Case Title: Moore v. Commonwealth

Citation: 

Docket Number: 080199

State: virginia

Court: Virginia Supreme Court

Date: 2008-10-31T00:00:00Z

Document:
Present:  Hassell, C.J., Keenan, Koontz, Kinser, Lemons, and 
Goodwyn, JJ., and Russell, S.J. 
 
MATTHEW TREMAINE MOORE 
             OPINION BY 
SENIOR JUSTICE CHARLES S. RUSSELL 
v.  Record No. 080199  
           October 31, 2008 
 
COMMONWEALTH OF VIRGINIA 
 
FROM THE COURT OF APPEALS OF VIRGINIA 
 
 
In this appeal we consider whether a police officer’s 
traffic stop invaded the Fourth Amendment rights of a 
motorist.  We also consider questions concerning the 
application of Rules 5A:12(c) and 5A:34. 
FACTS AND PROCEEDINGS 
 
Because the case was appealed after conditional pleas of 
guilty, there is no dispute as to the essential facts.  On the 
afternoon of February 15, 2005, Officer W. T. Bryan of the 
Henrico County police was sitting in his police cruiser parked 
in a parking lot behind a grocery store, facing an adjacent 
street.  He saw a car traveling southbound on the street.  The 
car displayed an inspection sticker that was “peeling off of 
the windshield.”  The car passed about five feet away from the 
front of his cruiser and, although the sticker was “sort of 
bowed,” the sticker was legible to the officer and he could 
see that it was valid.  The officer drove out of the parking 
lot and followed the car while checking the car’s license 
number on his computer.  This check revealed that the car was 
owned by a rental company in Midlothian, Virginia. 
 
Later, at a hearing on a motion to suppress the evidence, 
the officer testified that he had stopped numerous vehicles 
with peeling inspection stickers and found that “a great 
majority of the time . . . the inspection sticker, that will 
be peeling off the window, does not belong on that vehicle.”  
Asked to be more specific, the officer testified that he had 
stopped approximately 50 vehicles within the previous six 
months displaying peeling inspection stickers and that 30 to 
35 of the 50 stickers did not belong to the vehicles on which 
they were displayed. 
 
After verifying the ownership of the car, Officer Bryan 
stopped it because of his suspicion concerning the sticker.  
He was unaware of any other traffic infractions on the part of 
the driver.  As the officer approached the car, he detected an 
odor of marijuana coming from it.  The driver, Matthew 
Tremaine Moore, admitted that he had been smoking marijuana in 
the car.  The officer asked Moore and his passenger to leave 
the car and then searched it, finding marijuana, cocaine, 
heroin, digital scales and a semi-automatic pistol inside. 
 
In the Circuit Court of Henrico County, Moore was 
indicted for possession of cocaine with intent to distribute 
and for possession of a firearm after being convicted of a 
 
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felony.  He made a motion to suppress the evidence seized from 
the car on the ground that the peeling inspection sticker did 
not give Officer Bryan “probable cause or a reasonable 
suspicion of criminal activity” to stop the vehicle and that 
the stop and seizure therefore violated Moore’s rights under 
the Fourth Amendment.  After the circuit court denied the 
motion to suppress, Moore, with the consent of the court and 
agreement of the Commonwealth, entered conditional pleas of 
guilty to both indictments, reserving his right, pursuant to 
Code § 19.2-254, to appeal the circuit court’s ruling on the 
motion to suppress. 
 
Moore appealed the case to the Court of Appeals of 
Virginia.  His petition for appeal contained a single question 
presented:  “Did Officer Bryan have probable cause to make a 
traffic stop of the vehicle being driven by Moore on the sole 
basis that he observed that a valid inspection sticker was not 
totally affixed to the windshield of the vehicle?”  The 
Commonwealth filed a brief in opposition that made no mention 
of the wording of Moore’s question presented, but simply 
rephrased the question as follows:  “Whether Officer Bryan had 
reasonable articulable suspicion to stop the defendant’s car.”  
Thereafter, the case was briefed, argued and decided in the 
Court of Appeals solely on the basis of the “reasonable 
articulable suspicion” standard proposed by the Commonwealth.  
 
3
By majority decision of a three-judge panel entered on 
February 13, 2007, the Court of Appeals rejected the circuit 
court’s decision on the motion to suppress, holding that, on 
the facts in the record, Officer Bryan had nothing more than 
“an inchoate and unparticularized ‘hunch’ that the inspection  
sticker did not belong to appellant’s vehicle.  Such a ‘hunch’ 
is too slender a reed to justify an investigatory stop under 
the Fourth Amendment.”  Moore v. Commonwealth, 49 Va. App. 
294, 307, 640 S.E.2d 531, 537 (2007) (citation omitted). The 
panel’s order remanded the case to the circuit court.  Id. at 
308, 640 S.E.2d at 538. 
 
