NOTICE: NOT FOR OFFICIAL PUBLICATION.

UNDER ARIZONA RULE OF THE SUPREME COURT 111(c), THIS DECISION IS NOT PRECEDENTIAL

AND MAY BE CITED ONLY AS AUTHORIZED BY RULE.

IN THE

ARIZONA COURT OF APPEALS

DIVISION ONE

STATE OF ARIZONA, Appellee,

v.

SUZANNE JEANNETTE MALLOY, Appellant.

No. 1 CA-CR 19-0295

Appeal from the Superior Court in Yavapai County

No. P1300CR201700264

The Honorable Tina R. Ainley, Judge

REVERSED AND REMANDED

COUNSEL

Arizona Attorney General’s Office, Phoenix

By Michael O’Toole

Counsel for Appellee

The Zickerman Law Office, PLLC, Flagstaff

By Adam Zickerman

Counsel for Appellant

FILED 6-1-2021
STATE v. MALLOY

Decision of the Court

2

MEMORANDUM DECISION

Chief Judge Peter B. Swann delivered the decision of the court, in which 

Presiding Judge Michael J. Brown joined. Judge D. Steven Williams

dissented.

S W A N N, Chief Judge:

¶1 Suzanne Jeannette Malloy agreed during a traffic stop to 

allow law enforcement to conduct a dog sniff of the exterior of her vehicle. 

After the dog alerted, law enforcement searched the vehicle and discovered 

illegal drugs and drug paraphernalia. Malloy was charged with and 

convicted of multiple drug possession counts. She appeals, contending that 

the physical evidence was obtained via an illegal detention and consent 

extracted by duress. We reverse and remand because we conclude that the 

detention was unlawfully prolonged, which tainted her consent.

FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

¶2 On the evening of February 18, 2017, Trooper Aguilera of the 

Arizona Department of Public Safety stopped a vehicle for exceeding the 

speed limit on the I-17. Trooper Aguilera approached the stopped vehicle

on the passenger side and made contact with the driver, Jeffrey Shaw, and 

the front-seat passenger, Malloy.

¶3 After informing Shaw that he had been speeding, Trooper 

Aguilera asked for Shaw’s driver’s license as well as the vehicle’s 

registration and proof of insurance. Shaw provided his license, Malloy 

provided the registration (which was in her name), and Malloy informed 

Trooper Aguilera that she was looking for the insurance information on her 

cell phone. As Malloy manipulated her phone, Trooper Aguilera spoke to 

the pair. They told him that they were traveling to Phoenix from Arkansas, 

where they had gone to look at a 1938 coupe. Trooper Aguilera observed 

that Malloy’s hand was shaking and thought that she appeared nervous;

indeed, Shaw jokingly told Malloy to relax. After Malloy located the 

insurance information on her phone and showed the screen to Trooper 

Aguilera, the trooper asked Malloy for her identification. As Malloy located 

her driver’s license, Shaw again told her to relax. Trooper Aguilera took 

their licenses and the registration back to his patrol vehicle.
STATE v. MALLOY

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¶4 In his patrol vehicle, Trooper Aguilera checked the stopped 

vehicle’s information. He learned it had no lien and had been registered 

within the previous six months—which he viewed as significant because

“[a] lot of times with criminal activity or potential drug trafficking, vehicles 

are fairly newly registered and they don’t have liens.” He also learned the 

vehicle had crossed over the Mexican border a few times, as recently as the 

month before. After concluding the checks, Trooper Aguilera prepared a 

traffic warning.

¶5 Trooper Aguilera returned to Shaw and Malloy, informed 

them that he was issuing a warning, and asked Shaw to step out of the 

vehicle to sign the warning—the only task left for its completion. As Shaw 

exited, Malloy asked Trooper Aguilera how old he was. Trooper Aguilera 

answered that question and then asked Malloy several questions about the

pair’s trip to Arkansas. In response, Malloy stated that she and Shaw had 

stayed “two or three days” in Arkansas and that the trip had taken “a 

while.” She further stated that Shaw had gone to look at the 1938 coupe 

with his friend. In Trooper Aguilera’s opinion, Malloy still appeared to be 

nervous.

