REVISED May 9, 2017

IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT

No. 16-40817

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, 

 Plaintiff–Appellee, 

v. 

CECILIO ANTONIO BROCA-MARTINEZ, 

 Defendant–Appellant. 

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Southern District of Texas 

Before KING, JOLLY, and PRADO, Circuit Judges. 

EDWARD C. PRADO, Circuit Judge: 

Defendant–Appellant Cecilio Broca-Martinez appeals the district court’s 

denial of his motion to suppress. While on patrol in December 2015, Officer 

Juan Leal began following Broca-Martinez’s vehicle because it matched a 

description Homeland Security agents had provided the Laredo Police 

Department (“LPD”). Officer Leal stopped Broca-Martinez after a computer 

search indicated the vehicle’s insurance status was “unconfirmed.” The stop 

led to the discovery that Broca-Martinez was in the country illegally and that 

he was harboring undocumented immigrants at his residence. Broca-Martinez 

United States Court of Appeals

Fifth Circuit

FILED

April 28, 2017

Lyle W. Cayce

Clerk
No. 16-40817

2 

entered a conditional guilty plea to one count of conspiracy to transport 

undocumented aliens in violation of 8 U.S.C. § 1324. On appeal, he contends 

that there was no reasonable suspicion justifying the initial stop. Because we 

find there was reasonable suspicion, we AFFIRM.

I. BACKGROUND 

On December 2, 2015, Broca-Martinez was stopped by Officer Leal in 

Laredo, Texas. That day, Homeland Security Investigations (“HSI”) received a 

tip that undocumented immigrants were being housed at a residence on

Zacatecas Avenue in Laredo. While surveilling the residence, HSI agents saw 

two men leave and enter a gray Nissan Altima. HSI subsequently notified the 

LPD to have its officers “be on the lookout” for the vehicle. After receiving a 

radio transmission to “be on the lookout” for this vehicle, Officer Leal saw an 

Altima that matched the description. He followed the vehicle and entered its 

license plate number into an “in-vehicle computer” database designed to return 

vehicle information such as insurance status. The computer indicated the 

insurance status was “unconfirmed.” Based on his experience using this 

system, Officer Leal concluded that the vehicle was likely uninsured—a 

violation of Texas’s driver financial responsibility law. Official Leal then 

stopped the vehicle. After being stopped, Broca-Martinez gave his name to 

Officer Leal and admitted he was in the United States illegally. While they 

waited for HSI agents to arrive, Officer Leal issued Broca-Martinez a citation 

for violating the insurance requirement and driving without a license. 

When HSI agents arrived, they interviewed Broca-Martinez. The agents 

obtained verbal consent from Broca-Martinez to search the Zacatecas Avenue 

residence, where fourteen undocumented immigrants were being sheltered. On 

December 22, 2015, Broca-Martinez was indicted by a grand jury on three 

counts of conspiring to harbor illegal aliens in violation of 8 U.S.C. § 1324.

Broca-Martinez filed a motion to suppress evidence on January 25, 2016. He 
No. 16-40817

3 

argued there was no reasonable suspicion justifying the initial stop and that 

the exclusionary rule barred all evidence obtained as a result of the stop.1

Officer Leal testified to the following at a hearing on the motion to 

suppress: At the time of the stop, Leal knew the radio-transmission instruction 

involved a Homeland Security investigation but was unaware of any details. 

Upon seeing a vehicle that matched the given description, he ran the “license 

plates through what is called the NCIC/TCIC system, which gives a return on 

the vehicle, make, model, [and] year” as well as “a VIN number” and “a 

confirmation to see if the vehicle is insured.” Officer Leal has in the past 

“performed multiple traffic stops for vehicles not having insurance” and was 

familiar with the Texas law requiring drivers to have liability insurance. Leal 

did not stop the vehicle because of Broca-Martinez’s undocumented status—a 

fact he did not know—but because he believed Broca-Martinez was uninsured. 

He explained that when he types a license plate number into the NCIC/TCIC 

system, it will either report “insurance confirmed” or “unconfirmed,” and after 

getting a response he knows, “with the knowledge and experience of working,” 

whether the vehicle is uninsured. 