The Commonwealth filed a petition for rehearing en banc, 
in which it stated the sole question presented as:  “Did the 
panel majority err in finding there was no reasonable 
suspicion to justify the stop?”  The Court of Appeals granted 
the Commonwealth’s petition.  Moore v. Commonwealth, 49 Va. 
App. 497, 642 S.E.2d 769 (2007). 
 
A majority of the Court of Appeals, sitting en banc, 
declined to address the Fourth Amendment question upon which 
the case had been argued, ruling instead, sua sponte, that 
Moore was seeking reversal of the trial court on an issue 
outside the question presented in his petition for appeal, in 
 
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violation of Rule 5A:12(c).1  For that reason, the Court of 
Appeals affirmed the convictions without reaching the merits.  
Moore v. Commonwealth, 51 Va. App. 1, 3-4, 654 S.E.2d 305, 306 
(2007). 
 
Neither the Court of Appeals nor either of the parties 
made any mention of the variance between the parties’ 
respective versions of the question presented until 
publication of the court’s en banc decision.  We awarded Moore 
an appeal.  He assigns error to the Court of Appeals’ en banc 
decision, asserting that the court erred in ruling that he had 
failed to satisfy the requirements of Rule 5A:12(c) and that 
the court, by deciding the case on an issue that was never 
pleaded, briefed or argued before the court, without notice to 
the parties, had deprived him of his right to due process of 
law.  The Commonwealth assigns cross-error to the Court of 
Appeals’ failure to “[rule] in the alternative that the stop 
was supported by reasonable suspicion.” 
Analysis 
 
The Court of Appeals’ application and interpretation of 
the Rules of Court, like the interpretation of a statute, 
presents a question of law that we review de novo.  Jay v. 
Commonwealth, 275 Va. 510, 517, 659 S.E.2d 311, 315 (2008).  
                     
1 Rule 5A:12(c) provides, in pertinent part:  “Only 
questions presented in the petition for appeal will be noticed 
 
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The time limits for filing a notice of appeal and for filing a 
petition for appeal under Rule 5A:3(a) are jurisdictional, but 
the requirements of Rule 5A:12(c), like the contents of 
several other rules, have been expressly held to be not 
jurisdictional.  Id. at 517-20, 659 S.E.2d at 315-17. 
 
Any court may take notice of the violation of a 
jurisdictional rule or statute sua sponte at any stage of the 
proceedings. See Lucas v. Biller, 204 Va. 309, 312-13, 130 
S.E.2d 582, 585 (1963); Rule 3A:9(b).  On the other hand, 
invocation of a non-jurisdictional rule to dismiss an appeal, 
or to prevent consideration of its merits, should not be 
undertaken without considering whether a party’s failure to 
adhere strictly to the rule’s requirements is insignificant, 
or so substantial as to preclude the court’s addressing the 
merits of the case.  Jay, 275 Va. at 520, 659 S.E.2d at 317. 
 
As we pointed out in Jay, our holding in that case does 
not leave the Court of Appeals without appropriate remedies.  
It “may, among other things, require an appellant to re-submit 
the petition for appeal or opening brief, or it may treat a 
question presented as waived.”  Id.  A concurring opinion in 
the Court of Appeals’ en banc decision in the present case 
suggested an additional remedy:  “This case presents the rare 
occasion in which I believe that we should exercise our 
                                                                
by the Court of Appeals.” 
 
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inherent authority to expand the question presented and decide 
the issue argued – whether the stop of the defendant’s car was 
in violation of the Fourth Amendment to the United States 
Constitution.”  Moore v. Commonwealth, 51 Va. App. 1, 6, 654 
S.E.2d 305, 307 (2007) (Petty, J., concurring in the result). 
 
Moore, on appeal, agrees that the question presented in 
his petition for appeal to the Court of Appeals erroneously 
relied on the wrong standard governing his Fourth Amendment 
claim because it invoked the “probable cause” standard rather 
than the applicable “reasonable suspicion” standard.  He 
argues, however, that “reasonable suspicion” is subsumed 
within “probable cause” and the question presented, if 
inartfully expressed, was nevertheless sufficient to apprise 
the Commonwealth and the Court of Appeals that he was 
asserting a violation of his Fourth Amendment protection 
against unreasonable search and seizure.  Because “probable 
cause” requires a more stringent standard, putting the 
prosecution to a higher level of proof, we do not agree that 
the “reasonable suspicion” standard inherently presents the 
same issues.  We do agree, however, that Moore’s question 
presented left no doubt that a Fourth Amendment violation was 
the subject of his appellate claim. 
 
