Opinion ID: 3035323
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Willis’s Driving

Text: Early in the morning of December 19, 2002, Willis, an African-American male, was driving a car with Colorado license plates within the city limits of Las Vegas, Nevada. Officer Boehmer testified that he began to follow Willis in a marked patrol car after seeing him make a “rapid turn” from Hoover Avenue right onto Las Vegas Boulevard. Officer Boehmer testified at the hearing that three aspects of Willis’s driving warranted a stop for traffic violations — his “rapid turn” onto Las Vegas Boulevard, his accelerating and speeding after that turn, and his later U-turn on Hoover Avenue. I consider them in sequence.
Officer Boehmer testified that the “rapid turn” onto Las Vegas Boulevard from Hoover Avenue was “more excessive UNITED STATES v. WILLIS 16565 than it should have been,” and that he believed this turn violated the traffic laws. Officer Boehmer elaborated in an exchange with the magistrate judge: Q: What do you mean that the turn is more exces- sive than it should have been? A: Well, the speed is more excessive than I’d say operating speed would be. Q: All right. What is the traffic code violation? A: I don’t know, Your Honor. Q: No citation was issued in this case? A: No. Q: Do you have any idea what — I mean, is there — this was in the city of Las Vegas and would have been under the — either the state’s — A: It would have been — it would have been a municipal traffic code. Yes, Your Honor. Q: Okay. And you don’t know what the traffic code would be? A: No, Your Honor. I don’t really write too many tickets. Q: Okay. A: I just mostly do criminal investigations.
Officer Boehmer testified that after turning right onto Las Vegas Boulevard, Willis turned right onto Charleston Boule16566 UNITED STATES v. WILLIS vard, turned right onto Third Street, and finally turned right back onto Hoover Avenue. The distance on Las Vegas Boulevard between Hoover Avenue and Charleston (i.e., between Willis’s first and second turns) is one block. The distance on Charleston between Las Vegas Boulevard and Third Street (i.e., between his second and third turns) is two blocks. The distance on Third Street between Charleston and Hoover (i.e., between his third and fourth turns) is a block and a half. After his fourth right turn back onto Hoover, Willis parked his car on the south side of the street at or near the northwest corner of Third and Hoover. Willis traveled essentially in a circle, covering a total distance of somewhere between four-and-a- half and five blocks. On direct, Officer Boehmer testified that he was driving northbound on Fourth Street at the intersection of Fourth and Hoover when he first saw Willis. Officer Boehmer was one block away from Willis, who at that moment was making his “rapid” right turn from Hoover onto Las Vegas Boulevard. Officer Boehmer testified that he turned right onto Hoover toward Las Vegas Boulevard to follow Willis. Then, as Officer Boehmer turned right onto Las Vegas Boulevard from Hoover, he saw Willis — still one block ahead of him — turning right onto Charleston. Officer Boehmer testified, “I accelerated to attempt to catch up with the vehicle because it was apparent to me, with the distance he had gained, he had been accelerating. I then made a westbound turn onto Charleston, and at the time the vehicle was just beginning to make a turn onto northbound Third Street.” Boehmer testified that in his opinion Willis was trying to evade him. He said, “Just from my experience — my three years experience, in the past people trying to evade me, make rapid continuous turns like that.” On further questioning by the magistrate judge, Officer Boehmer reiterated his view that Willis’s right turn onto Las Vegas Boulevard had been a traffic violation. He also stated UNITED STATES v. WILLIS 16567 for the first time that, although he could not tell “exactly how fast” Willis was traveling, he was exceeding the speed limit: Q: [A]s you reached Hoover, to your right you looked and saw this white vehicle making a right turn from Hoover onto Las Vegas Boulevard south- bound? A: Yes. Yes, Your Honor. Q: A rapid turn? A: Yes, a rapid turn. Q: Was it a traffic violation in your judgment? A: It is. Basically the way he made his turn. Q: Is that what you thought at the time? A: Oh, definitely at the time, that’s why I contin- ued to follow him. And then once I made the turn and I observed how far he had gotten from me, the distance that he had gained, he wasn’t going the speed limit. I had, you know, no way to tell exactly how fast, but he wasn’t going the speed limit because I had to accelerate excessively to try to catch up with him. The magistrate judge sought to clarify the distances (and, by inference, the speeds) involved, asking if Officer Boehmer could see Willis after he turned onto Charleston from Las Vegas Boulevard, and then again after he turned onto Third from Charleston: Q: So you saw him make a right turn on Third [from Charleston]? 