UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE TENTH CIRCUIT

________________ _________________ UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff - Appellee,

v. CHRISTOPHER SCOTT SMITH, Defendant - Appellant. No. 21-5057 (D.C. No. 4:20-CR -00298-GKF-1) (N.D. Okla.)

________________ _________________ ORDER AND JUDGMENT *

________________ _________________ Before MATHESON , BACHARACH , and MORITZ , Circuit Judges.

________________ _________________ A federal grand jury in the Northern Di strict of Oklahoma indicted Christopher Smith on a single count of possession of metham phetamine with intent to distribute.
See 21 U.S.C. §§ 846, 841(a)(1), 841(b)(1)(C) . Smith entered a conditional plea of guilty, reserving his right to appeal the deni al of his motion to suppress. Exercising jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291, we affirm.

* After examining the briefs and appella te record, this pa nel has determined unanimously to honor the parties’ request for a decision on the briefs without oral argument. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(f); 10th Cir. R. 34.1(G). The case is therefore submitted without oral argument. This or der and judgment is not binding precedent, except under the doctrines of la w of the case, res judicata, and collateral estoppel. It may be cited, however, for its persuasive value consistent with Fed. R. App. P. 32.1 and 10th Cir. R. 32.1. FILED United States Court of Appeals Tenth Circuit 

### July 1, 2022 Christopher M. Wolpert Clerk of Court Appellate Case: 21-5057 Document: 010110704531 Date Filed: 07/01/2022 Page: 12 BACKGROUND 1 Smith was riding his bicycle near 58th St reet and Peoria Avenue in Tulsa, Oklahoma when Officer Kenneth Stewart of the Tulsa Police Department stopped him. Smith was travelling northbound on Pe oria on the right side of the street. Because there were obstructi ons in his path, he moved from the right-hand side of the street to the left-hand side of the street, crossing four traf fic lanes. He did not signal before this maneuver. After stopping Smith, Officer Stewart ra n a records check showing an active arrest warrant from the Muscog ee (Creek) Nation. Officer Stewart asked Smith if he had anything illegal on him. Sm ith responded: “Yes, I have a pipe in my pocket.” R. vol. 2 at 13 (internal quotation marks omitte d). After asking Smith to step off the bicycle, Officer Stewart removed a pipe with a white crystalline s ubstance inside it. He then removed some backpacks Smith was carrying and gave them to Sergeant Joshua Goldstein, who had arrived on the scene. Officer Gold stein searched the backpacks and found a container with 26. 77 grams of a substance that tested presumptive positive for methamphetamine, a se t of digital scales, and several empty plastic baggies. The officers arrested Smith, leading to his federal indictment. Smith filed a motion “to suppress all evidence seized, wh ether tangible or intangible, which were the fruits of the seiz ure and search.” R. vol. 1 at 26. In his