¶6 Trooper Aguilera left Malloy and walked back to Shaw, who 

was waiting by the patrol vehicle along with one uniformed and two plainclothes law enforcement officers. After removing his computer from the 

patrol vehicle, Trooper Aguilera spoke to Shaw, first telling him the basis

for the traffic warning and next asking him several questions about the trip 

to Arkansas. In response, Shaw stated that they had traveled to see a 1932

coupe, that they had stayed in a hotel and he thought it was a Super 8 but 

was not sure, and that they had no friends or family in Arkansas.

¶7 Trooper Aguilera then handed Shaw the computer and 

directed him to sign the warning on the screen. After Shaw signed and 

returned the computer, Trooper Aguilera manipulated it while telling Shaw

that he would print the warning. Trooper Aguilera then asked Shaw if 

there was anything illegal in the vehicle. Shaw said no. Trooper Aguilera 

asked Shaw for consent to search the vehicle, and Shaw responded the 

trooper would have to talk to Malloy. Shaw did, however, consent to a 

search of his own bags within the vehicle. At this point, approximately 

eleven minutes had elapsed since Trooper Aguilera initiated the roadside 

stop.

¶8 Trooper Aguilera left Shaw at the patrol vehicle and 

approached Malloy, who was still sitting in the stopped vehicle. He asked 

her if there was anything illegal in the vehicle, and she said no. He then 
STATE v. MALLOY

Decision of the Court

4

asked her for consent to search the vehicle, and she said no. He next asked 

if she would allow him to “just run a dog around it,” and she agreed.

¶9 Trooper Aguilera returned to his vehicle and radioed for a 

canine officer. He then informed Shaw, who was still waiting by the patrol 

car, that Malloy had consented to a dog sniff and that he had a dog coming. 

Shaw asked if he could return to his vehicle, and Trooper Aguilera agreed

but advised him, “Don’t drive off or nothing, ‘cause I still got your ID and 

all that.” Trooper Aguilera then promptly collected the warning printout, 

the registration, and the driver’s licenses, and returned them to Shaw and 

Malloy in their vehicle. As he did so, he advised Shaw and Malloy that he

had a dog coming.

¶10 Approximately fifteen minutes later, a canine officer arrived. 

Less than two minutes later, the dog sniff began. The dog ultimately alerted 

to the presence of drugs. Law enforcement searched the vehicle and 

discovered that a purse in the front passenger seat held multiple syringes

as well as substances consistent with illegal drugs.

¶11 Malloy moved to suppress the physical evidence on the 

ground that Trooper Aguilera’s request that Shaw exit his vehicle

unlawfully prolonged the traffic stop beyond the time reasonably required 

for its completion. The superior court denied the motion, concluding that 

Malloy freely and voluntarily consented to the dog sniff. In so concluding, 

the court found, contrary to the record, that Trooper Aguilera had “handed 

back the paperwork” before asking Shaw for consent.

DISCUSSION

¶12 We review the denial of a motion to suppress with deference 

to the superior court’s factual findings, including its findings on credibility, 

but we review de novo mixed questions of law and fact and the court’s 

ultimate legal conclusion as to whether an investigative detention was 

warranted and of reasonable duration. State v. Teagle, 217 Ariz. 17, 22, ¶ 19 

(App. 2007). We independently review the body-camera footage of the 

encounter that Malloy provided at the suppression hearing. See State v. 

Sweeney, 224 Ariz. 107, 111, ¶ 12 (App. 2010).

¶13 Law enforcement may detain a vehicle and its occupants 

pending inquiry into a traffic violation. Arizona v. Johnson, 555 U.S. 323, 327 

(2009). “Like a Terry stop, the tolerable duration of police inquiries in the 

traffic-stop context is determined by the seizure’s ‘mission’—to address the 

traffic violation that warranted the stop, and attend to related safety 

concerns.” Rodriguez v. United States, 575 U.S. 348, 354 (2015). As part of 
STATE v. MALLOY