In that light, we consider the criteria we articulated in 
Jay:  Was Moore’s failure to adhere strictly to the 
 
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requirements of Rule 5A:12(c) insignificant, or was it so 
substantial as to preclude the Court of Appeals from 
addressing the merits of the case?  In applying those 
criteria, we take into consideration the factors itemized in 
Judge Petty’s concurring opinion: 
 
While it is clear that appellant employed the 
irrelevant probable cause standard in his question 
presented, it is also clear that all parties 
involved in this case addressed the relevant 
standard of reasonable suspicion in arguing and 
deciding the case.  The defense attorney as well as 
the Commonwealth's attorney identified the 
appropriate standard in their arguments to the trial 
court.  The trial court obviously understood those 
arguments, commenting that "it basically boils down 
to whether or not the officer had a reasonable 
articulable suspicion. . . ."  In his opening brief, 
appellant argued that the officer had neither 
probable cause nor reasonable suspicion to justify 
the stop.  The Attorney General understood the 
issue, rephrased the question presented to state the 
correct constitutional standard, and went on to 
address it.  In a published decision, a panel of 
this Court decided the case on the merits.  Finally, 
we never asked appellant to address the issue at 
oral argument.  Simply put, at no time prior to our 
decision did the form of the question presented 
raise any concern. 
 
Moore, 51 Va. App. at 6, 654 S.E.2d at 507 (Petty, J., 
concurring in the result).2 
 
Code § 17.1-402(D) provides that the Court of 
Appeals sitting en banc “shall consider and decide the 
                     
2 The dissenting opinion in the panel’s decision did not 
mention any violation of the rules, but instead disagreed with 
the majority’s conclusion that the traffic stop was made 
 
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case and may overrule any previous decision by any panel 
or of the full court.”  (Emphasis added).  This language 
indicates a clear legislative preference for the prompt 
and final disposition of appellate cases on the merits, 
when that can be done without interfering with the 
orderly administration of justice.3 
 
Rule 5A:34 provides for “Rehearing En Banc.”  
Neither Code § 17.1-402(D) nor Rule 5A:34 expressly 
provides for the status of an existing panel decision 
when a rehearing en banc has been granted, but the Court 
of Appeals has recently ruled that “[t]he grant of en 
banc review vacates the prior panel opinion in toto.”  
Glenn v. Commonwealth, 49 Va. App. 413, 423 n.3, 642 
S.E.2d 282, 287 n.3 (2007) (en banc).  In the present 
case, the Court of Appeals expressly restated that 
holding:  “Our en banc order had the effect of vacating 
the panel opinion.”  Moore, 51 Va. App. at 2 n.1, 654 
S.E.2d at 307 n.1. 
                                                                
without reasonable suspicion.  Moore, 49 Va. App. at 308-11, 
640 S.E.2d at 538-39 (McClanahan, J., dissenting). 
3 A related and parallel purpose underlies the ancient 
statute of jeofails, which survives in modern form as Code 
§ 8.01-678.  (“When it plainly appears . . . that the parties 
have had a fair trial on the merits and substantial justice 
has been reached, no judgment shall be arrested or reversed 
[f]or any other defect, imperfection, or omission in the 
record . . . .”) 
 
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Nevertheless, in a decision four months after the 
decision in the present case, the Court of Appeals, en 
banc, unanimously4 imposed a limitation on the issues to 
be considered at a rehearing en banc:  “We are limited to 
the issues presented in the Commonwealth’s petition [for 
a rehearing en banc].  Thus, the only issues currently 
before us are the ones raised in the petition for 
rehearing en banc.”  Ferguson v. Commonwealth, 51 Va. App 
427, 433, 658 S.E.2d 692, 695 (2008).  As noted above, 
the Commonwealth’s petition for a rehearing in the 
present case was succinct:  “Did the panel majority err 
in finding there was no reasonable suspicion to justify 
the stop?”  No issue was raised concerning a rule 
violation.5 
 
The Attorney General's election to rephrase the 
question presented in Moore's petition for appeal, with 
Moore's tacit acquiescence, relinquished any reliance the 
Commonwealth might have made on Moore's violation of Rule 
5A:12(c).  The Commonwealth again adhered to that 
election in its petition for rehearing en banc.  The 
effect of that election was to present the legally 
                     
4 Four judges dissented on other grounds. 
5 Because the Court of Appeals’ ruling in Ferguson, quoted 
above, is not before us in the present case, we express no 
opinion as to its correctness. 
 