During the stop, Officer Leal did not ask for proof of insurance. He stated 

that he “already knew that the vehicle wasn’t insured” based on the 

“unconfirmed” status generated by the computer. However, the district court 

questioned why Officer Leal did not seek to confirm the computer’s report, 

asking specifically whether “reports are sometimes inaccurate.” Leal 

responded: “For the most part, no.” Later, Broca-Martinez’s attorney pressed 

Officer Leal on the “unconfirmed” status: 

 

1 In a separate motion, Broca-Martinez raised a Miranda violation. The district court 

denied both motions to suppress. However, Broca-Martinez does not address the Miranda

issue in his brief. 
No. 16-40817

4 

Q: Officer Leal, you said that the information you got on the insurance 

is that it was unconfirmed? 

A: Yes. 

Q: So, in other words, he could have or not have insurance, correct? 

A: No. 

Q: It’s unconfirmed? 

A: Yes. 

The district court denied Broca-Martinez’s motion to suppress. BrocaMartinez entered a conditional plea to one count of conspiracy to transport 

undocumented aliens in violation of 8 U.S.C. § 1324. Broca-Martinez preserved 

his right to appeal the district court’s denial of his motion to suppress. On June 

8, 2016, Broca-Martinez was sentenced to twelve months and one day 

imprisonment. He timely appealed. 

II. STANDARD OF REVIEW AND JURISDICTION 

“In reviewing a district court’s denial of a motion to suppress, we review 

the district court’s findings of fact for clear error and its conclusions of law de 

novo.” United States v. Lopez-Moreno, 420 F.3d 420, 429 (5th Cir. 2005). 

“Whether an officer had reasonable suspicion to support a stop is treated as a 

question of law.” United States v. Castillo, 804 F.3d 361, 364 (5th Cir. 2015). 

Nonetheless, this Court views the evidence “in the light most favorable to the 

prevailing party in the district court—in this case, the Government.” Id. The 

district court had jurisdiction under 18 U.S.C. § 3231, and this Court has 

appellate jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1291.

III. DISCUSSION 

Under Texas law, “[a] person may not operate a motor vehicle in [Texas] 

unless financial responsibility is established for that vehicle through” either a 

“motor vehicle liability insurance policy” or other means such a surety bond, a 

deposit, or self-insurance. Tex. Transp. Code Ann. § 601.051. Violating this 

statute is a misdemeanor. Id. § 601.191. At issue in this case is whether Officer 
No. 16-40817

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Leal had reasonable suspicion that Broca-Martinez was in violation of this 

statute.2 

The Fourth Amendment protects individuals against warrantless 

searches and seizures. U.S. Const. amend. IV. It “applies to seizures of the 

person, including brief investigatory stops such as the stop of the vehicle here.” 

United States v. Cortez, 449 U.S. 411, 417 (1981). When a vehicle is stopped, 

the officer “must have a particularized and objective basis for suspecting the 

particular person stopped of criminal activity.” Id. at 417–18. This “reasonable 

suspicion exists “when the officer can point to specific and articulable facts 

which, taken together with rational inferences from those facts, reasonably 

warrant the search and seizure.” Lopez-Moreno, 420 F.3d at 430. And while the 

officer must have more than a “mere hunch” that the person stopped is engaged 

in illegal activity, “reasonable suspicion need not rise to the level of probable 

cause.” Id. Indeed, it requires only “‘some minimal level of objective 

justification’ for making the stop.” Castillo, 804 F.3d at 367 (quoting United 

States v. Sokolow, 490 U.S. 1, 7 (1989)). 

We have not yet addressed whether a state computer database indication 

of insurance status may establish reasonable suspicion. However, several other 

circuits have found that such information may give rise to reasonable suspicion 

as long as there is either some evidence suggesting the database is reliable or 

at least an absence of evidence that it is unreliable. 