1 This factual summary come s from the findings of the district court, none of which Smith challenges as clearly erroneous. See United States v. Loera , 923 F.3d 907, 914 (10th Cir. 2019). Appellate Case: 21-5057 Document: 010110704531 Date Filed: 07/01/2022 Page: 23 motion, Smith challenged the legality of the in itial stop and the s ubsequent search of his backpacks. The government filed a re sponse, and the court held a hearing at which Smith, Officer Stewart, and Sergean t Goldstein testified. The court also considered Officer Stewart’s bodycam vi deo, the outstanding bench warrant, the Tulsa Police Department’s written “personal searches” policy, and the arrest report. The court denied Smith’s motion, concl uding that Officer Stewart had reasonable suspicion for the stop and that the search of the backpacks was valid as incident to Smith’s arrest. Alternatively, the court concluded th e inevitable discovery doctrine precluded suppression—even if the roadside search was illegal, the police would have found the items when conducting an inventory of Smith ’s property after they arrested him. See United States v. Cunningham , 413 F.3d 1199, 1203 (10th Cir. 2005) (“The inevitable discovery doctrine provides an exception to the exclusionary rule[] and permits evidence to be admitted if an independent, lawful pol ice investigation inevitably would have discovered it.” (c itations and internal quotation marks omitted)). This appeal followed.
DISCUSSION When reviewing a “denial of a motion to suppress, we view the evidence in the light most favorable to the government and accept the district cour t’s factual findings unless they are clearly erroneous, but the ultimate question of reasonableness under the Fourth Amendment is a legal conc lusion that we review de novo.” United States
v. Loera , 923 F.3d 907, 914 (10th Cir. 2019) (brackets, citation, and internal Appellate Case: 21-5057 Document: 010110704531 Date Filed: 07/01/2022 Page: 34 quotation marks omitted). The Fourth Ame ndment protects “[t]he right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures.” U.S. Const. amend. IV. “A tra ffic stop is a seizure within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment, even though the purpose of the stop is limited and the resulting detention quite brief.” United States v. Botero-Ospina , 71 F.3d 783, 786 (10th Cir. 1995) (internal quotation marks omitted ). Because “[a]n ordinary traffic stop is . . . more analogous to an investigative deten tion than a custodial arrest,” however, “[w]e . . . analyze such stops under th e principles pertaining to investigative detentions set forth in Terry v. Ohio , 392 U.S. 1 (1968).” Id. (parallel citations omitted). “To determine the reasona bleness of an investigative detention, we make a dual inquiry, asking first whether the officer’s action was justified at its inception, and second whether it was reasona bly related in scope to the circumstances which justified the interfere nce in the first place.” Id. (internal quotation marks omitted). We agree with the district court that the stop was justified at its inception because Officer Stewart observed Smith cha nge lanes without signaling his intent to do so. This action constitutes a potential viol ation of Okla. Stat. tit. 47, § 11-604(A) and chapter 10, § 640(B) of the Tulsa Re vised Traffic Code. Both the Oklahoma Highway Safety Code and the Tulsa Traf fic Code apply to bicyclists on public roadways. See Okla. Stat. tit. 47, § 11-1202; Tuls a Revised Traffic Code ch. 10, § 1000. Smith argues that O fficer Stewart made no mention of the failure to signal in his police report, did not mention the fail ure to signal during th e stop, and did not Appellate Case: 21-5057 Document: 010110704531 Date Filed: 07/01/2022 Page: 45 issue a citation for failure to signal. 2 But “[w]hether reasonabl e suspicion exists is an objective inquiry determined by the totality of the circum stances, and an officer’s subjective motivation for the stop plays no role in ordinary reasonable suspicion Fourth Amendment analysis.” United States v. Salas , 756 F.3d 1196, 1201 (10th Cir. 2014) (brackets and internal quotation marks omitted). Smith also argues the reco rds check was inconsistent with the purpose for the stop, but “[t]his court has routinely perm itted officers to conduc t criminal-history checks during traffic stops in the interest of officer safety.” United States v. Mayville , 955 F.3d 825, 830 (10th Cir. 2020). Relatedly, Smith asserts Officer Stewart unreasonably prolonged the stop by as king Smith if he was carrying anything illegal. In support of this argument, he cites United States v. Digiovanni , 650 F.3d 498, 509–13 (4th Cir. 20 11), in which the Fourth Circuit held an officer impermissibly extended the scope of a traffic stop by engaging in a lengthy investigation of potential drug trafficki ng unsupported by reasona ble suspicion. Unlike in Digiovanni , however, by the time Offi cer Stewart asked Smith whether he was carrying a nything illegal on him, he had already discovered the outstanding arrest warrant. The record thus belies Smith’ s assertion that, at that point, the mission of the traffic stop was still limited to issuing a citation for failure

2 Although Officer Stewart’s arrest report refers to the pena lty section of the Oklahoma Highway Safety Code for bicycle violations, see R. vol. 1 at 22, and explains that Officer Stewart observed Sm ith “ride a bicycle ac ross four lanes of traffic” and that he then “conducted a pede strian stop on the subject for the bicycle violations,” id. at 23, the report does not specify wh at traffic laws Smith allegedly violated on his bicycle. Appellate Case: 21-5057 Document: 010110704531 Date Filed: 07/01/2022 Page: 56 to signal. And Smith offers no basis to conclude that this single question—which elicited an affirmative answer and the discovery of drug paraphernalia—meaningfully extended the scope or dur ation of the stop. Finally, Smith challenges the district court’s application of the searchincident-to-arrest exception to the warra nt requirement to the search of his backpacks. But we need not consider this challenge because the district court also denied the suppression motion on the basis of inevitable discovery. “If the district court states multiple altern ative grounds for its ruling and the appellant does not challenge all those grounds in the opening brief, then we may affirm the ruling.” Rivero v. Bd. of Regents of Univ. of N.M. , 950 F.3d 754, 763 (1 0th Cir. 2020). Smith does not challenge the inevitable-discovery gr ound for the district court’s ruling, so we affirm the denial of the motio n to suppress on this ground.
CONCLUSION We affirm the denial of the motion to suppress.

Entered for the Court
Nancy L. Moritz Circuit Judge Appellate Case: 21-5057 Document: 010110704531 Date Filed: 07/01/2022 Page: 6