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correct, and constitutionally dispositive, question to 
the Court of Appeals by agreement of the parties.  That 
question was thereafter fully briefed, argued and decided 
on appeal.  In those circumstances, it can hardly be said 
that Moore's violation of that non-jurisdictional rule 
was so substantial as to preclude the Court of Appeals 
from addressing the merits of the case.  We conclude 
that, in the unusual circumstances of this case, the 
Court of Appeals erred in foreclosing Moore's right to 
defend the decision of the panel that had ruled in his 
favor, and will accordingly reverse the judgment of the 
Court of Appeals sitting en banc.6 
 
We turn to the issue of reasonable suspicion, 
presented on appeal by the Commonwealth’s assignment of 
cross-error.  Because Moore’s conditional pleas of guilty 
resolved all factual issues in the Commonwealth’s favor, 
the only question presented to us on appeal is whether 
those facts implicate the Fourth Amendment, and if so, 
whether Officer Bryan unlawfully infringed upon an area 
protected by the Fourth Amendment.  Because that is a 
question of law, we consider it de novo.  Alston v. 
                     
6 In fairness to the Court of Appeals, it must be borne in 
mind that its en banc decision in the present case was handed 
down before our decision in Jay. 
 
 
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Commonwealth, 274 Va. 759, 764, 652 S.E.2d 456, 459 
(2007).  The majority panel opinion in the Court of 
Appeals applied the same standard of review.  Moore, 49 
Va. App. at 297, 640 S.E.2d at 533 (quoting Hughes v. 
Commonwealth, 31 Va. App. 447, 454, 524 S.E.2d 155, 159 
(2002)). 
 
The Fourth Amendment to the Constitution of the 
United States prohibits “unreasonable searches and 
seizures,” and that protection extends to brief 
investigatory stops “that fall short of traditional 
arrest.”  United States v. Arvizu, 534 U.S. 266, 273 
(2002).  The requirements of the Fourth Amendment are 
satisfied, however, if the officer’s action in making an 
investigatory stop is supported by “reasonable suspicion 
to believe that criminal activity ‘may be afoot.’ ”  Id. 
(quoting United States v. Sokolow, 490 U.S. 1, 7 (1989)).
 
Here, as both parties and the Court of Appeals 
agree, the dispositive question is whether the officer’s 
traffic stop was founded on a reasonable suspicion that 
criminal activity was afoot, a standard less stringent 
than probable cause.  Nevertheless, reasonable suspicion, 
like probable cause, “is dependent upon both the content 
of information possessed by police and its degree of 
 
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reliability.”  Alabama v. White, 496 U.S. 325, 330 
(1990). 
 
In weighing those factors, courts must consider the 
totality of the circumstances.  Arvizu, 534 U.S. at 273.  
Among those circumstances, an officer’s specialized 
training and personal experience, unavailable to a person 
untrained in law enforcement, are entitled to some 
weight.  See United States v. Cortez, 449 U.S. 411, 418-
19 (1981).  If, however, after considering those factors, 
the court concludes that the officer’s concern was “more 
an inchoate and unparticularized suspicion or ‘hunch,’ 
than a fair inference in the light of [the officer’s] 
experience, [it] is simply too slender a reed to support 
[a search or seizure].”  Reid v. Georgia, 448 U.S. 438, 
441 (1980) (internal quotation marks and citation 
omitted). 
 
Applying those principles, we conclude that the 
majority panel opinion in the Court of Appeals reached 
the correct result.  Although inspection stickers may 
undoubtedly become partially separated from a windshield 
by a wide array of mishaps entirely unrelated to 
violations of the law, the officer’s experience leading 
him to suspect otherwise was entitled to some weight.  
His conclusion, however, was undermined by his knowledge, 
 
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prior to making the stop, that Moore was driving a rental 
car. 
 