Decision of the Court

5

the mission of the stop, an officer may perform such tasks as “checking the 

driver’s license, determining whether there are outstanding warrants 

against the driver, and inspecting the automobile’s registration and proof 

of insurance.” Id. at 355. But the officer’s authority for the stop “ends when 

tasks tied to the traffic infraction are—or reasonably should have been—

completed.” Id. at 354. So though the officer “may conduct certain 

unrelated checks during an otherwise lawful traffic stop,” he or she “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. “The 

seizure remains lawful only ‘so long as unrelated inquiries do not 

measurably extend the duration of the stop.’” Id. (quoting Johnson, 555 U.S. 

at 355). Once the mission of the traffic stop is or reasonably should be

completed, the officer must allow the vehicle’s occupants to continue on 

their way unless the encounter becomes consensual or the officer has

developed a reasonable and articulable suspicion of criminal activity. State 

v. Kjolsrud, 239 Ariz. 319, 322–23 (App. 2016) (citing Sweeney, 224 Ariz. at

112, ¶ 17).

¶14 Here, Trooper Aguilera’s observation that Shaw was 

speeding justified his detention of Shaw and Malloy and his requests for 

Shaw’s driver’s license, the vehicle’s registration, and the vehicle’s 

insurance information. His questions as he collected Shaw’s driver’s license 

and the vehicle information did not prolong the stop, and his request that 

Malloy provide her identification—a request with which she voluntarily 

complied—did not cause unreasonable delay. As Trooper Aguilera

checked the vehicle’s information, he learned that it had some 

characteristics consistent with drug trafficking: it had no liens; it was 

recently registered; and it had crossed the Mexican border several times, 

including the month before. He then prepared a traffic warning and asked 

Shaw to exit his vehicle to sign it.

¶15 Malloy contends that “[o]nce [Trooper Aguilera] ordered Mr. 

Shaw from the vehicle, it is clear that the Trooper was no longer attending 

to the original ‘mission’ of the traffic stop.” On this record,1 we must 

1 We note the incompleteness of the body-camera footage provided at 

the suppression hearing—there is an unexplained absence of audio in the 

footage during the entirety of the approximately six-minute period during 

which Trooper Aguilera sat in his patrol car, accompanied by an off-duty 

detention officer, conducting the checks on the stopped vehicle and 

preparing the warning. In view of the incomplete audio, the footage gives 

an incomplete picture of the circumstances surrounding Trooper Aguilera’s 
STATE v. MALLOY

Decision of the Court

6

disagree. Explaining the warning and obtaining Shaw’s signature was 

essential to the purpose of the stop. And though nothing in the record 

suggests that Trooper Aguilera could not have accomplished those tasks 

while Shaw remained seated, we detect no illegality in his decision to 

request that Shaw exit the car. Trooper Aguilera testified that during most 

stops he will ask the driver to exit, because:

[I]t gets them out so that I can have them sign my computer. 

It’s a very expensive computer which I don’t like handing into 

vehicles with a potential of somebody -- it getting dropped or 

somebody dragging off with it, and then it allows me to talk 

to the occupants a little bit more while we’re back there.

Contrary to the state’s contention, Trooper Aguilera’s testimony does not 

support the conclusion that he asked Shaw to exit as a human safety 

measure as permitted under Pennsylvania v. Mimms, 434 U.S. 106, 111 (1977). 

But the testimony does establish other grounds for Trooper Aguilera’s 

request, and we cannot say that those grounds were unreasonable. To be 

sure, we view Trooper Aguilera’s stated concern about the computer being 

dropped with some skepticism—after all, the body-camera footage shows

that he permitted Shaw to independently handle the computer over the 

roadside in light rain. And we are mindful that “removing the driver from 

the car to undertake further questioning falls into the category of a ‘detour’ 

from the mission of the underlying traffic stop.” Kjolsrud, 239 Ariz. at 323, 

¶ 14. But we must conclude that Trooper Aguilera’s concern that the 

computer could be “dragg[ed] off” if handed into the stopped vehicle was 

not unreasonable.

