Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/14pdf/13-9972_p8k0.pdf
Page Number: 21.0

8 

RODRIGUEZ v. UNITED STATES 

THOMAS, J., dissenting 

207–208  (1979).    This  Court  created  an  exception  to  that 
rule in Terry v. Ohio, 392 U. S. 1 (1968), permitting “police 
officers  who  suspect  criminal  activity  to  make  limited
intrusions  on  an  individual’s  personal  security  based  on
less than probable cause,” Michigan v. Summers, 452 U. S. 
692,  698  (1981).  Reasonable  suspicion  is  the  justification 
for such seizures.  Prado Navarette v. California, 572 U. S. 
___, ___ (2014) (slip op., at 3). 

Traffic stops can be initiated based on probable cause or
reasonable suspicion.  Although the Court has commented 
that a routine traffic stop is “more analogous to a so-called 
‘Terry  stop’  than  to  a  formal  arrest,”  it  has  rejected  the 
notion  “that  a  traffic  stop  supported  by  probable  cause
may not exceed the bounds set by the Fourth Amendment
on  the  scope  of  a  Terry  stop.”  Berkemer  v.  McCarty,  468 
U. S. 420, 439, and n. 29 (1984) (citation omitted).

Although  all  traffic  stops  must  be  executed  reasonably,
our  precedents  make  clear  that  traffic  stops  justified  by 
reasonable  suspicion  are  subject  to  additional  limitations
that  those  justified  by  probable  cause  are  not.    A  traffic 
stop  based  on  reasonable  suspicion,  like  all  Terry  stops,
must be “justified at its inception” and “reasonably related 
in scope to the circumstances which justified the interfer-
ence in the first place.”  Hiibel, 542 U. S., at 185 (internal 
quotation marks omitted).  It also “cannot continue for an 
excessive  period  of  time  or  resemble  a  traditional  arrest.” 
Id.,  at  185–186  (citation  omitted).    By  contrast,  a  stop 
based  on  probable  cause  affords  an  officer  considerably 
more leeway.  In such seizures, an officer may engage in a
warrantless  arrest  of  the  driver,  Atwater,  532  U. S.,  at 
354, a warrantless search incident to arrest of the driver, 
Riley v. California, 573 U. S. ___, ___ (2014) (slip op., at 5),
and a warrantless search incident to arrest  of the vehicle 
if it is reasonable to believe evidence relevant to the crime 
of arrest might be found there, Arizona v. Gant, 556 U. S. 
332, 335 (2009).