In United States v. Cortez-Galaviz, 495 F.3d 1203 (10th Cir. 2007), the 

Tenth Circuit encountered similar facts and affirmed the denial of a motion to 

suppress. Id. at 1204. In that case, a Drug Enforcement Agency agent stopped 

a vehicle after inputting its license plate information into a computer database 

 

2 Broca-Martinez acknowledges that the only reason for the stop was a traffic violation 

and that Officer Leal “had no information regarding any suspicion of any criminal activity by 

the passengers” in the vehicle. 
No. 16-40817

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and receiving the following notification: “INSURED/Not Found: AS 

OF/9/30/2005 Recommend request proof of insurance.” Id. The court found this 

information was “particularized and objective” and “suggestive of a traffic 

violation.” Id. at 1206. While acknowledging that the message “did not as 

definitively indicate criminal activity as a ‘no’ response,” it also did not “equate 

to an exculpatory ‘yes,’ and the suggestive ambiguity of the particularized and 

objective information [the officer] had at hand justified his decision to warrant 

a brief traffic stop.” Id. Like Broca-Martinez, the defendant in Cortez-Galaviz

argued that the stop was not justified because there were alternative means of 

complying with the state insurance law. Id. at 1207. But the Tenth Circuit 

found that argument “overstate[d] the requirements for reasonable suspicion 

under the Fourth Amendment.” Id; see also United States v. MirandaSotolongo, 827 F.3d 663, 669 (7th Cir. 2016) (“Reasonable suspicion . . . does 

not require the officer to rule out all innocent explanations of what he sees.”). 

Additionally, although the defendant in Cortez-Galaviz challenged the 

reliability of the computer database, the court found limited evidence of 

unreliability, especially when viewed in the light most favorable to the 

government. 495 F.3d at 1208.

By contrast, the Tenth Circuit reached a different conclusion in United 

States v. Esquivel-Rios, 725 F.3d 1231 (10th Cir. 2013), where there was 

evidence the database was unreliable. In that case, a Colorado state trooper 

stopped a vehicle after inquiring into the validity of its temporary registration 

tag. Id. at 1234. Even though the tag “looked genuine,” the trooper “called in 

the tag number to a dispatcher who soon replied ‘that’s a negatory on record, 

not returning.’” Id. The trooper stopped the vehicle solely based on that 

information and found illegal drugs after obtaining consent for a search. Id. at 

1234–35. On appeal, the Tenth Circuit found this case distinguishable from 

Cortez-Galaviz and other cases in which “the record suggested no reason to 
No. 16-40817

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worry about the database’s reliability.” Id. at 1235. Here, the dispatcher 

provided critical testimony that “Colorado temp tags usually don’t return,” 

which the court regarded as “a piece of evidence our cases haven’t confronted 

before: evidence admitted by a district court suggesting that the database on 

which the officer relied to justify his stop might bear a real problem.” Id. 

(emphasis in original). 

Cases from the Seventh, Sixth, and Eighth Circuits confronting similar 

fact patterns are generally consistent with the reasoning in Cortez-Galaviz and 

Esquivel-Rios. See Miranda-Sotolongo, 827 F.3d at 671 (finding reasonable 

suspicion established when the database showed no vehicle registration record, 

“at least in the absence of evidence that [the officer] could not reasonably rely 

on the absence of a registration record to support an investigative stop”); 

United States v. Sandridge, 385 F.3d 1032, 1036 (6th Cir. 2004) (concluding 

there was reasonable suspicion for a stop when license plate check three weeks 

prior had indicated the driver was driving without a valid license); United 

States v. Stephens, 350 F.3d 778, 779 (8th Cir. 2003) (holding that when 

database check showed license plates were “not on file,” there was reasonable 

suspicion to stop the vehicle).3 

Broca-Martinez relies only on state court cases to support his argument. 