¶16 As Shaw exited the vehicle, Malloy asked Trooper Aguilera 

his age. Malloy’s spontaneous question invited any delay occasioned by 

Trooper Aguilera’s answer. Trooper Aguilera, however, did not stop at 

answering Malloy’s question—he continued to engage her in unrelated, 

albeit brief, conversation by asking her further questions about her trip. But 

even if Malloy’s inquiry could be said to have opened the door to Trooper 

Aguilera’s questions, we detect no justification for Trooper Aguilera’s 

request that Shaw exit the vehicle. Audio of the conversation—or the 

absence of conversation—between Trooper Aguilera and his companion 

would permit the court to more accurately evaluate the trooper’s 

motivation in his subsequent interactions with Shaw and Malloy. But 

Malloy, who offered the footage at the suppression hearing, appears never 

to have challenged its incompleteness. We therefore evaluate this case 

based on the record before us.
STATE v. MALLOY

Decision of the Court

7

subsequent questioning of Shaw—which, tellingly, he later admitted he 

had planned to engage in before she asked his age, “[j]ust to get a quick story 

of where they were coming from.” See Rodriguez, 575 U.S. at 356 

(recognizing that on-scene investigation into other crimes detours from the

mission of the traffic stop).

¶17 Trooper Aguilera testified that by the time he exited his patrol 

vehicle: “The warning was completed. I just needed a signature at that 

point.” Upon joining Shaw by the patrol vehicle, Trooper Aguilera 

removed his computer and told Shaw the basis for the warning. Explaining 

the warning was, of course, central to the mission of the stop. After Trooper 

Aguilera completed that explanation, however, the only stop-related tasks

that remained were to obtain Shaw’s signature and provide him with the 

warning and his documents. There existed no further justification to delay 

those easily accomplishable administrative tasks. But instead of 

immediately pursuing those tasks, Trooper Aguilera asked Shaw further 

questions about his trip. To be sure, those questions were brief and did not 

significantly extend the duration of what was, until that point, not an 

unreasonably long encounter. But the body-camera footage and the 

trooper’s testimony establish that there was no reason the stop should not

have been completed when Trooper Aguilera explained the warning. We 

hold that the questioning “measurably” and therefore unlawfully extended 

the stop. And the extension of the stop was no more consensual in this case 

than it was in Rodriguez. See 455 U.S. at 355; see also Kjolsrud, 239 Ariz. at 

322–23, ¶¶ 11–12, 14 (holding that when officer conceded that he could have 

concluded traffic stop after conducting records check, but nonetheless 

asked driver to exit vehicle for sole purpose of facilitating further 

investigatory conversation, officer took “detour” within meaning of 

Rodriguez that “amount[ed] to an additional seizure”).

¶18 Further, after Trooper Aguilera ultimately obtained Shaw’s 

signature—at which point the state concedes the mission of the traffic stop 

was complete—he immediately asked Shaw for consent to search. But he

did not first provide the warning or return the driver’s licenses and 

registration—a critical fact that the superior court misapprehended. By 

retaining the licenses and registration while asking for Shaw and Malloy’s 

consent, Trooper Aguilera ensured that they were not free to leave and 

continued their detention beyond the scope of the traffic stop.

¶19 The continued detention was not supported by consent or 

independent reasonable suspicion of criminal activity. Malloy’s consent to 

the dog sniff (which was not even required) did not amount to consent to 

prolonged detention. Though “[r]easonable suspicion is something short 
STATE v. MALLOY

Decision of the Court

8

of probable cause, . . . it must be more than an ‘inchoate and 

unparticularized suspicion or “hunch.”’” Sweeney, 224 Ariz. at 112, ¶ 21

(quoting United States v. Sokolow, 490 U.S. 1, 7 (1989)). An officer must have 

“some minimal, objective justification for the detention.” Id. Though we 

must consider the totality of the circumstances, including the officer’s 

knowledge, experience, and training, “circumstances that do not reliably 

distinguish between suspect and innocent behaviors are insufficient to 

establish reasonable suspicion because they may cast too wide a net and 

subject all travelers to ‘virtually random seizures.’” Id. at 112–13, ¶ 22.

¶20 The state places great weight on Malloy’s nervousness as 

supporting a reasonable suspicion of criminal activity. Though the state 

concedes that “[o]ften a person’s nervousness is not a particularly weighty 

factor in determining whether a reasonable suspicion exists,” it contends

that Shaw’s comments during the stop about Malloy’s nervousness 

“confirmed that Malloy was exceptionally nervous.” We cannot agree with 

the state’s contention.