Violations of Article 21 of Chapter 10, Subtitle III 
of the Motor Vehicle Code (Code §§ 46.2-1157 to 1175.1, 
“Safety Inspections”) are made Class 3 misdemeanors, for 
a first offense, by Code § 46.2-1171.  Guilty knowledge, 
however, is an essential element of the offense of 
displaying a fictitious inspection sticker or one issued 
for another vehicle.7  Those who operate their own cars 
may sometimes have a motive to evade the motor vehicle 
inspection laws, but one who lawfully rents a car from a 
rental company would have little or no reason to verify 
the inspection status of the rental car, to be aware of 
any offense that may have been committed by the rental 
company, or to participate in concealing such an offense.  
Accordingly, the officer’s experience with peeling 
inspection stickers was entitled to little weight in the 
circumstances of this case.  We agree with the majority 
panel decision in the Court of Appeals that, in this 
instance, the officer’s observation of a peeling 
inspection sticker, without more, gave rise to nothing 
                     
7 Code § 46.2-1173 provides, in pertinent part:  “No 
person shall display or cause or permit to be displayed upon 
any vehicle any safety inspection sticker knowing it to be 
fictitious or issued for another vehicle." (Emphasis added.) 
 
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more than a “hunch” that Moore was violating the motor 
vehicle inspection laws, and, therefore, was “too slender 
a reed” to justify an exception to the protections 
afforded by the Fourth Amendment. 
Conclusion 
 
For the reasons stated, we will reverse the judgment 
of the Court of Appeals en banc, reinstate the majority 
panel decision and remand the case to the Court of 
Appeals with direction to remand it to the circuit court 
for further proceedings if the Commonwealth should be so 
advised. 
Reversed and remanded. 
JUSTICE LEMONS, with whom JUSTICE KINSER joins, 
dissenting. 
 
In my judgment, the Court of Appeals simply followed our 
example and our direction when it affirmed the trial court in 
this case.  I respectfully dissent. 
 
Rule 5A:12(c) states in pertinent part that 
 
[t]he petition for appeal shall contain the 
questions presented.  The form and contents of 
the petition for appeal shall conform in all 
respects to the requirements of the opening 
brief of appellant (Rule 5A:20). . . .  Only 
questions presented in the petition for appeal 
will be noticed by the Court of Appeals. 
 
In Jay v. Commonwealth, 275 Va. 510, 659 S.E.2d 311 
(2008), we held that the Court of Appeals erred when it 
 
15
dismissed portions of the petitions for appeal at issue in the 
case.  Holding that the requirements of Rule 5A:20 are not 
jurisdictional, we noted the difference between dismissing a 
case for jurisdictional reasons and denying an appeal for 
failure to comply with the rule.  We stated that the Court of 
Appeals “should . . . consider whether any failure to strictly 
adhere to the requirements of Rule 5A:20(e) is insignificant, 
thus allowing the court to address the merits of a question 
presented.”  Jay, 275 Va. at 520, 659 S.E.2d at 317.  We gave 
an example of what would be insignificant when we suggested 
that an overly rigid application of the Rules might mean that 
“if an appellant did not list cases alphabetically in the 
table of citations as required by Rule 5A:20(a), dismissal of 
the appeal would be mandated as a jurisdictional matter.”  Id. 
The sort of technical defect proffered as an example in 
Jay is dramatically different from Appellant’s mistake here: 
misstating the legal standard upon which his entire appeal was 
based.  Additionally, the fact that neither the Commonwealth 
nor the panel of the Court of Appeals recognized the 
Appellant’s noncompliance with the Rules does not preclude the 
Court of Appeals sitting en banc from rendering a correct 
judgment.  In this case, the Court of Appeals not only has 
done what this Court routinely does, it also has followed our 
direction to do likewise.  In Jay, we noted our analogous Rule 
 
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5:17(c) and stated, “[w]hen an appellant fails to comply with 
Rule 5:17(c)(4), this Court generally treats the argument as 
waived.”  Jay, 275 Va. at 519, 659 S.E.2d at 316 (emphasis 
added).  We cited seven cases in support of our practice:  
Atkins v. Commonwealth, 272 Va. 144, 149, 631 
S.E.2d 93, 95 (2006) (failure to brief an 
assignment of error constitutes a waiver of the 
issue); Muhammad v. Commonwealth, 269 Va. 451, 
477, 619 S.E.2d 16, 30 (2005) (same); Elliott 
v. Commonwealth, 267 Va. 396, 422, 593 S.E.2d 
270, 286 (2004) (same); Burns v. Commonwealth, 
261 Va. 307, 318, 541 S.E.2d 872, 880 (2001) 
(same); Kasi v. Commonwealth, 256 Va. 407, 413, 
508 S.E.2d 57, 60 (1998)  (same); Jenkins v. 
Commonwealth, 244 Va. 445, 451, 423 S.E.2d 360, 
364 (1992) (same); Quesinberry v. Commonwealth, 
241 Va. 364, 370, 402 S.E.2d 218, 222 (1991) 
(same). 
 