See Gonzalez-Gilando v. State, 306 S.W.3d 893, 896–97 (Tex. App.—Amarillo 

 

3 A district court in Texas also recently found reasonable suspicion for a vehicle stop 

when a computer database search returned an “unconfirmed” insurance status. United States 

v. Vela, No. 2:15-CR-429, 2016 WL 305219, at *1–2 (S.D. Tex. Jan. 25, 2016). In that case, an 

officer typed the vehicle’s license plate into a Mobile Data Terminal (“MDT”) to determine 

insurance status and received the “unconfirmed” notification. Id. at *1. At a hearing on the 

motion to suppress, two officers “testified that they regularly use[d] the MDT to determine if 

a vehicle is insured, and such a search will result in either a ‘confirmed’ or an ‘unconfirmed’ 

insurance status.” Id. They further testified that “[i]n their experience, 80% to 85% of the 

vehicles that have an ‘unconfirmed’ insurance status do not have valid insurance” and that 

while “unconfirmed” occasionally means the vehicle was insured very recently, the database 

was generally accurate and reliable. Id.
No. 16-40817

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2010, pet. ref’d) (finding database information insufficient to establish 

reasonable suspicion because there was no “evidence developing the source of 

the information comprising the database, explaining what was meant when 

insurance information was unavailable, . . . [or] illustrating the accuracy of the 

database”); State v. Daniel, 446 S.W.3d 809, 815 (Tex. App.—San Antonio 2014, 

no pet.); Contraras v. State, 309 S.W.3d 168, 173 (Tex. App.—Amarillo 2010, 

pet. ref’d).4 But although states may “impos[e] more stringent constraints on 

police conduct than does the Federal Constitution,” this does not dictate our 

Fourth Amendment analysis. California v. Greenwood, 486 U.S. 35, 43 (1988). 

Even so, Broca-Martinez’s case is distinguishable from Gonzalez-Gilando; 

here, there was testimony regarding Officer Leal’s experience with the 

database and suggesting the system was reliable. 

We agree with the other circuits that have confronted this question. A 

state computer database indication of insurance status may establish 

reasonable suspicion when the officer is familiar with the database and the 

system itself is reliable. If that is the case, a seemingly inconclusive report such 

as “unconfirmed” will be a specific and articulable fact that supports a traffic 

stop. Lopez-Moreno, 420 F.3d at 430. Viewed in the light most favorable to the 

government, Officer Leal’s testimony provides sufficient support for the 

reliability of the database. Officer Leal explained the process for inputting 

license plate information, described how records in the database are kept, and 

noted that he was familiar with these records. He explained that “with the 

 

4 Notably, some unpublished state court opinions have declined to follow GonzalezGilando and favor the government’s position. See Swadley v. State, No. 02-15-00085-CR, 2016 

WL 7241564, at *6 (Tex. App.—Fort Worth Dec. 15, 2016, no pet.) (mem. op., not designated 

for publication); Tellez v. State, No. 09-10-00348-CR, 2011 WL 3925627, at *3 (Tex. App.—

Beaumont Aug. 14, 2011, no pet.) (mem. op., not designated for publication); Short v. State, 

No. 09-10-00489-CR, 2011 WL 3505611, at *3 (Tex. App.—Beaumont Aug. 10, 2011, no pet.) 

(mem. op., not designated for publication). 
No. 16-40817

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knowledge and experience of working,” he knows the vehicle is uninsured when 

an “unconfirmed” status appears because the computer system will either 

return an “insurance confirmed” or “unconfirmed” response. When BrocaMartinez’s attorney questioned the system’s reliability, Officer Leal confirmed 

that it was usually accurate. (“Q: So, in other words, he could have or not have 

insurance, correct? A: No.”) (“Q: You asked him for his insurance? A: Not that 

I recall. I already knew that the vehicle wasn’t insured.”) (“Q: I mean reports 

are sometimes inaccurate, right? A: For the most part, no.”). 

Even if Officer Leal was not positive Broca-Martinez was uninsured, he 

cleared the bar for reasonable suspicion. An officer does not have to be certain 

a violation has occurred. See Castillo, 804 F.3d at 366. “This would raise the 

standard for reasonable suspicion far above probable cause or even a 

preponderance of the evidence, in contravention of the Supreme Court’s 

instructions.” Id. 

IV. CONCLUSION 

For the foregoing reasons, we AFFIRM the denial of Broca-Martinez’s 

motion to suppress and AFFIRM Broca-Martinez’s conviction and sentence.