Opinion ID: 854253
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Trooper Riefers

Text: Trooper Riefers also articulated several factors informing his suspicion that Bryant and Clark were engaging in criminal activity. For example, Bryant began exhibiting extreme signs of nervousness when asked if he was transporting anything illegal. Additionally, Bryant and Clark gave Trooper Riefers conflicting accounts of their travel plans. Clark told Trooper Riefers that they were headed to the Dallas/Fort Worth area while Bryant said they were traveling to see his uncle in North Carolina. Trooper Riefers also found the car rental agreement to be suspicious because the car was rented in the name of Clark’s girlfriend, who was not present, and Clark’s name was handwritten into the agreement despite a separate section indicating that there were no additional authorized drivers. Trooper Riefers also found it suspicious that Bryant and Clark were traveling along a known drug-trafficking corridor in a rental car, whose interior indicated “hard” travel based on the energy drinks, water bottles, and snack containers within it. The close proximity of the cars also heightened his suspicion that the two were traveling in tandem with at least one other vehicle, which is a common drug-trafficking tactic. Based on the totality of these facts, Trooper Riefers was justified in continuing the detention. See, e.g., Pack, 612 F.3d at 361–62 (finding extreme nervousness, irreconcilable stories, and the location of a stop on a highway frequently used by drug smugglers sufficient to establish reasonable suspicion justifying a prolonged detention); Brigham, 382 F.3d at 509 (finding a prolonged 12 Case: 11-11228 Document: 00512162491 Page: 13 Date Filed: 03/04/2013 No. 11-11228 detention reasonable based the defendant’s presentation of a fake I.D., his inconsistent explanation for his trip, his extreme nervousness, and the absence of the authorized driver listed on the car rental agreement). Bryant and Clark argue that the length of the detention was unreasonable because Trooper Riefers’s suspicion should have been dispelled after the half-hour consensual search yielded no results. Trooper Riefers testified, however, that his search provided information consistent with his earlier suspicion, namely, the lack of receipts for the energy drinks and snacks, the tampering of the area under the windshield, and the loose grommets and screws. It was also during this time that Trooper Riefers learned that the driver that Trooper Dollar pulled over was telling a similar travel story to Bryant. Based on these additional discoveries and cognizant that there is “no constitutional stopwatch on traffic stops,” Brigham, 382 F.3d at 511, we cannot say that Trooper Riefers did not diligently pursue a means of investigation that was likely to confirm or dispel his suspicion. As a result, the district court correctly determined that reasonable suspicion justified the prolonged detention.