Id. at 519-20, 659 S.E.2d at 316-17. 
We have also required the Court of Appeals to apply Rule 
5A:12(c), the rule at issue here, in the same way.  For 
example, in Clifford v. Commonwealth, 274 Va. 23, 645 S.E.2d 
297 (2007), we reversed the Court of Appeals, on the ground 
that the basis upon which its decision rested was not properly 
before the Court because it was not contained in the 
appellant’s petition for appeal.  Id. at 25, 645 S.E.2d at 
297.  We cited the Court of Appeals’ own interpretation of 
Rule 5A:12(c), in McLean v. Commonwealth, 30 Va. App. 322, 
329, 516 S.E.2d 717, 720 (1999) (en banc) (holding that 
“[o]nly those arguments presented in the petition for appeal 
 
17
and granted by this Court will be considered on appeal”).  
Clifford, 274 Va. at 25, 645 S.E.2d at 297.  Other Court of 
Appeals opinions affirm this interpretation of the rule.  See, 
e.g., Lay v. Commonwealth, 50 Va. App. 330, 336 n.3, 649 
S.E.2d 714, 716 n.3 (2007); Selph v. Commonwealth, 48 Va. App. 
426, 434, 632 S.E.2d 24, 28 (2006), vacated on other grounds, 
51 Va. App. 238, 656 S.E.2d 425 (2008).  We should not reverse 
the Court of Appeals for failure to properly interpret the 
rule as we did in Clifford, and then here reverse it again 
when it has done so. 
We have not had the opportunity since Jay was decided in 
April of this year to reaffirm this approach to interpreting 
the rule, but the Court of Appeals has followed it in several 
unpublished opinions during that time.  See Rahnema v. 
Rahnema, Record No. 2701-07-1, slip op. at 4 (June 10, 2008); 
Greene v. Greene, Record No. 3031-07-4, slip op. at 4-5 (June 
3, 2008); Jones v. Charlottesville Dep’t of Soc. Servs., 
Record No. 1710-07-2, slip op. at 2 (May 27, 2008).  And in 
Parks v. Parks, Record No. 1991-07-1 (September 23, 2008), 
decided just last month, a three-judge panel of the Court of 
Appeals found that an appellant’s failure to provide legal 
authority in support of her arguments violated Rule 5A:20(e).  
Because this violation was significant, the Court of Appeals 
treated the appellant’s questions presented as waived and 
 
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affirmed without opinion the judgment of the trial court.  
Id., slip op. at 2.  As the Court of Appeals rightly observed, 
this outcome was dictated by and fully consistent with our 
opinion in Jay.  Id., slip op. at 1-2. 
The issue of noncompliance in this case goes directly to 
the heart of appellate review:  stating the issue to be 
considered and the legal principle that governs.  Here, Moore 
asked the Court of Appeals to reverse the trial court because 
the evidence was insufficient to support a finding of probable 
cause to stop him.  The Court of Appeals could answer that 
question and still not resolve the case before it because the 
correct legal standard for a Terry stop is whether police had 
a reasonable articulable suspicion that criminal activity was 
afoot.  
The majority holds that the Attorney General “[elected] 
to rephrase the question presented in Moore’s petition for 
appeal, with Moore’s tacit acquiescence.”  In my opinion, this 
holding avoids the issue.  The issue is not what the parties 
may have done; rather, it is the power of the Court of Appeals 
to do what it has done in its en banc judgment.  To restate 
what should be obvious, Rule 5A:12(c) states:  “Only questions 
presented in the petition for appeal will be noticed by the 
Court of Appeals.”  The en banc majority of the Court of 
Appeals simply enforced the plain language of this Rule. 
 
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Our system of appellate review requires the litigants to 
place before the reviewing court the issues that are the 
subject of the appeal.  It is not proper for an appellate 
court to intervene on behalf of a particular party and reframe 
an issue to help their cause; such action violates a basic 
premise that American courts act as neutral arbiters.  In this 
case, the Court of Appeals en banc rendered its judgment in a 
fashion identical to the manner in which we handle the 
analogous rule and decided the issue exactly as we have 
specifically directed them in a recent case.  In doing so, the 
Court of Appeals en banc embraced a neutral application of the 
Rules.  In short, the Court of Appeals en banc did not err. 
 
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