¶21 Trooper Aguilera’s assessment that Malloy was “nervous” is 

supported by the body-camera footage, which shows that her hand was 

shaking and that Shaw told her jokingly twice to calm down. But we detect 

no objective indicia of “exceptional” nervousness in the footage. Next, with 

respect to the information that Trooper Aguilera learned during the records 

check—i.e., that the vehicle had some characteristics consistent with drug

trafficking—the state concedes, and we agree, that the information is of 

“minimal weight.” The fact that a paid-off vehicle recently registered in 

Arizona has crossed the Mexican border several times is not a reliable 

indicator of criminal activity. Similarly, despite the state’s contention to the 

contrary, the fact that a person has chosen to drive rather than fly when 

taking a short, limited-purpose trip to a distant destination is not a reliable 

indicator of criminal activity. The state finally points out that Shaw 

stammered when Trooper Aguilera first asked the couple where they were 

traveling from, and that Malloy was vague when she later described the 

trip’s duration and travel time. But though these facts, combined with the 

totality of the other circumstances, may have been sufficient to support

some level of unparticularized suspicion of criminal activity, we hold that 

they were insufficient to establish reasonable suspicion.2 Cf. Sweeney, 224 

2 We further note that even if we considered the information obtained 

during the unlawful questioning of Shaw at the patrol car, the facts were 

insufficient to create reasonable suspicion. The additional information was: 

Shaw identified the vehicle the couple claimed to have traveled to see by a 
STATE v. MALLOY

Decision of the Court

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Ariz. at 113, ¶ 24 (“A reasonably prudent person’s suspicions would not be 

raised after observing a foreign national driving a clean, deodorized rental 

car with an atlas on the passenger seat, who upon being stopped and 

questioned outside in the three-degree weather by the police, failed to 

articulate with specificity the places he had visited while staying in an 

unfamiliar city. A holding to the contrary would subject nearly everyone 

to a continued, intrusive detention following a routine traffic stop.”).

¶22 It was in the context of the unlawful detention that Trooper 

Aguilera obtained Shaw’s consent to a search of his bags and Malloy’s 

consent to a dog sniff of the vehicle. We therefore must decide whether the 

unlawful detention invalidated the consent. “Evidence seized following 

consent to a search must be suppressed if the consent is tainted by a prior

constitutional violation.” State v. Guillen, 223 Ariz. 314, 317, ¶ 13 (2010); see 

also Florida v. Royer, 460 U.S. 491, 507–08 (1983) (“Because we affirm the . . . 

conclusion that Royer was being illegally detained when he consented to 

the search of his luggage, we agree that the consent was tainted by the 

illegality and was ineffective to justify the search.”). “Even assuming 

voluntary consent, ‘the evidence found as a result of that consent must be 

suppressed if the unconstitutional conduct . . . is not sufficiently attenuated 

from the subsequent seizure.’” State v. Monge, 173 Ariz. 279, 281 (1992). 

Attenuation is measured by: “(1) the time elapsed between the illegality and 

the acquisition of the evidence; (2) the presence of intervening 

circumstances; and (3) ‘particularly, the purpose and flagrancy of the 

official misconduct.’” Guillen, 223 Ariz. at 317, ¶ 14 (quoting Brown v. 

Illinois, 422 U.S. 590, 603–04 (1975)). The third factor is the most important. 

See State v. Hummons, 227 Ariz. 78, 81, ¶ 14 (2011). “Factors such as an 

officer’s regular practices and routines, an officer’s reason for initiating the 

encounter, the clarity of the law forbidding the illegal conduct, and the 

slightly different year than previously stated; Shaw said the couple had no 

family or friends in Arkansas, whereas Malloy had said Shaw viewed the 

vehicle with a friend; and Shaw could not remember the name of the hotel

where the couple had stayed. Innocent travelers may well misstate a 

vehicle model year and fail to recall the name of a hotel, and Shaw’s 

statement that the couple had no family or friends in Arkansas was not 

necessarily inconsistent with Malloy’s statement that he had seen the 

vehicle with a friend. Moreover, even viewing the vagueness and 

inconsistencies in Shaw’s statements as creating further grounds to suspect 

criminal activity, we cannot say that the totality of the facts supported 

reasonable suspicion.
STATE v. MALLOY

Decision of the Court

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objective appearance of consent may all be important in this inquiry.” Id. 

at 82, ¶ 14.

