Opinion ID: 1965108
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: the facts of the stop

Text: [¶ 24] Barbara Kremen was stopped for speeding shortly after noon on August 15, 1997. The stop was only for speeding. The officer saw no erratic operation or other suspicious activity in the vehicle. The record indicates no issue that would have given the officer any reason to require the vehicle's occupants to leave the vehicle due to concerns regarding the officer's safety or the occupants' safety. However, the officer did not engage in the common practice of leaving the driver in the vehicle while he returned to his vehicle to check license status and write a ticket. Instead, he ordered Ms. Kremen to exit her vehicle and accompany him back to the front seat of his vehicle. The officer then finished all of the paperwork incident to the traffic stop and issued the speeding ticket to Ms. Kremen. The transaction regarding the traffic stop was completed. However, the officer did not release Ms. Kremen from his vehicle and tell her she was free to go. Instead, he began questioning her as to whether there might be anything illegal in her vehicle. At this point, the testimony presented by Ms. Kremen and the officer diverge. Ms. Kremen testified that the officer threatened to jail her if she did not give consent to search. The officer testified that Ms. Kremen's consent to search was entirely voluntary. Ms. Kremen also testified that she specifically objected to a search of the front compartment of her vehicle, although the officer testified that the search of the front compartment was consented to. To challenge the officer's credibility, the defense presented evidence that the officer had plead guilty to four counts of crimes involving dishonestyillegally tagging deerin 1992. The search of the front compartment of the vehicle yielded the marijuana and marijuana pipe which led to the possession of marijuana charge. [¶ 25] In its order denying the motion to suppress, the District Court indicated that it believed the officer's testimony over Ms. Kremen's testimony on the question of whether the officer had threatened to jail Ms. Kremen in order to extract her consent to search. The court did not proceed to examine the other circumstances of the stop and detention of Ms. Kremen to determine if, in the totality of those circumstances, her continued detention was justified and her consent to search was voluntary. Likewise, it does not appear that the trial court analyzed whether the statement authorizing the search of the vehicle should have been subject to Miranda [11] warnings. The court's findings on the consent issue consisted of: (1) a finding that the officer asked if he could search the Front compartment area; (2) a conclusion that the Defendant consented to this; (3) a footnote rejecting Ms. Kremen's contention that her consent was not voluntary because she was threatened with jail if she did not consent; and (4) a discussion of the appropriate scope of the search.