 
Howard L. “Rex” Dimmig, II, Public Defender, and Pamela H. 
Izakowitz, Assistant Public Defender, Tenth Judicial Circuit, 
Bartow, Florida, 
 
 
for Respondent 
 
Robert Wayne Evans of Allen, Norton & Blue, P.A., Tallahassee, 
Florida, 
 
 
 
for Amicus Curiae Florida Sheriffs Association 
 
J. David Marsey of Rumberger, Kirk & Caldwell, P.A., Tallahassee, 
Florida, 
 
 
for Amicus Curiae Florida Police Chiefs Association 
 
Christie S. Utt, General Counsel, Florida Department of Highway 
Safety and Motor Vehicles, Tallahassee, Florida, 
 
for Amicus Curiae Florida Department of Highway Safety and 
Motor Vehicles 
 
 
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Carlos J. Martinez, Public Defender, and Andrew Stanton, Assistant 
Public Defender, Eleventh Judicial Circuit, Miami, Florida, and 
Matthew J. Metz, Public Defender, and Robert Jackson Pearce III, 
Assistant Public Defender, Seventh Judicial Circuit, Daytona 
Beach, Florida, 
 
 
for Amicus Curiae Florida Public Defender Association, Inc.