¶23 We hold that even if Shaw and Malloy’s consent was 

voluntary, their consent was tainted by the unlawful detention because the 

detention was not sufficiently attenuated from the seizure. The time 

elapsed was short, and there were no intervening circumstances. 

Moreover, though the incomplete record prevents a fulsome evaluation of

Trooper Aguilera’s motives, the law clearly forbade his extension of the 

detention both when he asked further questions of Shaw and when he 

asked for the consent. Further, his testimony tends to support the 

conclusion that he deliberately extended the detention for the purpose of 

conducting an investigation separate from the traffic stop—he testified that 

his customary request that drivers exit their vehicles is at least partially 

based on his desire to “talk to the occupants a little bit more,” and he 

testified that he intended to ask Malloy questions about her trip even before 

she asked his age.

¶24 Contrary to the dissent’s view, we do not adopt a novel 

standard here about precluding officers from talking to drivers when they 

are issuing a warning or citation. Instead, we apply well-established 

principles that (1) a driver must be allowed to leave when the mission for 

the stop has, or should have been, completed; and (2) after that point, the 

stop cannot be prolonged unless the encounter becomes consensual or 

reasonable suspicion of criminal activity justifies continued detention. See

Kjolsrud, 239 Ariz. at 322–23, ¶ 10. Similar to the dissent, the state attempts 

to justify the continued detention because it was brief and not 

unreasonable, essentially asking us to conclude that any excessive delay 

caused by Trooper Aguilera’s questions that occurred after the stop should 

have been completed was de minimis. We decline to do so because that 

position was rejected in Rodriguez. See Rodriguez, 455 U.S. at 355 (holding 

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”).

CONCLUSION

¶25 Trooper Aguilera unlawfully prolonged the detention 

occasioned by the traffic stop both when he questioned Shaw about 

unrelated matters before permitting him to sign the warning and when he 

asked Shaw and Malloy for consent to search after obtaining Shaw’s 

signature but before returning the couple’s driver’s licenses and the vehicle 

registration. Both Shaw and Malloy’s consents were tainted by the 
STATE v. MALLOY

Decision of the Court

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unlawful detention. We therefore reverse the superior court’s denial of 

Malloy’s motion to suppress, and we remand for all necessary further 

proceedings.

W I L L I A M S, Judge, dissenting:

¶26 The majority summarizes nicely the facts in the record before 

us, and accurately notes, supra ¶ 12, that this court gives “deference to the 

superior court’s factual findings,” so long, of course, as they are 

“reasonably supported by the evidence.” State v. Adair, 241 Ariz. 58, 60, ¶ 9 

(2016). Relying upon State v. Sweeney, 224 Ariz. 107, 111, ¶ 12 (App. 2010), 

the majority also states that this court “independently review[s] the bodycamera footage of the encounter that Malloy provided at the suppression 

hearing.” And while I don’t disagree with that statement, I think it is worth 

noting, for clarity, that this court only does so, as with all record evidence, 

to determine whether the superior court’s factual findings are, again, 

“reasonably supported by the evidence.” Adair, 241 Ariz. at 60, ¶ 9. In other 

words, nothing about Sweeney addressed, or changed, our review of video 

evidence from deferential to de novo. 

¶27 The dispositive issue before us is whether the Trooper’s 

actions impermissibly extended the traffic stop beyond the time needed to 

reasonably complete his mission. See Rodriguez v. United States, 575 U.S. 348, 

357 (2015); Illinois v. Caballes, 543 U.S. 405, 408 (2005). The majority’s view is 

that, up until the Trooper asked Shaw to exit Malloy’s vehicle and sign the 

warning while standing outside of the Trooper’s vehicle, the traffic stop had

“not [been] an unreasonably long encounter.” I agree. And I agree with the 

majority that the Trooper’s “further questions about [Shaw’s] trip” after 

signing the warning “did not significantly extend the duration” of the 

traffic stop. But I disagree with the majority’s view that the traffic stop 

became unlawful when the Trooper questioned Shaw after Shaw had 

signed the warning because the Trooper did not “first provide the warning 

or return the driver’s licenses and registration” before asking for consent to 

search the vehicle.

