Opinion ID: 2324370
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Constitutional Significance of a Traffic Stop

Text: [¶ 8] A traffic stop of a motorist by a law enforcement officer is a seizure for purposes of the Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution and article I, section 5, of the Maine Constitution. Illinois v. Lidster, 540 U.S. 419, 425-26, 124 S.Ct. 885, 157 L.Ed.2d 843 (2004); State v. Hutchinson, 2009 ME 44, ¶ 18 n. 9, 969 A.2d 923, 928; State v. Brewer, 1999 ME 58, ¶ 12, 727 A.2d 352, 355. A seizure is unlawful if it is unreasonable. U.S. Const. amend. IV; Me. Const. art. I, § 5. In almost all circumstances, a warrantless seizure is unreasonable in the absence of an objectively reasonable, articulable suspicion that criminal conduct has taken place, is occurring, or imminently will occur. [2] State v. Donatelli, 2010 ME 43, ¶ 11, 995 A.2d 238, 241 (quotation marks omitted). However, the Supreme Court recognized in Brown that even in the absence of reasonable articulable suspicion, a seizure for information-seeking purposes may be reasonable if the gravity of the public concerns served by the seizure [and] the degree to which the seizure advances the public interest outweigh the severity of the interference with individual liberty. 443 U.S. at 50-51, 99 S.Ct. 2637. [¶ 9] Courts have applied the three-factor balancing test articulated in Brown to uphold the constitutionality of traffic stops in the absence of reasonable articulable suspicion. For example, in Lidster, a highway roadblock stop was deemed constitutionally sound in the absence of reasonable articulable suspicion when law enforcement conducted the roadblock to identify possible witnesses to a fatal hit-and-run accident, the roadblock was in the vicinity of where the accident occurred, and the officers stopped every approaching vehicle for only a brief time. 540 U.S. at 422, 427, 124 S.Ct. 885. We thus examine the reasonableness of the trooper's stop of LaPlante by evaluating (1) the gravity of the public concern in addressing a civil speeding infraction; (2) the degree to which the seizure of a motorist advances a speeding investigation; and (3) the severity of the interference with a motorist's constitutionally-protected liberty interest when that motorist is stopped for questioning by law enforcement.