16568 UNITED STATES v. WILLIS A: Yes I did. Q: And then when you reached Third and made a right turn, do you recall where he was when you were able to see down Third Street? A: Yes. I believe he was already past Coolidge because I was saying — I remember saying to myself, man, this guy is driving so fa[s]t, you know it was almost to the point I was going to call out the vehicle pursuit, but I had no other description besides the white vehicle. The distance between Charleston and Third is a block and a half. Coolidge comes into Third at an angle, joining Third half a block up from Charleston. The magistrate judge contin- ued: Q: And then when you turned north on Third Street, he was already halfway between Coolidge and Hoover? A: Yes. Q: He must have been slowing down as he approached Hoover, correct? A: He did. Q: And he then made a right turn on Hoover? A: Yes. Q: Just around the corner practically — A: Yes. Q: — and parked — UNITED STATES v. WILLIS 16569 A: Yes. Q: On the south side of the street? A: Yes, Your Honor. When Willis parked his car, he was less than two blocks from where he had been when Officer Boehmer had first spotted him. He was now back on Hoover, pointed in the same direction he had been driving when he made his “rapid turn” from Hoover onto Las Vegas Boulevard. Officer Boehmer never testified as to the speed limit on the streets on which Willis traveled, or as to the exact speed Willis was traveling. He also made no attempt to explain how Willis had been able to exceed the speed limit when he never traveled more than two blocks in a straight line. Nor did Officer Boehmer attempt to reconcile his belief that Willis was trying to evade him with the fact that Willis had essentially driven in a four-and-a-half to five-block circle, coming back onto Hoover and then stopping voluntarily.
After parking his car on Hoover, Willis got out, “sprinted” (Officer Boehmer’s word) across the street to a nearby apartment, and banged on the door. He was admitted to the apartment and stayed for a short time. He then came out of the apartment, got into his car, and made a U-turn on Hoover. He crossed Third Street and stopped the car at the curb on Hoover in front of what we now know was his own apartment. Officer Boehmer testified that Willis’s U-turn on Hoover was illegal, but he cited no provision of any applicable traffic law. Nevada’s traffic laws provide that “[a] U-turn may be made on any road where the turn can be made with safety, except as prohibited by this section and by the provisions of N.R.S. 484.309 [driving on a divided highway] and 484.339 16570 UNITED STATES v. WILLIS [turning on a curve or crest/grade].” Nev. Rev. Stat. 484.337(1) (2002). U-turns may not be performed at stoplights that have signs prohibiting these turns. Id. at 484.337(2). Nor may they be performed in a business district unless at an intersection. Id. at 484.337(3). Las Vegas’s municipal traffic code provides, “The driver of any vehicle shall not turn such vehicle so as to proceed in the opposite direction upon any street in a business district and shall not upon any other street so turn a vehicle unless such movement can be made in safety and without interfering with other traffic.” Las Vegas Mun. Code 11.12.050 (2005). Nowhere in his testimony did Officer Boehmer state that Hoover Avenue at Third Street is in a business district. We know from Officer Boehmer’s testimony that there were residential apartments along Hoover at the point where Willis made his U-turn. Further, Officer Boehmer’s testimony indicates that there was no traffic on Hoover when Willis performed the U-turn. Finally, there is nothing in Officer Boehmer’s testimony to indicate that there was a stoplight or a sign prohibiting a U-turn, or that Willis’s U-turn was unsafe.
Officer Boehmer testified at the suppression hearing that he had no recollection of having mentioned any traffic violations to Willis during the course of the arrest, and that no traffic citation was ever issued to Willis. Officer Boehmer further testified that he did not mention Willis’s rapid accelerating and speeding in either of his two written reports prepared after the arrest. Officer Boehmer did mention Willis’s U-turn in his reports, but only as part of the narrative leading up to Willis’s voluntary stop in front of his own apartment. Officer Boehmer did not indicate anywhere in his two written reports that Willis’s U-turn was illegal. Indeed, there is nothing in either of Officer Boehmer’s two reports to indicate that Willis had violated the traffic laws in any manner, or that Officer Boehmer had stopped Willis for a traffic violation. UNITED STATES v. WILLIS 16571