¶28 A review of the video recording shows that the Trooper first 

made contact with Shaw and Malloy seventeen seconds after initiating the 

traffic stop. Ten minutes and twenty seven seconds later, Shaw signed the 

warning on the Trooper’s handheld computer. But the warning still needed 

to be printed and given to Shaw, and the licenses and registration needed 

to be returned to Shaw and Malloy. As the warning was being printed, the 
STATE v. MALLOY

Williams, J., dissenting

12

Trooper began asking Shaw a few more questions. It is not clear from the 

video recording, nor from other record evidence, at what point the warning 

had finished printing and was ready to be handed to Shaw. Indeed, the 

court does not make any factual finding regarding the same. But it is clear 

that the Trooper’s questions to Shaw lasted a matter of seconds, not 

minutes, and began to be asked while the warning was printing. Shaw 

voluntarily answered those questions. Thirty seconds after signing the 

warning, when the Trooper asked to search the vehicle, Shaw directed the

Trooper to inquire of Malloy. Ten seconds later, Shaw consented to a search 

of his belongings. Malloy, similarly, within seconds of being asked, 

consented to a K-9 exterior sniff of her vehicle. 

¶29 The court found that once Shaw signed the warning, “[Shaw] 

was asked for consent to search,” and “did give the [Trooper] consent to 

search [his] belongings within the car.” Shaw also directed the Trooper to 

Malloy, “who was the owner of the car . . . for permission to search [the 

car].” These findings are reasonably supported by the record. The court also 

found that “the body cam video clearly shows that consent was freely and 

voluntarily given, without any illegal show of force.” That finding is also 

reasonably supported by the record evidence and, in my view, one this 

court should give deference to. See, e.g. Teagle, 217 Ariz. at 22, ¶ 19; see also 

State v. Rodriguez, 1 CA-CR 18-0127, 2019 WL 1785298, at *3, ¶ 14 (Ariz. App. 

Apr. 23, 2019) (mem. decision) (“But an officer’s brief questioning after 

issuing a traffic violation warning can be a permissible consensual 

encounter if the driver agrees to answer questions.”).

¶30 It is also well settled that there is no hard and fast limit for 

gauging the reasonableness of length of the detention. United States v. 

Sharpe, 470 U.S. 675, 686 (1985) (noting United States v. Place, 462 U.S. 696 

(1983) “expressly rejected the suggestion that we adopt a hard-and-fast time 

limit for a permissible Terry stop.”). In my view, the majority’s approach

promotes a standard that law enforcement officers are now somehow 

precluded from continuing to converse with a driver once the driver has 

signed a warning if the printed warning, license, and registration have not 

first been returned to a driver. This is novel. And the majority’s conclusion 

that the Trooper “measurably” extended an otherwise “not [] unreasonably 

long encounter” by asking a few, brief follow up questions, which began 

while the warning was being printed, that lasted a matter of seconds, and 

which were voluntarily answered, is, in my view, at odds with

longstanding caselaw defining Fourth Amendment violations as those 

which are prolonged beyond the time reasonably required to complete a 

traffic mission. See Rodriguez, 575 U.S. at 349 (2015) (“Authority for the 

seizure ends when tasks tied to the traffic infraction are—or reasonably 
STATE v. MALLOY

Williams, J., dissenting

13

should have been—completed.”) (emphasis added); see also Caballes, 543 U.S. 

at 408 (2005) (holding that a traffic stop “become[s] unlawful if it is 

prolonged beyond the time reasonably required to complete th[e] mission” 

of the traffic stop) (emphasis added). While I agree that questions lasting 

only seconds, as were asked here, can be “measured” in time, I do not 

believe the superior court’s factual findings that the encounter became 

consensual should be so easily set aside by this court on this record.

¶31 In my view, the superior court’s order denying Malloy’s 

motion to suppress should be affirmed.